Learn to speak and believe God’s word for your life

I was brought up on the Wirral in Cheshire, the youngest of four children. I had a happy childhood with loving parents and went to boarding school when I was eleven — I loved it there.

After school, I trained as an interior designer, then restored old china and porcelain, and even ran a cottage industry painting children’s furniture. One day someone asked: “Can you paint houses?” I said, “I don’t know, but I’ll try.” That led to years of painting people’s homes, and now I love sculpting.

Experiencing marriage and miracles 

I met my husband, Simon, at a party when I was 24. He was 25 — we took an instant liking to each other and married soon after. He’s a fabulous man, though we’re sadly divorced now. In his 20s, Simon got Hodgkin’s disease. He went through radiotherapy, chemotherapy and even an autologous bone marrow transplant, but each time the cancer returned, until doctors said there was nothing more they could do. A Christian friend of my father-in-law told us how he’d been miraculously healed by Jesus, saying: “God can do this for you too.”

We started attending a week-day Bible study and reading the Gospels; slowly we were coming to faith in Jesus. The healing stories sank deep. One day I simply reached out to Simon in bed and prayed that he’d be filled with the Holy Spirit and healed. He prayed too and began to quiver. Minutes later, he opened his eyes and said: “I felt an amazing peace and heat up and down my body.”

We were staying in Devon then. The next day in the little village church, out of the blue Simon felt to read Psalm 116:8-9: “For you, Lord, have delivered me from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before the Lord in the land of the living.” He knew it was for him. We praised God and continued to give thanks.

After that point his symptoms all left – the night sweats and pain. A month or two later he went for a check-up with the doctor, and he was given the all clear!

Soon after, we left London and rented a cottage in Wiltshire. We found a lively Anglican church where they trained us in praying for healing and sharing words of knowledge. I’d never seen church like that before.

I say: “Sickness and disease have no power over me — by his stripes I am healed.” I hardly ever get ill

One day, we were praying about buying a house. We had £200,000 to spend but Simon was fussy about what to buy. One day he said: “I feel like we need to go to the Cross Keys pub in a certain village — the landlord will know of something.” I thought it sounded ridiculous, but Simon went, and the landlord told him about two derelict cottages for sale nearby. I prayed: “Lord, if this is from you, let it be signed and sealed by 12 tomorrow.” I didn’t know buying a house normally takes months! But by noon the next day, the sale was agreed — £130,000, leaving exactly £70,000 to do it up. I still live in that house; it’s very special to me.

Finding our family

After Simon’s miraculous healing, I developed a benign brain tumour on my pituitary gland, which messed up our chances of having children. I’d been through years of failed IVF, not knowing the tumour was the cause. I prayed: “Lord, should I keep going

with IVF, or adopt?” I then had to rush into town and bumped into Patsy, a Christian friend from church. She asked how I was, and I burst into tears. She said she felt: “The Lord is preparing a baby for you — from a long way away.”

This was in 1993 and, a week later, we got a phone call at 7am. A Russian family we knew asked if we’d like to adopt a baby, in three weeks’ time! It turned out Lara’s birth mother was a Christian who had refused an abortion and prayed God would find her baby a happy home. Three days before she gave birth, we were connected through our Russian friends. When Lara’s birth mother came to England, I gave her a Russian Bible — she’d never had one before.

I eventually had the tumour removed through three operations over ten years. 

Even though I loved having Lara, we didn’t try to adopt another child straight away because my health was still quite poor. After seven years I still wasn’t feeling great, but we knew we wanted another child. There were no adoption agencies in the UK to adopt from Russia at the time, and we wanted to go back to Russia to give a baby from an orphanage a chance at life, rather than adopting a newborn in England. So, we went through an American adoption agency and met with them in London. They liked us, we liked them, and they matched us with a baby boy named Vladislav from a city called Bryansk, six hours south of Moscow.

We went to meet Vlad, and we fell in love with him immediately, but we couldn’t bring him home yet because our paperwork wasn’t complete. We travelled back to the UK to finish it all, then returned three months later when he was 13 months old and brought him home. He was tiny, only 13 pounds, severely undernourished and suffering from rickets. But the doctor reassured us that a good diet would sort it out. His knees were swollen then, but they’re perfect now. That’s Vlad — and he’s now 24!

God’s word at work

Through all my health battles, I’ve learned to speak God’s word aloud every day. I say: “Sickness and disease have no power over me — by his stripes I am healed.” I hardly ever get ill.

More recently, I had an ECG that showed a condition called ‘left bundle branch block’, plus two other heart issues I didn’t even know about. My friend Sarah from church prayed with me and said: “I see Jesus standing there with a new heart for you.” I believed it, brought my MRI scan forward by nearly a year, and the consultant said both conditions had completely cleared. At first, he told me I still needed the medication, but when I asked again, he said: “Actually, you can come off it.”

Sadly, Simon and I separated after 36 years of marriage. I’d developed an unhealthy relationship with alcohol to cope with anxiety.  I drank socially, never alone, but it was too much. I even went through rehab. Our marriage was struggling, and one evening I ended up in the humiliating position of having to be taken home drunk from a party. 

We divorced two years ago. Simon has since re-married someone else. Time and God’s grace have healed so much; now I just can’t be bothered to carry bitterness. God has truly carried me through the heartbreak. His word says he is close to the broken-hearted (Psalm 34:18), and I’ve felt that deeply. Every day I spend time with God. I read my daily Bible notes and pray for my family — even Simon. I believe it’s essential to speak the word aloud, so each day I confess key verses over my life: “By his wounds [I am] healed” (Isaiah 53:5), “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God” (Philippians 4:6-7) and “For the Spirit God gave [me] does not make [me] timid, but gives [me] power, love and self-discipline” (2 Timothy 1:7).

It’s amazing how God has used my own story to encourage others too. I help run healing meetings at our church, where we’ve seen many people healed through prayer and the laying on of hands. 

Life hasn’t been perfect. There’s been sickness, infertility, heartbreak and loss. But I’ve learned that nothing is wasted when you put your hope in God’s word. His promises are alive and active, and so is he.

Our Life Lessons series is comprised of interviews with women aged 70 and over. If you know someone who has something to share, get in touch! womanalive@premier.org.uk

Words by Jemimah Wrigh