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Deputies: Cancer ‘Miracle’ Was A Huge Lie; Church Reacts To News
April 8, 2011
She stood in front of the congregation at Highland Baptist Church in Molino with a handwritten sign on a piece of cardboard, claiming a miracle. But it was, Sheriff’s investigators say, one huge lie.
“Cancer had my body for 6 years,” was written on the cardboard testimony held by Sonja Luker of Molino during a special service at Highland Baptist last November. “But God had my (heart) and gave me my miracle.”
“She never had cancer,” Deputy Chris Welborn, spokesperson for the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office, said.
Her church cardboard testimony was not the first time Luker claimed a divine miracle. She claimed in a 2009 NorthEscambia.com interview to have been diagnosed with cancer when her son was a senior in high school — five year prior to the interview.
“All I did was pray for God to let me see my children graduate,” she said. “I got my miracle.”
Luker said she had been told to prepare for the end because chemotherapy and radiation were unable to destroy all of the cancer cells attacking her body. She said she began to wonder how she will tell her children that she would not live long enough to see them marry, how she would tell her parents that she would probably die before them.
Her claims to battle cancer whole volunteering with the Molino Ballpark, the Molino Christmas Parade, Relay for Life and even Special Olympics led to NorthEscambia.com naming her one of the North Escambia Persons of the Year for 2009.
But all of her claims made in interviews with NorthEscambia.com and The Atmore Advance were lies, according to investigators. Stories from both news organizations are among the more than four dozen pieces of evidence that the Sheriff’s Office says prove Sonja Luker’s lies about cancer.
The news has hit the communities in the North Escambia area hard, including the congregation at her church, Highland Baptist, where church leaders and members would often pray for Luker and encourage people to attend her fundraisers.
“We are deeply troubled by the recent events surrounding Chris and Sonja Luker,” Highland Pastor Brian Calhoun said. “As members of our church, we have tried to love, care, pray for and minister to them in the love of Jesus.”
“In the end, the truth is what anyone would desire. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Lukers,” Calhoun stated, citing a Bible verse. “In John 8:32, Jesus said, ‘And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free’.”
Comments
23 Responses to “Deputies: Cancer ‘Miracle’ Was A Huge Lie; Church Reacts To News”
I agree w/ jp and I wish everyone would let God handle this….As he has stated “Judge ye not lest ye be judged”, but remember also that vengence belongs to him and he will be God. JP lost his dad to pancreatic cancer and was there when he drew his last breath, yet he chooses to forgive. Please, our country, state. county, city etc. is in such an evil state. Let us show we know God’s love by letting him be God and we accept his grace. I praise him for his mercy and grace because I KNOW I DO NOT DESERVE EITHER!! GOD BLESS!!
JP must go to the same church as Chris and Sonya
I sincerely hope the HEAVENY FATHER is pleased with the way the community
has responded to this deception. Else we shall share the same pew with Chris
and Sonja at the final judgement.
They ought to be ashamed of themselves even the more to include God in this atrocious & wicked act of deception!
WOW, that about all I can say, they are just SICK!
whitepunknotonpap….”But God DIDN’T strike HER down and that should give you something to think long and hard about. Hmmm.”
Yep! Shore does: The Mercy and LONGSUFFERING of God for all sinners. Even you and I.
He can and will completely change their hearts and turn their lives around if they truly repent and call on Him. They do not even have to get good enough first. But they must be TRULY sorry. And, they cannot fool God. He sees their hearts.
When I saw myself for the lost sinner I really was (in all my “goodness”), it broke my heart. I cried until I couldn’t, when I found myself in the Presence of a loving and HOLY God.. I knew then what The Word meant that says that all our (own) righteousness is as filthy rags. He is real, and He is VERY AWESOME. These folks need to really meet Him. He will forgive them if they repent, but WILL WE?!
Well….I must say my family did not give her a dime!! For some reason I had a spirit that what she was doing was fraud.
“If that was me i would be terrified that God would strike me down dead or one of my children.”
“I would be terrified to hold that sign up. I would be terrified that God would drop me dead right then or even my kids.”
But God DIDN’T strike HER down and that should give you something to think long and hard about. Hmmm……
This just goes to show you how profound our sin problem is. There are no depths to which we (as sinful beings) are not capable of lowering ourselves. Jesus (God the Son) is our only hope!
This is also a good example of how one lie leads to many lies. Once Sonja Luker decided to deceive others she had to keep up the swindle. If you were a member of a church that had such a woman in it (one you thought had been cured of cancer), would you not think that your church family would encourage (or pressure?) such a woman to join in with the testimonials? And so when you lie to others you are driven to lie again. Sometimes by circumstance.
Oh, that we could be honest with ourselves and others!
wolves in sheep clothing will always try to defame the blessing of the lord,so don’t let this stop you from helping someone that is in need of help because all good and perfect gifts come from GOD,HE will expose them,next we have a civil duty to serve on a jury that our time to let these demons we win in the end……
I would be terrified to hold that sign up. I would be terrified that God would drop me dead right then or even my kids. I hate to see the day that she is going to walk into those pearly gates.
I have to add my two cents in to this foray as well…I resent the situation created by the Lukers. In my opinion they have slapped the face of every cancer survivor. They have disgraced the memory of every cancer patient that has passed away from this horribel disease. I am a member of HBC where I witnessed Sonia Luker giving her testimony at our Community Thanksgiving service last year. She stood in the pulpit on another occasion and gave her “testimony” about how God delivered her from this disease. How could she have done this horrible thing to her community, friends, and church? Simple..we wanted to believe in the miracle that God heals and that he chose to heal her from her affliction. However, we were duped by an exceptionally convincing actor and actress. This is funny in its own way, but yet it is sad because we will be more reluctant to give to those who are truly in need.
You know her standing in front of that church like that holdin that sign amazes me. If that was me i would be terrified that God would strike me down dead or one of my children. She obviously didnt care about that. How in the world can you in the house of God period ,yet alone lie in the house of God about dying from cancer.If she gets out of it. I hope and pray that the town people and all the voluteers and her family they just shun her off. I would want nothing at all to do with any of they.I would really hate to be both of them when those Pearly Gates open.
Whitpunknotondope,
You are really bitter towards Christianity, aren’t you? It seems that you miss no opportunity to bring some fallen minister/ministry or whoever that claims The Name. Can you not see that there are rotten apples in almost every basket? Why do you pick on Christians? Maybe for the same reason I do not call myself one anymore. I am sick of all that too. But, The Bible said that this would happen. It is a fulfillment of prophecy. I now call my self a believer in and follower of Christ. I am not perfect yet, but His perfection was imputed to me when He said, “It is finished.” I bet you are one that does not believe, because of the wrong you see in the church. Well, why don’t you be part of the solution? I hate religion, and Christianity, for the most part, has become another religion. There are some true believers being raised up and called by God to do what He said, and will be used to bring The Kingdom to earth, which was what He told his followers to go and preach. It will happen when those do Romans 12:1 and submit to His authority, to be changed by Him. Why don’t you ask Him if you can be one of them, so you can stop the nonsense you hate so much. The chosen hate it too.
She’s no different than Tammy Fae and Jimmy Swaggert. Selling a product to people who will pay for it.
May the power of Christ compel them to make things right again. The community has been deeply hurt by this. Most people are generaly kind hearted and like to give and help their fellow man. do not let these two people, and those who assisted them, change all of that. there is still a lot of good to be done in the community. Don’t give up because of a few fakes who took advantage of us. I say us, because I gave and supported too!
EMD, i can tell you why..because both of them are greedy scumbags…if there is a god both of these morons will come down with a case of the worst cancer there is and noone will have to worry about them anymore….i suggest you people run them out of town on a rail after they are given probation…just don’t run up to alabama…we don’t want them either..
This just makes me pure sick!! Your judgement day will come…trust me!!
I just want to know; WHY??? Can they, the Lukers, honestly tell us, WHY?
Shame, shame, shame.
We all need to pray for this couple instead of running them down. God is in control of everything.
Also, in the same great book it states “You will always reap what you sow”
Very sad day when folks take advantage of Chuch going folk!
This is just awful.. Just imagine what it’s going to be like for others to trust those who REALLY and HONESTLY have cancer!