For William Vandenkolk of Las Vegas, the answer is no. Sitting cross-legged in front of a big-screen TV, the 11-year-old squints through Coke-bottle glasses at a Miracle Crusade video made more than two years ago in which he starred as a boy who miraculously recovered from blindness. "I liked it at first because I thought I was being healed," says William in the living room of his aunt and uncle's home.
On the screen, Hinn bends down to William, his hands on the child's face. "Look at these tears," says Hinn, peering into the child's eyes. "William, baby, can you see me?"
Before more than 15,000 people in a Las Vegas arena, William nods. In a small voice, the boy says: "As soon as God healed me, I could see better." Hinn, an arm wrapped around William, tells the audience that God has told him to pay the child's medical expenses and education. People weep. Today William is still legally blind and says his sight never improved, and that his onstage comments were wishful thinking. "It's pretty sad when you mess with a little boy's mind," says Randy Melthratter, William's uncle and guardian. Melthratter says it took two years, a series of phone calls and a reporter's inquiry before his family was told where a $10,000 fund had been set up in William's name. Family members say they still haven't received any paperwork on how to access the money. For their part, ministry officials say they were told that William's sight improved initially and that Melthratter was kept fully apprised of his nephew's fund.
