Sunday, January 27, 2019 -
Last night, “K” came into my cell. It took him a few minutes until he was finally able to ask what he wanted, though.
He had just found out that he was scheduled for surgery on Monday, and he wanted me to pray for him. He wasn’t sure which surgery he was having, as he’d been cleared for three different surgeries that the government said they’d pay for. Either hernia surgery, a hip replacement, and the third I can’t recall. He’s only 51 years old! So I prayed for him right then and later again at our 9 pm prayer meeting. The worst part of it, I told him, was that Kathie was in the hospital having surgery and I was waiting for her to come out of recovery when I felt so bad I’d taken the elevator down to the emergency room, where they’d pushed me into surgery to remove the hernia.
Kathie came out of recovery wondering where in the world I was.
I don’t recall how we both made it home, but someone else would have had to have come to get us. We were both in so very much pain, and recovered in bed together, groaning and moaning together, trying to avoid touching each other in the wrong places! It was quite a sight!
Today I was scheduled for work at 9 am, which meant I had to go and sit in the chow hall until 10:30, when I could go back and wait in my unit for Kathie, Josiah, and William to come for a visit. One of the windows looks out at the parking lot, and I saw them arrive and walk inside at 10:45. Yet I had to wait until 11:30 to see them! The visit, ending at 3 pm, went by way too quickly! It is so very hard, especially for Kathie, to leave me behind, and seeing her leave without me! Each time it doesn’t get any easier.
Josiah is our child who was miraculously healed as a baby – still crawling. Kathie had been using the Vitamix to fix soup, and had just poured boiling potato soup into the machine, turned her back without replacing the top when Josiah crawled onto the stool. He reached up and hit the lever that turned the machine on. Since the top wasn’t on, the boiling mixture shot out, landing on Josiah’s face and head.
We rushed him to the hospital and the doctor immediately sent him over to the severe burn unit at the University of Virginia Hospital. He was burned so badly, strangers in the corridor would glance and then turn and look the opposite way, finding him repulsive. It was so scary. Kathie put a cool cloth over his face and when she took it off, part of his little nose came with it, and part of his eyelid! She thought later that we would have the only bald kid in kindergarten! The doctor at UVA told us he’d probably need a minimum of five surgeries and skin grafts.
When we left the hospital to go home, Victoria, then about seven years old, perked up and said, “Why don’t we stop at Advancing Native Missions so they can pray for Josiah?” And that’s what we did.
Over the next five days, we would walk out of the room and walk back in, and each time his burns looked a little better. It was visibly healing before our eyes! His first follow-up with the team of surgeons was scheduled for exactly one week later.
When the five doctors walked into the room where we were waiting, they stood together, looked at their paperwork and charts, glanced up, mumble things together, glance back at their papers, and then at us, and finally said, “Is this Josiah?”
We, of course, said yes, and one of them said, “It can’t be!” one or two of them affirmed that it was impossible this could be somebody that was there a week ago, and finally one asked, “But what did you do for him?” Kathie quickly chimed up, “We had him prayed for and anointed with oil.” They all stood there awestruck, except for one of the doctors who had a huge smile on his face! One of them spoke up and said, “Well, whatever it is, keep it up because it’s working!” Josiah ended up having no surgeries – no scars, no disfigurement as predicted, and a head full of black hair!
A few years later, though, all three children (at that time) went to the ceremony for new citizens in Northern Virginia. One of the young Russian kids had chickenpox, and Josiah came down with a bad case of it not long afterward, which left a little scar on the tip of his nose – a permanent reminder of God’s miraculous healing power! Now our family is remembering all the miracles God has done in our life, expecting Him to heal Kathie of the pain in her mouth from a damaged nerve from an implant procedure that has been agonizing her for more than five years, and the complications that come along with that. We know, from personal experience, that God can and will heal her in His timing. Please pray for her healing!
Tonight, as I was writing this, “C” came to me, alarmed from reading about the end times in a book by David Jeremiah. He sees that we are close to the end times predicted in Scripture, yet doesn’t fear for himself, but for his family. He has asked, and Kathie has agreed, for her to contact his sister. He knows nobody else can tell her about Jesus. Pray for Kathie as she does this, and for “C’s” sister, who lives in Indianapolis. I spent a long time with “C” tonight, as he told me about his family, and his past, including the story where, when he was most recently arrested, would have had a shoot-out with the police rather than being taken – but lacked the ammunition. He now looks back and realizes it was all part of God’s plan to bring him to prison so he would meet the Lord while here. I am convinced, and I believe Chris can see it now as well, that God can use his life in a mighty way when he gets out of prison in 2028. Pray for “C!” I’ve suggested he read the biography of David Yon Moe, Never Say Die by Douglas Hsu to see what God can do through a former drug addict like “C.”
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