Raised From the Dead

As an LPN working in the critical care unit at a local hospital, I was in the final hour of a twelve-hour shift when I entered my last patient’s room. A "Do Not Resuscitate" sign was posted at the door. I had met several of her family members the evening before and appreciated their love for her.

Looking at the cardiac monitor I saw her heart rate decrease to zero. I listened to her heart and lungs for life-signs. There were none. Stepping out, I asked the unit secretary to call her family members in from the waiting room.

Back at her bedside I leaned over, placed my hand on her chest and spoke quietly to her lifeless form, "Your family is coming in and you know they would like to be with you to say goodbye." Gazing at the monitor, I watched her heart rhythm begin slowly. I laid my stethoscope on her chest and listened to her faint heartbeat while my own raced.

She was alive! And she lived long enough for her family to gather at her bedside and say goodbye to her.

Do such resurrections occur today? Yes. I am a witness. God on His throne reached down and used a young Christian to touch the soul of a dying woman.

Life is a precious gift. I know the Person who gives this gift. Do you know Him?

"Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows" (James 1:17 NIV).

In Christian Love,

Berta

New Life

Hospitalized after a serious injury I developed pneumonia. A culture of my secretions grew out MRSA (mer-sa) and the nurses moved me to an isolation room. My doctors said that if I lived I would have brain damage, be bedridden, and ventilator dependent. They told my husband that he was too young to be stuck with an invalid wife and they offered to let me die—comfortably, of course. My husband, remembering his wedding vows, chose life for me, and had me transferred to a rehabilitation hospital in Atlanta, GA.

As spring arrived, I had a birds-eye view of treetops outside my second floor isolation room window. Spring had always been my favorite season and I watched tender red shoots and buds appear on tiny limbs, followed by the smallest pairs of green leaves. Those signs of new life brought me comfort and encouragement.

However, one tree didn’t grow new branches or buds. Each day it was the same ash gray color and I decided that it was dead. I told everyone who came to see me that I wished someone would cut it down so I wouldn’t have to look at it.

Then one sunny morning I saw tiny pairs of green leaves on that dead tree. I began to weep as I realize what I’d been saying about that tree was what the doctors had said about me. I knew then God was with me, telling me my life wasn’t over.

“To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven” (Ecclesiastes 3:1 NKJV).

In Christ Alone,
Berta