Give It to God

Have you ever attended church only to have the sermon begin with an apology? And then been told that the prepared message would not be given because you were in the congregation? That recently happened to my husband and me.

Let me explain. It had been almost nine years since we had been at that church. The speaker, our friend David, went on to say that the last time he had seen us was at the airport the day after my husband had retired, and we were flying to Florida, USA. David suffered from heart disease, and his only hope for life was a heart transplant.

He was on his way to Boston, Massachusetts, USA. for a second opinion. My husband prayed for him while I silently asked God to give me something encouraging to share with our friend. I told him I had recently been informed that the heart murmur I had lived with since my teen years had now cleared up. It was gone. David shared how our prayers and encouragement had given him hope. He was no longer afraid of his death-sentence diagnosis. He knew God would heal him. He testified he was able to give it completely to God and wanted us to know what had transpired in the intervening years. The report from Boston confirmed the original diagnosis, and though he did not understand, he trusted that somehow God would work it out. He and his wife prayed for guidance, and through a series of amazing events, he was scheduled for a heart transplant in less than six months—not the typical two-year wait.

After the surgery he was able to communicate with the surgical staff and asked them to extubate him because the machines were causing damage to the healing process his body was trying to do. Perhaps because he is a doctor, they did what he asked. Only five days late he was discharged with his new, God-given heart. David read the following quote: “The same compassionate Saviour lives today, and He is as willing to listen to the prayer of faith as when He walked visibly among men. . . . It is a part of God’s plan to grant us, in answer to the prayer of faith, that which He would not bestow did we not thus ask.”* You may be the one who needs hope or encouragement today—or you may be the one to offer encouragement. Whatever the situation, look for the door God wants to open for you.

Rita Kay Stevens

* Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy (Mountain View, CA: Pacific Press®, 1911), 525.