What happens when you don't take "no" for an answer!

​Today’s story is so inspiring and convicting, I cannot stop thinking about it!  I was speaking to my friend who lost her husband two weeks ago this week, and she was praising God for all the miracles they’d seen in this situation.  What an attitude!  Her husband was killed instantly, and their daughter was critically injured and is still in the hospital, and she is thanking God for all He has done.  She was telling me that their daughter’s seat belt basically cut her in two, crushing her abdomen and resulting in her losing a significant portion of her intestines, both large and small.  She was on a ventilator for days and really had a bleak prognosis.
At one point in this situation, their daughter’s husband was told that they were going to have to amputate one of her legs because there was no blood flow getting to it.  He instantly says, “No – give me two hours.”  They agree to wait two hours, and he goes to the chapel in the hospital and prays for two hours for his wife and her leg.  He returns and the blood flow has gone down her leg to her knee.  The doctors say, “Okay, then we will only have to amputate from the knee down.”  He says, “No – give me two more hours.”  He returns back to the chapel and prays another two hours.  Upon his return, the blood flow has reached her foot.  I’m telling you, I can hardly type this without wanting to jump and shout! 
They tell him, “Okay, now we will just have to amputate her foot.”  He says, “No – give me two more hours.”  Now, this man has spent four hours already on his knees in this chapel.  He returns back to his “closet,” and he storms the throne of heaven once more.  When he returns, the blood flow has gone into her foot to everything but the big toe.  They began to talk about amputating the toe, and at that point, having prayed six hours, he agreed that she could live without her toe.  And to the best of my knowledge, that toe has not been removed so far!  She is doing well and was up in a chair yesterday – praise God!
What do you do when you get bad news?  We get on the phone and we tell someone else – we share our misery.  What do we do when we get bad news in the hospital?  We sit with those that are with us and we share the misery.  Oh, yes, sometimes we whisper a prayer…but how many of us have stopped EVERYTHING and gotten on our knees for uninterrupted nonceasing prayer?  I have never prayed two hours at a time, uninterrupted, in my life.  Why?  Why haven’t I?  I’m too busy.  I’m always multitasking when I pray.  Shame on me, shame on us!  Do we spend two hours watching TV or looking on Facebook?  Of course.  And yet people are dying all around us, their very lives are being amputated by drugs and by hatred and by sin.  And we sit and wring our hands.
I called my friend this week to check on her and to offer my assistance, and she gives me reason to praise, reason to repent, reason to CHANGE MY WAYS by her praise and her son-in-law’s faithfulness!  This reminds me, again, of the movie War Room, which if you haven’t seen, please get it and rent it as soon as it comes out.  Phenomenal movie, and an illustration of how the REAL work of the Lord gets done.  It’s prayer!  I speak on miracles to churches and women’s groups sometimes, and one of the main scriptures I use is the one where Mary is trying to talk Jesus into changing the water into wine.  His first miracle.  And he is resistant.  “Mom, stop, it’s not my time.”  “But they need it, and I know you can provide it.”  “Mom, no, I’m not doing this.”  Eventually she wears him down.  Was that God-inspired?  Did God tell her to nudge him into stepping into what He was capable of?  Who knows?  What we do know is that at first he said he wasn’t doing it, and her persistence paid off and He changed His mind.  I do believe in the will of God – absolutely – but I also believe that what might have been the will of God at one time can be changed by the POWER OF PRAYER!  Multiple examples in the Old Testament and the New Testament where God’s people begged for mercy, begged for a different plan, and He granted it.
I know for me, this story has been so convicting, has shamed me to my core, and I WILL be doing things in my life differently.  I will not be taking my problems to other people to “vent;” instead, I will be taking them to the Lord in UNINTERRUPTED prayer, without multitasking, because those other things can wait.  What miracle do you need today?  I encourage you, find a closet, a quiet place (even go sit in your car) and reach out to the Lord.  He WILL BE found.  Praise His Name!