Episode Transcript
Speaker A
00:00:00 - 00:09:42
It is all too often said that there are no miracles performed these days. Well, I'd like to challenge this idea with my story of a miraculous healing. Welcome to Miracles in the 21st Century. I'm Andrew Russell. I'd like to tell you the story about my friend Nabeel, my friend and church member. I'm the pastor of the Hoxton Park Seventh-day Adventist Church And one day I got a phone call from Nabeel. Nabeel rang me quite distraught over the phone, very upset, asking me to come for an immediate visit with his father. He asked me to come and anoint his father because his father was in hospital and the doctors had given him a very bleak diagnosis and the anticipation was that he might pass away soon. You see, Nabeel's father had failing kidneys and he only had 3% of his kidneys left. There was no more dialysis available to him and it had been that way for quite a while. And now he was in agonizing pain on the hospital bed. The family had gathered around him and the anticipation was that he wouldn't last much longer. Well, I promised Nabeel that I would come and that I would come hastily. I prayed before I went. I said, God, my friend Nabeel, Elder Nabeel from the Hoxton Park Church, is asking me to come and in some way he's hoping for a healing or some miraculous intervention on his behalf. But I recognized that I have no power of my own. I recognized that I am not the healing agent in these things and in these situations. And so I recall kneeling down before my armchair, bowing my head and really calling upon God, and I asked God to be with me as I went. And in humility, I asked God to work on behalf of this family well before I got there. I asked God to already go ahead of me. I asked him to send his presence as represented by the Holy Spirit and also the holy angels to go ahead of me and to begin to bring comfort to the family in their dire situation. I really didn't know what to expect, but by the time I arose off my knees, God had given me every assurance that he was with me, and that was all that I was asking for. I arrived at the hospital and made my way eventually to the room, the hospital room that Nabeel's father was kept. I entered and saw the family. surrounding his bed. There was much tears. It was a very confronting situation, and I think what was particularly challenging for Nabeel was that his father had all of a sudden deteriorated so rapidly that he didn't feel that he had the opportunity to even say goodbye to his father. I saw his father lying there in writhing pain, I saw that he was not in his right mind and I could tell that the situation was quite desperate. I then, after greeting the family, began to talk about the nature of my visit, the nature of my coming as per the family request, and also that I believed that there was a God in heaven that hears the prayers of His faithful saints. I proceeded to talk about how we're going to call upon God and in so doing we wanted to ensure that we had a right standing before God ourselves as we asked for Him to intervene on this occasion. And so we did, we bowed our heads together and I began to pray, asked God according to His grace and His election to wash us clean of our sins and give us a right standing before him. And I claimed the promise that we could come boldly to his throne of grace to find help in our time of need, Hebrews 4:15. And so we did, and then I began to then pray for this man. I had never met him before, I just knew that he was Nabeel's father. But I began to pray and ask God According to His love, His care, and according to His divine wisdom that He intervene as He saw fit on behalf of this man. We prayed for his healing, but we recognized that God has a greater perspective than what we do at times. So we trusted in God's wisdom, but we prayed for his healing nonetheless. Well, the amazing thing was that as soon as I said amen and finished the prayer, and as I looked up and began to look at Nabeel's father again, I noticed that there seemed to come a sense of ease and a calm began to take over him. And in just a matter of minutes, the pain seemed to subside. And all of a sudden this man began to come into his right mind. This man was also, according to Nabeel, he was consigned to a wheelchair for the last 6 to 12 months. He couldn't walk. His health had deteriorated that much. But after the prayer, I began to engage with him. He was of Middle Eastern origin. He had a thick accent, and we could just understand one another. But as I asked him certain questions, he began to respond. And Nabeel then introduced me as his pastor. And so it was quite incredible just to see the change that immediately took place. And to the point where we even had a little chuckle together with a humorous anecdote. And I could see that the family was comforted, especially Nabeel, because he was able to connect and communicate with his father when he had considered that he might not necessarily have that opportunity again. The wonderful thing is that after I left there and went home, Nabeel later reported that his father had made such a recovery to the extent that the next morning he was actually walking around in the hospital room. Well, the doctors actually dismissed him not long after and he was allowed to go home back to his family. He spent the next 12 months with his family. There was no miraculous healing in terms of his kidney function, but God certainly restored him to health and dignity long enough so that the family could actually enjoy their time with him, make the necessary preparations concerning him, and then also give him a final farewell. And Nabeel always reminds me of what took place in that hospital that day. He said, we had gathered to say goodbye, The doctors had called us in, but after that prayer, my father began to instantly respond to the prayer of faith, instantly respond to the grace of God working on behalf of this family. God really loves us, brothers and sisters. He has various ways of working with us, of answering our prayers. The Bible says the prayer of the righteous availeth much. This is just one instance of how God divinely intervened and there was an immediate response, and yeah, an immediate response to that prayer. And I was so thankful. Nabeel was so reassured and he was so glad that he could say farewell to his father in the most graceful way. His father died with dignity, he said, and they were truly comforted by what God had performed on their behalf. So remember, friends, put your trust in God. Remember that God still does miracles today. It may not always be a healing. It may be the miracle of a renewed heart. It may be the miracle of divine counsel and wisdom. It may be the miracle of divine intervention so that the right people come into your life at the right time. The miracles are still there today for you and me, and I could tell you so many more, but I'm going to leave you with what God did on behalf of my friend Nabeel and his family according to their prayer of faith. God bless you, and perhaps we'll have time to share another miracle again.
