Episode Transcript
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. From near Death to Full Life. Welcome to miracles in the 21st century. I'm Edwin M Cotto of the Advent Defense League. I was feeling quite suspicious one time, I recall, back at about 2000, towards the end of 2018, around there, if I recall correctly, sitting next to an individual on an airplane flight who was coughing quite a bit. Everybody during that time had their masks on because we were undergoing the situation of COVID But this individual just kind of kept coughing away. And I was hoping that he just had a. Maybe an allergy or some minor cold. But as it turns out, and time went by, it ended up that he had Covid. And I caught it from him. Now, nobody in my family expected for us to get Covid. You know, you hear this on the news and you don't think it's ever going to come to your family or that you're going to get sick until the day it finally arrives. Now, recall when I told my wife I was diagnosed by the doctor. I had to hide myself in the room. My bedroom door closed. My wife would have to bring the food to me. And she was pregnant at that time, so it was quite difficult. She would use the Lysol all the time, clean everything, bring me my food. I would have to drop it off at the door, close the door, she would take it back. For about the first few days, I would say maybe four or five days, All I felt was weaknesses. I didn't think anything of it. But for precaution, because my wife was pregnant at that time, I figured I'd just stay inside the room. As time went by, the symptoms got worse and started feeling lightheaded and quite sick. I recall to the point where in some cases, I felt very short of breath. And as I had conversations with physicians over the phone about what I was going through, it was determined I should probably go visit the hospital. I recall when I went to the hospital and I got there, it was a line of people waiting to speak to the registration. But I was so out of breath that I cut the whole line and went to the front and sort of threw myself on top of the table with very short breath. They went ahead and got a wheelchair, wheeled me to the back, did an arterial blood gas test, a couple of other tests, and determined that I was suffering from pneumonia. Well, because it wasn't such a huge deal, or I should say it wasn't a big. A huge case of Pneumonia. They sent me back home with some medications to deal with some stomach issues, which I really wasn't going through well. The pneumonia kept spreading and my breathing kept getting worse, and I had no medications for it. And as time went by, at about a week and some days into the situation, I found myself with less ability to breathe. The only relief I had was to kind of sneak out my window and walk into an area that I called my wilderness. I now call it my wilderness experience. It's an area back where I live, a bit further out from my property, where it's just woods and trees. And I would kind of go in there by myself and I would talk to God and I would ask the Lord to answer me and to make me feel like he's going to answer my prayers and help me to overcome this sickness. And I truly felt like I was going to die. I couldn't hardly breathe in many cases. But I would leave and go back into my bedroom and kind of lay down on my bed. And I just kept getting weaker, kept getting weaker and weaker. And with as much strength as I could muster, I would continually leave through the window of my home, my room, and go into my wooden experience. And I would kneel down there on the grass, and I would pray to God that He would answer my prayer and give me some sign, speak something into my ears, perhaps show me something that I know that I can confirm that he was listening to me. I'm not sure if you've ever felt that way, as if God was not listening to you or he wasn't there with you in some of the most trying moments of your life. But that's how I felt. To make a long story short, I recall the moment when I was back on top of my bed, laying on my back. And the amount of weakness I felt at that time was more than ever before. And it was to the point where I wasn't answering any more phone calls, because I didn't have the strength even to pick up my phone and push the button to answer the phone calls. I couldn't text. It was a very scary experience. But for some reason, I answered a phone call that came in at the moment. Now, prior to that, I had pleaded with the Lord. I said, God, take this sickness from me, because I love youe Word and I want to preach youh Word. If youf would ask so much as. Just grant me one more opportunity to preach youh Word, one more chance to tell other people the gospel and about Jesus. Well, the moment I had that prayer, thinking I was Going to take my last breath. I did not tell my wife how I felt. She didn't know the gravity of the situation. I didn't want to scare her. But at that very moment, once I uttered those words, I received that phone call. Now, I wasn't answering phone calls, but for some reason, I answered this one. It was on my chest. I looked at it briefly, pushed one button, and it was on speaker. On the other line was a gentleman calling out my name. And in my weakness, with the most that I can bear. I told him that I couldn't speak and I was going to hang up. And he said, don't hang up, Edwin, because I'm calling you. I wanted to make a request. I said, I cannot help you. I'm very sick. I have to let you go. And he says, well, you got to get better, because I'm calling because I'm a pastor of a church, and I want to invite you to preach at my church. It was at that moment when I realized, just as I uttered that request of God to give me another opportunity to pray, to preach, God had sent somebody to confirm that that's exactly what he wanted me to do. And it told me that I was going to overcome the sickness. Well, ultimately, I got better. And I ended up preaching at that church a few weeks afterwards, once I recovered from a lot of the weaknesses I was dealing with in sickness. And I made an appeal when I preached that sermon where many people. I believe, if I'm not mistaken, everyone in that church had made a decision for Christ. It's a wonderful experience, but I'll close with this. A few months after that, my father ended up getting Covid. His situation was worse. He got double pneumonia on both sides, and he was to the point where he was almost in and out of consciousness. At some point, I was told that they had to give him CPR while he was in the hospital. It was quite scary. And since I couldn't travel during that time, I was on the phone dealing with the nurses and dealing with the doctors. Since I had worked in the medical field for a while, I had some experience in this. Plus, I went through Covid, so I know what that was. So I daringly gave advice to the doctors on how to treat my father. They were considerate enough to, at minimum, hear what I had to say. They were very great. But one doctor had told my dad that there's nothing else they can do except to insert tubes down his throat so that he can just kind of be on that. And he was very scared, and he started texting me, telling me what was going to happen. And I prayed to God and I asked the elders of my church to pray and others to not allow this to happen to him. Well, by God's grace, that particular doctor had left to work elsewhere and a new doctor came and took over. And my dad tells me that the doctor tapped him on the shoulder and said, you're going to be alright. We're not going to intubate you. You know, at one point, my dad started texting me and texting a lot of people, saying, don't think I'm going to make it. I'm sorry if I've done anything to offend you. He's making things right with people. And. And my dad's a minister, so he believed in God, but he felt like he just wasn't going to make it at that time. And one night he tells me this story later. One night he had a dream. And as he was dreaming, he says he was walking through a wilderness place where it was nothing but woods and trees and grass. And he looked around and looked around and he saw nobody but his son. And when he looked and he saw me, he says, I noticed you were there, and you were knelt down on your knees and you seemed like you were praying. And then I took a closer look, he said, and when you looked up, you looked at Jesus. Jesus was there. He was holding on to your shoulder and he was looking at you and you were looking at him. And all of a sudden, as I stared into this scene that I'm looking at, Jesus turns his face from you towards me and gives me such a smile that his teeth brightened to the point of waking me up out of that sleep. And it was at that moment that I realized when I thought I was alone in my own wilderness experience, Christ was there. When I thought I was alone, when I didn't hear God's voice, I didn't have no signs, no miracle. Nothing happened while I was there. Those moments when I went to the wilderness to spend time with God and pleading for him to give me some sign that he was at least hearing what I had to say, I never got that. But little did I know that all this time he was there every moment. And he confirmed it with giving my Father that dream. I'm going to read to you a text in Hebrews, chapter 13. It says in verse 5, Let your conduct be without covetousness. Be content with such things as you have. For he himself has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. So we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear. What can man do to me? When I look at this text and I compare it to the situation I went through, it wasn't man that I was being told not to fear. It was the sickness I was being told not to fear. What can that do to me when I had Christ by my side at every moment? So I want to encourage you those moments when you feel like nobody is there to listen and God is not hearing what you have to say and you cry out to God and you plead with him for help and everything is silent. Sometimes God is silent on purpose for reasons we may not be aware of, but it could very well be because he wants to increase your faith. One of the ways he speaks to us, apart from visions and dreams is is by his word. So he will speak to you, guaranteed by his word. But God will confirm to you in one way or another, even if it's just by his word, that he will never leave you nor forsake you. My name is Edwin M Cotto from the Advent Defense League. Thank you so much for hearing my testimony and I pray. It's been a blessing for you. Keep the faith.
