at the tail end of december, while we were away in Wisconsin visiting tim's family, i started bleeding. on our way to the closest emergency center, i fired off a text to a handful of friends, asking them to pray, and immediately got responses that prayers were mine. the bleeding was heavy enough to be classified as hemorrhage, actually. my blood pressure plummeted to near-deadly lows as i dipped close to unconsciousness. i was afraid and so startled to learn in one and the same moment that i was both pregnant and no longer pregnant; i was miscarrying. but in the ambulance that took me to the ER in Madison, my spirit was overflowing with prayer, then with praise, as the song, "be glorified" came to mind, and i sang it ever so quietly under my breath as the EMT hovered above me, checking this and that and making small talk.
our turning point -- the point when we knew we were out of the woods -- came with corporate prayer, and with authoritative healing prayer. tim was texting back and forth with jenn, who happened to be at our Sunday Church gathering back home at that moment, who then interrupted the service with tear-choked voice to ask everyone to intercede for me. tim and i also paused, while our skeptical atheist nurse was out of the room, commanding my bleeding to stop in Jesus name, and my blood pressure to rise. the next blood pressure reading showed an answer to that prayer. and though we couldn't immediately verify it, i also sensed that my bleeding stopped at that point. when they checked me a couple hours later, it had. i also received a blood transfusion. from thereon out, i steadily improved and was allowed to go home later that night to cuddle and nurse my baby, with warnings not to overdue it because i had, after all, lost about 20% of my total blood volume.
this is what i want to testify to: how in those moments when we are so scared and so out of control, the prayers of His kids move God into action. the prayers of our brothers and sisters actually lift and carry us. and yet, even before He intervenes with miraculous changes of circumstance or symptoms, He mysteriously shifts our hearts into worship. and worship under duress is always a work of the Holy Spirit; it is always a miracle. worship in an ambulance when your life is quite possibly in danger and all you can think about is how you don't want to leave your babies motherless. i will praise Him still.
::brooke::
