Friday The 13th

"I'm sorry Mrs. Jones. I know you were hoping to go home today, but your tests reveal a few things we need to keep an eye on for at least another day. We need to admit you for observation and we don't have any open beds at our hospital. We've arranged to have an ambulance take to a hospital across town."

A few minutes later, we arrived at the bedside of a sweet woman of 94 years who was being admitted for congestive heart failure. We did the introductions and prepared to move her to the gurney.

She wanted to do it herself, but it was obvious she needed help. We assisted her from the bed to the gurney and during the move, I noticed she had a hard time standing on her right leg. I asked why. She said she had severe pain from arthritis in her right knee. Before leaving the ER I suggested we might get that healed on the trip.

I saved the details for later.

Once we were underway and I had her vitals charted, I shared a few healing stories with her, including the story of the woman healed of a torn rotator cuff. After the testimonies, I asked if I could pray over her knee. She was happy to have me do it. She didn't feel anything different the first time I commanded the pain to leave, so I did it again. After the second time, she said the pain was going down. I did it a third time and asked how she felt. She said, "It feels really good, now."

I asked if she was lying.

She laughed and said, "No....it really does feel much better now.' We took her to her room and transferred her to the bed. She gave me a big hug before I left and thanked me for praying with her.

Our next patient was 44 years old. She’s had “cyclic vomiting” her entire life. I’d never heard of it before, but it sounded terrible. She’d been throwing up for 12 straight days and had severe abdominal pain despite the meds she was given. She was cranky, miserable and needy. Her nurse warned that she wasn't a happy camper. I wasn't looking forward to this trip.

We got her loaded and she asked about pain medication. I told her we couldn't give her anything. She proceeded to flop around in misery on the gurney. I thought about ignoring her.

Then I noticed that her face sheet said she was a Christian. I decided to ask if I could pray with her. It's rare when Christians will say no to prayer.

She said yes.

So I place my hand on her stomach and commanded it to be healed, I commanded unclean spirits to leave, and invited the peace of God to surround her. A few minutes later she said all the pain was gone and she felt completely peaceful. Then she told me about the near – death experience she had as a girl and how her father met her and told her it wasn’t her time to go yet.

We shared stories the rest of the way and talked about how great God was and I taught her how to keep her healing. By the time we got to the other hospital she was crying tears of joy one minute and laughing out loud the next. Before I left her room she hugged me and thanked me for praying with her.

This was how my day went on Friday May 13th. If this day is so unlucky, why did all my patients get healed?

The following day, I saw the nurse who gave report and told her the story. She thought it was cool and said I need my own TV show. I told her I have the next best thing; a website with hundreds of amazing God stories. I gave her a card to the website.

I hope she reads this and drops us a line.

I really hope this inspires you to heal your patients. It's not as hard as it seems.

We all need a few more hugs.