When Seeing Is Believing

I thought I had a regular partner at my new job, but he quit. So for now, I have a chance to work with a different partner every day. Some people would complain about that. It is nice to have the same partner. It makes establishing routines easier. But for now, God has something else planned.

Yesterday, we transported a woman who complained of numbness in her right leg from her groin to her toes. Her doctor ordered an ultrasound, suspecting a vascular injury.

She'd had a heart attack and stent placement a few weeks earlier. To insert a stent, they place a large needle and sheath into a blood vessel in the groin and advance it to the heart. Our suspicion was that the insertion site for the catheter in her groin may have developed an aneurysm, compressing the femoral nerve, causing numbness to her leg.

To complicate the picture, she had end-stage kidney failure and is on dialysis. The dialysis fistula in her left arm deteriorated to the point where it was no longer useful. So her surgeon tied it off and following the surgery, she developed pain and some loss of function in her left hand. She also had complete blindness in her left eye and partial blindness in her right eye from detached retinas.

The facility she lived at was across the parking lot from the hospital. I had a few hundred feet of blacktop in which to work a miracle.

As we wheeled her toward the elevator, I asked if she'd let me pray for her to be healed. She agreed, so I started with her left hand. She reported the pain as 6 out of 10. As we got on the elevator, I commanded the pain to leave in the name of Jesus. After the door closed, I asked how she felt.

"I don't feel anything, now"

"Do you feel any pain in your arm or hand?"

Smiling, and flexing her wrist and fingers in amazement, she said, "No pain at all. It feels normal."

We wheeled her toward the ambo and loaded the gurney. I needed to get vitals and some more information then call the receiving hospital. I asked my partner to get in back for a few minutes. I did a brief neurological assessment of her right leg. She felt nothing when I ran my finger along the sole of her foot. I did it several times to make sure. I pinched her skin above the ankle.

"I can feel you touching me, but I can't tell if it's dull or sharp."

Just below her knee, she could tell I was pinching her skin. The neurologic deficit was slight at the knee, progressively getting worse toward the foot, which had no sensation at all.

I placed my hand on her leg and invited the Holy Spirit to touch her, then commanded the nerves and blood vessels to be healed in the name of Jesus. I asked if she felt anything.

With a smile she replied, "My whole leg is tingling."

I rubbed the bottom of her foot again and asked if she felt anything.

"Yes, I can feel you touching the bottom of my foot." I pinched the skin above her ankle. "I can feel you pinching me." All the numbness in her leg was now gone.

My partner looked on in quiet amazement, finally breaking her silence. "I think you may have just made a believer out of me."

I turned to her and said, "This is the kind of healing Jesus did when he walked the streets of Jerusalem. He healed the sick, gave sight to the blind and opened the ears of the deaf. And he gave his disciples authority to do the same things. "

Finally, I began praying for her eyes. Each time I commanded her eyes to see, she reported more light coming into her right eye, but no improvement in her left. Not every healing is instant; some take a little more time. I made the call to the hospital, but continued praying over her eyes until we arrived.

We transferred her to the ER and gave report. When the nurse left the room, I thanked the patient for letting me pray with her and said, "I'm glad you're being healed, and I believe you will eventually see normally out of both eyes. This was important for my partner. She's never seen a miracle of healing and it's changed her beliefs about God."

After we left the hospital we found a shady spot to park while and waited for the next call. We talked about healing and God. I shared some testimonies and she let me pray for her back to be healed.

Someone once said, "Preach the gospel at all times. Use words if necessary." Today, my partner (a complete stranger, no less) saw the gospel in action. I never said a word to her about God until after our patient was healed. No preaching was needed. We didn't talk about creation or evolution or even sin. A simple miracle of healing compelled her to confess a change of heart.

For some of us, seeing is believing. If that's true, perhaps we ought to let the world see more of our Jesus in action.