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The entourage of physicians came into John’s room in the Intensive Care Unit very slowly and very quietly. I was seated in a shadowy corner with my Bible open and had been praying the Scriptures for several hours. In the months of hospitalization, the sweet privilege of praying the portions of Scripture the Holy Spirit led me into was an immense blessing to me and a healing power for John.

The doctors, after going around the bed, consulted briefly and then the attending physician approached me. I got up with my Bible held close to my heart. “You will have to let him go, Mrs. Therkelsen. He is full of septic shock, some systems are beginning to shut down and others are nearly shut down already. He cannot live, he is dying even now.”

Nearly three and a half months prior to this day the Presence of God had filled me so completely it took my breath away. That same peace lingered with me well into the next year. It was that peace that allowed me to acknowledge and process the news of John’s diagnosis of Acute Myelogenous Leukemia. It was also the same peace that I experienced on September 22, 2005, the day’s experience that I am now sharing with you. The Blessed Indwelling Holy Spirit is the peace that I was experiencing.

Quietly, I thanked the doctor for what they had done assisting him so intently that day, but also reminding them of what I knew in my heart. “But you do not understand what is happening here. John has nearly died two other times in the last three and a half months. In fact, he was dying when he was first diagnosed. God has saved him both times, and He will bring him up out of this bed again to live. God would not have helped him numerous times to abandon him today.”

In unison the doctors turned on their heels and walked out of the room. I knew they thought that I was a religious fanatic, totally unreasonable, and mentally unbalanced.

When I was first allowed in the room that morning I had gone to John’s bedside and prayed, “Father, You and You alone empowered me to pray, with John’s consent, a prayer of total relinquishment to God’s will at the beginning of this experience. Whatever would give Jesus the most glory, whether John was healed here or in Heaven. John still belongs to you today, and we still intend for only your highest will to be done. But Lord, You are going to have to change my heart, after all I’ve seen You do these last months, it looks like to me You mean him to be healed on this side. But I release him to you totally again. Have your own way in Jesus name. Amen.” I had returned to my “prayer corner” in great peace and calm.

That Thursday night was our regular meeting time for our “waiting on God” prayer group. It has been a rich experience. We wait on God nearly an hour before there is any audible prayer. I had asked one of the women who had been so faithful in coming to the hospital waiting room, to lead for me. I knew she would call many others from our Tuesday Night Intercessory Prayer Group to come. At that time, we had been meeting for 28 years every Tuesday night. They are devoted, consecrated intercessors who meet with God daily.

A pastor, who is regular in his attendance on Tuesday night, told me later “Margaret, you don’t know what a prayer meeting that was! We literally hung onto the horns of the alter and poured out our hearts in faith believing prayer. The Presence of God was in that room.”

They persisted in prayer until the blessed assurance came that John would experience the perfect, holy will of God. When faith believing prayer is poured out, laying aside everything, including time, rest, and food, God takes the substance of prayer which is our faith, and heart trust in him, and begins to work his perfect will. He takes the actual faith we truly have in him to bring the answer to what is in His heart to do.

When I was allowed back into the room that evening the night nurse said, “He is sick unto death, but there is something going on in this room.”

“Yes, there is, God is going to bring him up out of that bed,” was my response as I put my hand on his shoulder. “A group of men and women are praying right now for him.”

“But you don’t know how sick he is,” he replied in a very heated manner.

“I know perfectly well how sick he is, but God will bring him out of his bed. He has been saved from death two other times in the last 15 weeks.”

I went home to a dark house, slept well in a deep peace. How precious our beloved Lord is to His children! There is no one like Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The next morning I took up my prayer place in John’s room. My mind and heart went to Ephesians 6:10-18, “Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.” I began to pray the whole passage over John as I had done often during these months.

After sometime the entourage of doctors entered the room and walked very slowly around John’s bed not once but three times, looking shocked and amazed.

I rose from my little corner as the attending doctor turned to me. He was so overcome that he could only say, “well…well…well, my…my… perhaps we can be cautiously optimistic.”

“You be whatever you feel you must be, doctor, but I am totally optimistic!”

So wondrous was God’s healing touch on John, that five days later he was moved to a regular room to convalesce. A complete and total miracle only the dear Lord could do, through heartfelt prayers of his children!

I will never forget the look of awe and wonder on the faces of those five doctors. They became conscious of the fact that they had been in the presence of a miraculous event. In our praying communities and the countless people all across greater Lexington who are praying, there is a mounting conviction that God is yearning to do many miraculous deeds in these days to reveal his Presence and his Power. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His character of Divine Love has not altered in any way. The Godhead is alive and well in the Heavenly Realm, he waits on his people to pray. He is not a respecter of persons, but of conditions. He will do great and mighty things if we will pray with believing faith, obeying his commandments of love based on his character and his word (John 13:34-35).

Are you praying regularly with others every week? This so enriches our private daily time. To miss the daily solitary time and the weekly coming together to cry out to God is to miss an expanding, deepening life of communion with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. I want to urge you to gather weekly with others to pray. You will be amazed at what God will do!

He wants to take you into the high places with him. Will you go with him?

Margaret Therkelsen has a new book published entitled The Prayer Experiment: Prayer Principles from the Sermon on the Mount. She is an international speaker and retreat leader on prayer.

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When God’s People Pray – God Answers! By Margaret Therkelsen

When God’s People Pray – God Answers!
By Margaret Therkelsen