I Believe in Miracles

So today in Sunday school we took a little rabbit trail to discuss answered prayer and miracles. Okay, not the *I blow on you and you fall over in a faint* miracles, (although I don't doubt God's ability to make me fall over in a faint if He wants me to, not sure why he'd want to, but anyway, that's not what I'm talking about). I believe that when we pray, and believe, God is freed to do amazing things. And what I have come to believe is that God makes us part of His miracle, not to split the glory with us, but so that we can be personally and intimately privvy to it, and be all the more amazed by his grace and goodness.

On Friday The Hero had his 6 month post-op orthoptic appointment. His eyes are now *exactly* the same, with only a slight astigmatism in both. To think that just SIX short months ago we were in Vancouver awaiting major optical surgery. We had prayed (privately) for years for healing of The Hero's lymphangioma, and not seen any change. When we finally faced surgery, and the worry and concern that accompanies such a moment, we took our prayer requests public and so many people became part of our journey. Our entire church and network of family and friends prayed intensely for a successful surgery, for peace and strength, for little things like The Hero to not react violently to the anasthesia which had always been an issue with him.

Our miracle was not the healing of our boy's tumors, but the amazing, more than amazing precise answers to precise prayers that were prayed by our friends and loved ones standing in the gap for us during his surgery. We asked for prayer that we would be strong while he was put to sleep and during the surgery, one of our friends prayed for someone to be "there" for us, to keep us company during that time and God answered by sending a dear friend from our ship days with coffee and donuts right after our boy went into the operating room.

We asked for prayer that the 6-8 hour surgery would be as short and easy as possible. The surgery took just over TWO hours!!! The surgeon said there was no way it could have gone any better, that as he started extracting the first tumor the second tumor basically just "moved forward" into its place. I get tears in my eyes just recalling his comments. This meant that another major prayer could be answered. I hadn't even thought to pray that our son's skull wouldn't have to be cut open, I understood it was part of the surgery and neccessary to deal with the second and third tumor, but one of our dear friends prayed that his little skull would NOT need to be cut open. Praise God and thank you Brenda!

The third tumor, which was the one that was going to take the majority of time since it was at the back of the eye connected to optical nerves.... was so shrunk (the size of a sunflower seed) that it didn't even require extraction. This was phenomenal as in all the years our baby had been under monthly observation no shrinkage *ever* took place.

When The Hero came out of the anasthesia there was not a whine or a single motion of violence (believe me, freaking out and lots of violence were part and parcel of previous MRI's and CAT scans.) He just opened his one non bandaged eye and said, "I'm hungry."

Finally, we asked that the 3-5 day hospital stay would be as short as possible, and that healing and recovery would take place quickly and uneventfully. We were released from hospital the DAY AFTER surgery, took him in for a final check 4 days after surgery and were home FIVE days after surgery.

Wow. What an amazing experience for us of the power of prayer and God's inclusion of His people in what He does. May we never forget, how God included His people and our loved ones in our miracle, and may we become part of His miracles in other people's lives.