Apr
29
2020
April 29, 2020 – Click here to listen
Today a friend of mine is in ICU. His heart is racing at 160 plus beats, (mine is 50.) They tried several medications yesterday to lower it but none of them worked. He has been undergoing chemo treatments for lymphoma off and on for quite some length of time.
I’ve been praying for Michael several times a day. It is the first thing I do when I wake up and the last thing I do before I go to sleep. I also pray for him throughout the day. Michael told me the doctor informed him that if he got Covid19 with his immune system the way it is that it would all be over.
He is as nice a person as one could meet with a heart of gold. There aren’t enough people like that in this world and I’ve asked God to allow him more time. We need him in this crass world. He loves to discuss the Bible and prior to hospitalization called me daily to discuss various topics seeking my take on them.
I don’t doubt for a minute that he will immediately be in heaven and he makes no bones about his faith. He has taken care of the well-being of his family financially and otherwise, but no one is ready to see him depart for heaven at this time.
The Lord will decide, and we will abide. My wife and I have had a tumultuous last several months beginning with my liver problems, then a near fatal boating accident in high seas and finally her bout with two pulmonary emboli. We are both alive and well and we can only thank God for it.
Like Michael we are ready to go to heaven and we too have our affairs in order, but we want to stretch out our lives and accomplish more for the Lord and spend more time with family and friends. So we pray and ask others to pray and we know that God hears those prayers. I do know that God wants to spend time with us too; I just try to gently remind Him that we will spend eternity with Him and there is just a little vapor of time allotted for this life to enjoy with family and friends and to spend time planting seeds and trying to lead others to His Son Jesus.
I ask you this morning to pray for Michael’s heart to normalize and his cancer to go back into remission. I also pray for his lovely wife who cannot be with him in ICU or even enter the hospital. It is so difficult to sit home alone waiting and waiting for any kind of word. Why do I ask others to pray with me for someone they don’t even know? Because the Bible makes it clear that we are to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. God told us if we only love those who are friends, we aren’t much different than the unsaved. And don’t ever think your prayers are not effective provided they are in the will of God. Please whisper a prayer for him right now wherever you might be. He would do it for you . . .
James 5:16
Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
