musings

I'll never forget the time I went to the ICU at our city hospital to call on an elderly lady who was critically ill. Before entering the suite, I was informed by a charge nurse that the patient was suffering greatly, in spite of the morphine that was in her system. She was unconscious, thrashing about violently, murmuring pathetically.

I wondered if it was a waste of time. Perhaps I should return at a later date, when she was more lucid and not so uncomfortqable. But I had come this far and decided to proceed with my visit.

I gently placed my hand on her arm and began to pray. The words didn't come easily. In fact, they were more groans than words. The best prayers have often more groans than words. Suddenly, she began to calm down, slowly at first, then miracuously, by the time I had finished my brief prayer, she was completely at ease.

There was an unseen Presence in that room. Even the nurse commented that she had never seen anything like it. I was reminded of something I had read regarding the famous Mayo Brothers, Doctors Will and Charles, who founded the world-renound Mayo Clinic. Said Dr. Will Mayo: "I have seen patients that were dead by all standrds. We knew thy could not live. But I have seen a minister come to the bedside and do something for him that I could not do, although I have done everything in my professional power. But something touched some immortal spark in him and in defiance of medical knowledge and materilaistic common sense, that patient lived!"

Who can measure or fathom the power of believing prayer? Who can unravel its awesome mystery? Tennyson said it well: "More things are wroght by prayer than this world dreams of."