Spared!
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In the past six months, I nearly lost two very important people. Why did God spare them and not others?
First, my son was involved in an auto accident. He was driving down the highway at night doing 60 mph when he hit three pregnant black Angus heifers. He called us to come get him and said, “I hit a cow.” What an understatement! When we got there, we approached from behind. The car looked fine at first glance, but as we walked to our son at the front of the car, we could not believe he was standing in front of us. The front end was smashed up and the windshield had buckled into the car where all three cows had hit the windshield and one had flown over the car. The windshield had stopped within inches of his head. He did not have a scratch on him. He was not even sore the next day. It was truly a miracle that he was alive.
The second was my husband. He recently suffered a massive heart attack–one that is
termed a “widow-maker.” He is in his early fifties with no risk factors. He had symptoms that were explained away by issues with his neck and stomach.
I was not home when his heart attack happened, but two of our children were. He started having chest pains and sat down thinking it was his gallbladder and would pass. After ten minutes, he asked our son to take him to the emergency room. They didn’t make it two miles before my son called 911. He told them where they were and where he was headed. They told my son to stop at the highway and they would be there. (We live in the middle of nowhere.) The EMT’s started working on him immediately.
Meanwhile, my daughter had called to tell me that they were going to the ER with chest pains and that she was by herself. My son could not answer his phone because he was talking to 911, so I had no idea what was happening. I sent a message to a lady at our church, asking for prayer, and told my daughter to call a friend of ours down the road to come sit with her. The friend called her church and within minutes, five prayer chains had been activated. My son finally answered and told me what had happened. He was scared and sitting in the car. I told him to go be near his dad so that we would know what was happening. As soon as he got near the ambulance, I heard “heart attack.” I was thirty minutes away with my other son and felt so helpless.
The paramedics said they were mediflighting him. I knew it was bad at that point. I got to the hospital right after my husband, followed by many family members and friends.
He was taken to the cath lab and had two stents placed, followed by a third one a week later. The doctor credits our son and the paramedics with saving his life and said that it is a miracle that he made it to get help.
God has a plan for both their lives. Sometimes, we think that only applies to younger people like my son, but anytime God spares us, it is for a reason. We may not know that reason in this lifetime but we must strive to live our lives to honor God. We never know when something we do will affect someone else.
Jeremiah 28:11 (NIV)
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
If God has given you a second chance, make the most of it.
