A Glimpse of Heaven

By Susan Dollyhigh –

“At Christmas, all roads lead home,” Marjorie Holmes said. I couldn’t imagine being anywhere but home at Christmas. With the excitement of a small child, I anticipated gathering with my five siblings and each of our families at Mama and Daddy’s house on Christmas Eve. Like the snow on our jackets, the years melted away as we walked in the door where Mama’s outstretched arms met us with soft hugs, laughter greeted our ears, and the smell of delicious home-cooking tantalized our taste buds.

My parents were only in their mid-fifties, and I had never imagined our Christmas celebrations changing, and certainly not anytime soon. However, on December 10th, 1991, Daddy went into respiratory failure, was rushed to the ER, resuscitated and placed on a ventilator. A few days later, he suffered a stroke, and his condition only deteriorated.

Christmas Eve found my family gathered in a cold, sterile intensive care unit of the hospital. “I’m sorry,” the doctor said. “His EEG is flat, and he’s not responding to any stimuli. The ventilator is the only thing keeping your dad alive. Unfortunately, you have a decision to make.”

But Daddy had already made that decision; he’d told us he didn’t want to be kept alive by machines if there was no hope for recovery.

Daddy was taken off the ventilator and moved to a private room. When I walked in to see him, I noticed his eyes were open as they had been in ICU, but something was different. Then Daddy, who’s EEG was flat, began talking to us in a low, raspy whisper. Yet when doctors or nurses checked on him, he returned to staring straight ahead, and made no attempt to respond.

On Christmas morning, a single red poinsettia graced the window ledge of that hospital room. As we gathered around Daddy’s bed, he got a far-off look in his eyes and spoke to us of heaven and angels. “Jesus is here in this room,” he said. Standing there that Christmas morning, I reflected on Jesus coming to earth 2000 years before, and realized that once again, He had come down to earth and given my family not only a Christmas miracle, but a little glimpse of heaven, through our Daddy’s eyes.

Prayer: Father, thank you for your love and grace, and for the blessing of miracles. Amen

Bible Verse: “He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed, miracles that cannot be counted” (Job 9:10 NIV).

Let God Take Care of the How

By Pat Hodges –

Have you ever experienced times in your life when God seemed so distant and far away, you wondered if He was even remotely interested in you or your situation? I know I have. I can think of numerous times when He surprised me by His unmistakable intervention in the midst of crisis both big and small.

I remember one time when my wife and I had traveled to India on a ministry trip with a friend of ours who had been to India numerous times. We had endured a twenty-six hour train ride from Delhi to Shiliguri, a very remote area of eastern India, located in the Sikkim Province between the countries of Nepal and Bhutan. Exhausted from the arduous journey, the lack of air conditioning, and constant movement of the train, which we weren’t used to, we just wanted to get to our destination so we could catch up on some much needed sleep.

There was one little problem that came up. On the train ride, we realized we could not contact the pastor who we were supposed connect with to take us to Mong Poo, our final destination up in the foothills of the Himalayas. Shiliguri is a city of one million people, and without being able to contact him, he hand no way of knowing what day or time we would be arriving.

I remember praying and asking God to supernaturally intervene and allow us to connect somehow. Once we arrived in Shiliguri, we decided to take a motorized Rickshaw and look for our East Indian contact, not even knowing where to start. We hadn’t been in the Rickshaw for ten minutes and there he was walking down the street.

A wave of relief swept over us seeing how the Lord had placed us all at the right place at precisely the right time.

You know, the Lord works like that. He won’t always tell you the details ahead of time. We question how God is going to answer our prayer, or how He is going to work out something for our good. What we need to do is put our trust in Him and leave the ‘how’ up to Him.

“In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths” (Proverbs 3:6 KJV).

Doggone Wealthy

By Cheri Cowell –

When I was growing up, we had a huge collie named Happy. Happy was the perfect dog for children; he was protective, playful, gentle, and a lot of fun. We often dressed him up like a doll, and he loved to play in the Water Wiggle with us in the back yard. It was my job to feed Happy at night, which meant filling his water bowl, scooping a big cupful of dry food into his dish, and then topping it with table scraps. The bowl would almost overflow, but it didn’t take long for it to disappear. Every once in awhile my father would stop at the butcher to get meat for our family, and while there, he always got a box of bones for Happy. Once a week, my sister and I would go into the freezer and get one of those bones for him. You would have thought he had died and gone to heaven. Today I believe he is enjoying a doggie banquet in heaven, where even the lowliest of us here on earth will sup with God.

“Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, ‘Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.’ Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, ‘Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.’ He answered, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.’ The woman came and knelt before him. ‘Lord, help me!’ she said. He replied, ‘It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.’ ‘Yes it is, Lord,’ she said. ‘Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.’ Then Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.’ And her daughter was healed at that moment” (Matthew 15:21-28 NIV).

A dog was a term the Jews used to demean Gentiles. Jesus was not demeaning the woman by using this term; he was showing their hypocrisy. She saw in Jesus someone whom she could trust so she offered to eat the scraps from His table if He would heal her daughter. This woman, a Canaanite enemy of the Jews, was then offered the best meal in town, for her faith brought her the very thing she wished. All of us are equal in God’s eyes, so we should not be surprised when one day we see who is seated next to us at His large banqueting table in heaven.

PRAYER: Thank You Lord for the privilege of even being allowed the crumbs from Your table, yet incredibly, You have offered me a seat of honor there. Help me treat others the way You see them: valuable, worthy, and to be honored.

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