Heart Touchers - Comfort From Above

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*Comfort from Above* 2/17/03

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Comfort from Above

By Janet Seever
jseever1@shaw.ca

A gray blanket of haze hung over Manila. Although it was only 6:30 a.m.,
the day would be another hot, humid one--my blouse was already sticking
to me. Dreading the trip ahead, I wished I could make the nightmare of
the past few days vanish by closing my eyes.

Weaving through traffic, the Filipino driver was taking my co-worker,
Helena, and me to the bus station. Manila traffic was as unnerving now
as it had been when our family had arrived in the Philippines five
months earlier to do mission work.

I settled back against the seat, my mind whirling with recent events. I
hadn't slept well for several nights and my body was running on adrenaline.

My husband, Dennis, had spent several days in the modern Manila Heart
Hospital, undergoing tests for shortness of breath and chest pains.
Doctors discovered that his previous damage from rheumatic fever twenty
years earlier had now doubled.

The cardiologist's words ran through my mind like a continuous tape
loop: Atrial fibrillation. Sixty percent leakage past the mitral valve.
Congestive heart failure. Fluid in the lungs. A dangerously enlarged heart.

The cardiologist told Dennis he needed surgery within a month, or he
would face certain death. Even now she didn't know if the surgery would
be successful. She offered no promises, no guarantees.

Today's bus trip would take me back to the little barrio (community) of
Lantap, 180 miles north of Manila where we had been learning Ilocano,
one of the national languages, for the past five weeks. I needed to pack
up all of the belongings we had left behind when we hurriedly came to
Manila for Dennis's tests.

My thoughts drifted to Dennis, my husband of ten years, and our two
children who were staying in the mission guest house in Manila while I
was making my three-day trip. Dennis would be spending his time resting
while other people watched Tim, six, and Rachel, three.

"Lord, be with them today; keep Dennis safe."

Over the past few days I had looked at dozens of Bible verses on peace
and comfort, but God's peace still eluded me. My one question was: would
I be a widow at thirty-nine?

"Lord, I know You want me to trust You, but I'm finding it hard. I'm so
afraid. Don't let Dennis die."

"I recognize that corner," said Helena, jolting me back to the present.
"The bus station will be on our right in about three blocks." She would
be traveling back on the same bus with me.

True to Helena's words, our driver soon pulled into the bus yard. As we
got our suitcases out of the trunk, I turned to Helena. "I'm glad you'll
be on the bus with me."

"It's not really a difficult trip once you've made it as many times as I
have," said Helena. "The Banaue bus is the one we want." She indicated
one in a long line of buses.

Since we were early, we had our choice of seats and found two toward the
back.

The 180-mile trip ahead of us would take about eight hours with many
stops along the way. The road through the mountains of Luzon had
numerous hairpin turns. All scenery along the way looked as if it could
be made into picture postcards, but today I wasn't interested in sight
seeing.

I closed my eyes, feeling exhausted. I was trying so hard to trust God,
but the anxious thoughts kept crowding my mind. "Lord, show me that You
are with me in a tangible way. Help me trust You."

Other passengers were now beginning to fill the bus. I looked up just as
two young men entered. One was carrying a guitar and both had a lapel
pins. As they came closer, I could see one pin read "Trust God" and the
other was a cross within a fish. Were they Christians?

Finding seats directly in front of us, the two men turned around to
greet us. They knew English well.

"Are the two of you with SIL?" asked one of the men.

"Yes. How did you know?" I asked, shocked that we could be identified in
a city of 20 million people. How had they even heard of SIL, the Bible
translation organization with which Helena and I were working?

"You don't look like tourists because you don't have cameras," was the
response. "You're not dressed like tourists."

One of the men, a Filipino of Chinese descent, explained he was Pastor
Lim from a small church about forty miles beyond where we were going. He
had met someone from SIL on a previous bus trip.

Pastor Lim's traveling companion introduced himself as Rogel. He worked
with a mission in Banaue.

Helena settled back in her seat with a magazine, while I continued my
conversation with Pastor Lim. He said he was the first in his Buddhist
family to become a Christian. The rest of his family had rejected him
and his choice of occupation.

In answer to his question about my family, I told him my husband and two
children were staying in a mission guest house in Manila.

"Why are you traveling alone?" he asked.

"My husband has a serious heart condition. I need to go back and pack up
our things." Conversation with this gentle man came easily. "God wants
me to trust Him, but I'm afraid my husband might die," I said, wiping
tears from my eyes with a tissue.

"God loves you very much and is watching over your family," Pastor Lim
replied with certainty. "Your husband will be all right." For the next
hour Pastor Lim turned around in his seat and lovingly shared Scripture
and words of comfort with me. Then he prayed with me.

God's peace, which had been eluding me, flooded over me. I felt God's
presence in this encounter with a stranger in a way I never had before.

"Thanks, Lord, for showing me you care for me. I trust You."

As I thought about this incident shortly afterward, questions rushed to
my mind. Just who were these two men? How did they know who we were? A
Bible verse came to mind. "Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by
doing so some have entertained angels without knowing it" (Hebrews 13:2
NIV). What do angels look like?

When I reached the bamboo house in Lantap, I repacked everything we
owned into a crate. Then I returned to Manila by bus three days later.

Because Dennis might die, we returned to the U. S. for the surgery.
There we were surrounded by our families.

Heart damage in the U.S. was rated 1 to 4, with 4 being the most
serious. Doctors ranked Dennis as 4 plus. However, true to Pastor Lim's
prediction, Dennis came through the surgery well. The mechanical heart
valve is still working seventeen years later with no further problem.

Over the passing years, I've often thought about the incident on the
bus. The strangers seemed as human as I am . . . but who understands
God's ways? Of one thing I am certain--it was a God-arranged encounter.
My two "angels" came with God's message of love and comfort when I
desperately needed it.

Write Janet and let her know your thoughts on her story!

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The mother of two adult children, Janet Seever lives in Calgary,
Alberta, Canada, with her husband, Dennis. She writes for Word Alive
magazine and has had articles published previously on
HeartTouchers.com. You can also find her writing on
www.worthfinding.com and www.sermonillustrator.org.

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Thought For The Day:

"People are alike in their promises. It is only in their deeds that they differ."

Verse for the Day:

"Many a man claims to have unfailing love, but a faithful man who can find?"
Proverbs 20:6

Kid's Thought for the day:

"Hiding peas under your napkin only works once."

Parent's Thought For The Day

"Perhaps once in a hundred years a person may be ruined by excessive praise, but surely once every minute someone dies inside for lack of it."

Coach's Thought For The Day

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