Eva and her mother were at the hospital, sitting at the bedside of her father.  He was very ill and hadn’t spoken in several days, and although she and her mother had prayed so hard, it looked as if her father was not going to recover.

“Suddenly Dad began speaking, and praising the Lord!” Eva said.  “It seemed as if he was seeing Jesus.  Less than a half hour later, he died.”  As machines shut down, several nurses came into the room to check his pulse and do a final examination.  Eva’s mother was devastated, so when the nurses left the room, Eva went with them.  She thought her mother might need some time alone.

Eva, of course, was also grieving, but that memory of her father’s vision had made her feel—almost joyful. What had he seen during those last moments? Soon she went back to his room, but now there was another nurse there. Eva hadn’t seen her on any of the shifts, and although she wore an identification tag, there was no name on it.  The nurse was talking quietly with her mother, and whatever the nurse was saying was having a calming effect. “I listened for a few moments-—it seemed as if they were talking about the Holy Spirit—and then I left again and walked down to the nurses’ station.”

A nurse that she knew gave her a hug.  “I’m sorry about your father,” she said.

“Who is that new nurse in his room?” Eva asked.  “She’s certainly making my mother feel better.”

“There aren’t any new nurses on this shift,” the woman told Eva as she flipped through the charts.  “Just us.”

“But….”  By now Eva knew each nurse on each shift.  Nor had she seen anyone entering her father’s room, or coming out of it. And when she returned to the room, her mother was alone.  “Who was that woman talking with you?” Eva asked.

“A new nurse,” her mother answered.  “She was very kind.  She just left.”

But Eva had been watching the doorway from her post at the nurses’ station.  No one had come out during that time, and she hadn’t passed anyone when she went back into the room.

“Then I realized that God had sent an angel to comfort my mother,” Eva says. “I believe with all my heart that angels come when we are in trouble, sick or sad, whenever we need to be strengthened for what lies ahead.” The following days were difficult, but hopeful. Eva knows she will see her father again.

Recently Daniel had what the family thought was flu, but it got worse and when he was taken to the hospital, a smart doctor in the emergency room did a CT scan, which showed that Daniel had fluid around his heart, which was making it beat 200 times per minute.  They airlifted him to another hospital, where a heart team waited for him. No heart surgery but he was in Intensive Care for five days.  When he did finally get back to school, the same thing happened and he had to return to the emergency room.

Needless to say, the family was not able to get the news around to everyone, but they are convinced it was prayer power that kept Daniel from dying.  In fact, they have been told that the e.r. doctor probably saved his life.  He is back at college (probably finishing his finals) and is okay but very tired.  How the family will bring Christmas to the people there this year is anyone’s guess.  Obviously we need prayers for this fine young man and his wonderful family, as well as prayers for those who depend on the Cayces.  Let’s send some extra angels to Thornton this year.  And here’s our story:

“When you were a little girl, Grandma, was there a Christmas?” my granddaughter asked one December day as, heads together, we read a book about the season.

“Why of course!” I laughed. “There’s always been Christmas, honey, ever since Baby Jesus was born.”

“What was it like-—your Christmas?” she wanted to know.  And I set the book down for a moment as the sounds and scents and the magic of long ago crept into the room…

Christmas started back then, strangely enough, with the aroma of wet wool.  Scarves and mittens dampened by the first snowfall and hung to dry over steamy school radiators somehow signaled the beginning of the season.  As the scent stole across the classroom, we children would catch each other’s eyes, unspoken understanding passing among us.  It was the beginning.

From wool, we progressed to boots, not the sturdy leather footwear that today’s children use, but floppy rubber overshoes clanking with metal buckles, fitting snugly over oxfords or saddle shoes—if one tugged hard enough.  In every home in mid-November, the same scenario ensued: locate the stored-away boot box, drag it to the drafty back hallway, measure which child would be promoted to which pair—and caution children to wear the contents Every Day.  We didn’t mind. It was another ritual, another step in the dance.

Then slowly, almost without notice, the trappings of Christmas began to appear.  Store windows took on a  dusting of artificial snow, an occasional red ribbon or evergreen bough, very often, the beloved manger scene itself.  Lights sparkled over the front door of the village hall while local firemen hung stockings from the mantelpiece behind their engines.  Wreaths, hand-drawn in colored chalk, festooned the school blackboards, and the faint sound of carols drifted across the snowy landscape.  No raucous commercialism, no hucksters exhorting us to “Buy, buy!”– just a simple but growing awareness of the time that was to come.  And we children watched, and held our breath and waited.

Christmas came in bits and pieces in those days, changes in our routines that whispered rather than shouted.  An extra delivery of coal to ensure a warm house for the visitors who would share the day. Sledding on the big hill, then coming home in the late-afternoon dusk for warm soup, and hearing the rustle of tissue paper behind Mother’s closed bedroom door.  The soft aroma of sugar cookies unexpectedly mingling with breakfast oatmeal and toast.   In the Chicago area, the radio program “The Cinnamon Bear,” faithfully reviewed each day on our walks to school.  Being asked to accompany Dad on an evening shopping trip, the sound of our boots squeaking on the packed snow, the thrill of being out after dark with the most important man in our lives.  Those pleasures were as much a part of the awareness of Christmas as bells and candles and holly.

And then one day, at last, the tree.  Pine-scented needles scattering across the kitchen floor,  Dad carried it to its place of honor in front of the window so we could share its beauty with all who passed.  First, the lights, then the delicate colored balls, and the tinsel which we hung one strand at a time in a shimmering waterfall.  The angel at the very top and finally the crèche in the place of honor, its chipped statues heralding memories of Christmases past.  “And it came to pass…” someone would read the comforting words that gave the season its true meaning.

The countdown began in earnest now.  Five days…four days… Hurriedly we completed our own shopping —a comb for a favorite aunt, a candle for Grandpa—and stored our wrapped cache under our beds, understanding again the joy of giving. Three days…two..the turkey on the cold back porch. Quick errands, candles, stockings that didn’t have holes (my brother hung a kneesock), cookies for Santa, and the feeling that one’s heart would burst..

And finally, on a cold dark morning, my siblings, wrapped in flannel bathrobes, bouncing on my bed in excitement.  “It’s Christmas!” they were shouting.  “It’s here!”

The remembered wonder gripped me again as I sat in my own living room, my own grandchild listening in delight.  “It came!” she exclaimed.  “Your Christmas always came!”

And yours will too, I told her silently.  Oh, the trappings will be different from the slower days of my childhood.  You will have frozen turkey breasts, TV commercials, a wrapping service at the local mall—by-products of a more modern age.  But beneath the gadgetry and clamor will be the same holy Child, the joy at his arrival shared by millions, past, present and yet to come.

For Christmas is excitement and anticipation and wonder, the secrets, the smiles, the sharing.  It’s the message of the little King repeated down through the ages, the message of hope and peace, renewed again in a troubled world. The message that keeps us believing in the magic of love.

“Yes,” I told my granddaughter, “Christmas will always come.  For what would we do without it?”

—I had the honor and privilege of being able to interview the last survivor of the World Trade Center bombing, whose story ultimately appeared in my book, IN THE ARMS OF ANGELS.  At the point when she was discovered, the rescue workers had given up on finding any survivors, and were absolutely astonished when they came across this young woman, bruised and broken but alive.  How had she survived those terrifying hours?  By holding on to the hand of a man named Paul, she insisted, a man who kept her spirits up and encouraged her to keep calling for help.  But there was no man anywhere in the pit where they finally found her—and no way for anyone to have gotten in or out.  I could re-tell her story.

—During subsequent days, people wrote to ask, “Where were the angels in this tragedy?”  And I was able to answer with conviction:  “Right there.  Right on the scene.”  I knew this only because those with angel experiences came forward to share.  A man who saw smoke breaking up as it ascended, and then saw each piece in the shape of an angel, carrying a human being home to heaven…a trumpeter playing at Ground Zero a few days later, attracting a curious crowd. And yet no one’s camera worked.  No one there was able to get a photo…..A man who was escorted out of the building via a nearby stairway that he had never seen before…  There are probably many stories like this.  I could research one or two.

—Or I could tell all of you how meaningful that day was to me personally.  The night before, at 11 p.m. our
daughter had given birth to our first grandson, and I was up practically the entire night thinking about him.  The following day, as my husband and I drove to the hospital, we heard the news of the crashes.  Of course, like everyone else, we did not know how far such horrors would spread.  Was this unbelievable happening the end of the world?
When we finally arrived at the hospital, it was on lock-down, and for a moment I thought that we would not see this precious child, not today, not ever.  But the reception room nurse took pity on us and let us in, one of so many kindnesses offered that day.  It was when I held that little bundle that an the answer occurred to me, in a quote I’d heard: “A baby is God’s promise that life shall go on.”  It was not the end of the world.  And yesterday, in the midst of painful memories, we celebrated an eight-year-old’s special day.  I could write about that.

But maybe, as we lower our flag to half-staff today, it’s enough to quote something from the angel book:  “The future holds exceitement and opportunity.  We may grow inwardly in new ways, emerge stronger, holier and more interested in ministering to the needs of others than to ourselves.  We may learn that the people in our lives are far more important than any personal achievement or possession.  Rabbi Harold Kushner once observed that all the complicated structuress we spend so much time and evergy creating are built on sand.  “Only our relationships to other people endure.  Sooner or later, the wave will come along and knock down what we have worked so hard to build up.  When that happens, only the person who has someone’s hand to hold will be able to laugh.”

See you next time.

Well, Jo Pabon writes from LaGrange, Illinois to offer another story, unique in its own way (as they all are).

Jo’s mother, Harriet Cimock, grew up in Corning, a small town in southwest Iowa. She was a farm wife and helpmate, working alongside her husband and raising five children.  Harriet had many interests, but she loved collecting (especially butterflies) and shopping garage sales. She spent a lot of time making rosaries and baby blankets, to give to those who needed them.

In April 2007, Harriet had a routine mammogram, and since her husband had had shingles recently, she took the vaccine too.  Shortly afterwards, she developed a rash on her chest.  Her doctor diagnosed it as shingles—she was apparently one of the few who got the illness from the shot. “Mom was not a complainer,” says Jo, “but two months later, she still had the spots, and was distracted by them.”  Harriet had a biopsy, and the family was stunned at the result.  She did not have shingles; she had Inflammatory Breast Cancer, an especially quick-spreading type.  Chemotherapy started immediately.

Back in Illinois, as Jo and her sisters struggled to handle their fear, a strange situation developed.  Jo began finding dimes.  “Not quarters, nickels or pennies, but dimes. Dimes in unusual places-—peeking out from under a baseboard, in the back of a dusty broom closet,in the shower! It became almost comical.” Jo told her good friend Vicki about it, and Vicki started finding dimes too.  “We joked about where we had found them, and somehow the dime would turn the day into a good one.”

In October Jo went to Iowa to be with her mother.  Harriet was not doing well. No amount of chemo seemed to stem the rapidly spreading cancer, but she kept her hopeful attitude.  One day Jo accompanied Harriet to chemotherapy, and after she stood up from the chair, they both saw it where she had been sitting—a dime. When Jo returned home, the dime discoveries continued—in a forgotten coat pocket, on the seat of a taxi, a store parking lot. Surely the law of averages would have intruded by now—how could people find so many coins, and why were they all dimes? But they were. Jo couldn’t help but wonder what the purpose of it was.  She longed to turn it all into a “sign,” something to reassure her that her mother would have many healthy years ahead. But Harriet’s decline continued.  She died just five months after her diagnosis.

“Her service at their country church was beautiful,” Jo says. “She had planned everything in advance, from the music to her obituary, and her memorial was filled with butterflies.  Afterwards, we were taking funeral flowers back to the house, and I lifted up a big vase.  Under it was—a dime.”  Back at the house, the family received another surprise.  The siblings began to sort through Harriet’s treasure trove of garage sale finds, and Jo discovered a clear plastic piggy bank.  It was stuffed to the top, with dimes. “My brother mentioned that he had given my mom a bank several years earlier and he went to the bedroom to find it,” Jo says. “He returned and turned it over on the table top. We could not believe our eyes as the dimes started pouring out!”

Jo returned home to Illinois trying to accept the suddenness of this great loss. Her mother had lived a healthy life—-why her? Strangely, the only consolation the family could muster was the fact that they were now all finding dimes. The stories made them laugh.

One day Jo was searching for breast cancer awareness items on the internet. She came across a picture of a pink breast cancer pin.  Next to it in the photo was a dime! The ad said the dime was in the picture to show the size of the pin. “That was a light bulb moment for me,” Jo says.  “It was not right that we would save all our dimes, and sit around and look at the pile. We were to pass them on for a good cause, and what better cause than breast cancer research and awareness?”

Today Jo and her family have a special jar in the kitchen, and her family knows just where to put the dimes that they continue to find. (Her nine-year-old son even cashed in his $25 savings account, converted the money to dimes and added them to the jar.) Their friends save too. When the jar gets big enough, they change the dimes into a check and send it to Inflammatory Breast Cancer Research Foundation, in memory of Harriet.

“I have two beautiful reminders of my mom,” Jo says, “every time I see a butterfly and every time I find a dime. (Or should I say – a dime finds me?!)” She knows there will be more coming their way. Thanks, Mom!

If you would like to find out more about IBCRF, check the website at http://www.ibcresearch.org/

“You’ve had surgery—you don’t need to be doing any lifting,” one told her.  The others agreed.

Liz has no idea where the impulse came from, but she suddenly gestured over her right shoulder with her thumb.  “That’s okay,” she said, smiling.  “Meet Cletus, my angel.  He does all my heavy lifting.”  Everyone laughed and let Liz help, and the patient was settled comfortably.

Liz had always believed in guardian angels, but she had never named hers, nor had she spoken to anyone about her beliefs.  (Twenty years ago, angels were not as popular as they are now.)  Why had she mentioned it?  She had no answer, but as the days passed Liz began to notice something unusual.  Whenever she was called upon to lift a heavy weight (usually a patient) she could do it easily.  “Usually they were dead weight too, about 180 to 200 pounds,” she says.  But the loads were no problem for her.

Had she suddenly developed amazing strength?  That was the other unusual feature:  Liz could lift easily ONLY at work.  At home she had the usual difficulties.  A forty-pound bag of salt for her water softener was a real challenge.  This situation continued for over eighteen years, until Liz retired from nursing.

“Now, in another life, I am the owner of a religious gift shop, and although my weight-lifting limit is only 25 to 30 pounds I know I can still rely on Cletus when the need is there,” Liz says.  “We are all so bleassed by God to have these amazing halpers with us to guard our steps, guide our decisions and just be our “best friends.”

We often say, “I’ll pray for you!”  But do we honestly believe that there is power in prayer, even more power when many are praying in unison?  For those of you who responded to the call this past week, to pray for a little boy none of us knew, you were part of a miracle.  Here’s the story:

It was an ordinary late April day at the Frank family farm in downstate Atkinson, Illinois.  The five youngest Frank grandchildren were enjoying playing together when suddenly there was an explosion in the barn, and a ball of fire roared through the barn door directly toward the children.  As horrified adults ran towards the flames, they realized that eight-year-old Isaac had received the worst of it—-second and third degree burns on his torso, face and arms. Isaac’s dad scooped up his son, ran for the family car, and called 911 on the way.  “The ambulance met them, and a second ambulance brought a burn specialist,” grandmother Mary Frank says.  “Help was there right away.”

Once at the hospital, however, the grim reality set in.  Isaac’s burns were severe, and he cried constantly from the pain (according to the Mayo clinic, second degree burns are the most painful.)  Within two days, the doctors at the local hospital transferred him to Loyola University’s world-famous burn unit.  The family later learned that burns don’t mature for about 72 hours, and when Isaac’s face began to swell, the local doctors were afraid his lungs would too. He needed more specialized care.

According to Mayo’s, When the first layer of skin has been burned through and the second layer (dermis) also is burned, the injury is called a second-degree burn. Blisters develop and the skin takes on an intensely reddened, splotchy appearance. Second-degree burns produce severe pain and swelling. Isaac’s face was covered extensively with second degree burns.  It was still unknown if his eyes and ears had been permanently damaged, and he had frightening flashbacks of the accident, that kept him from sleeping.  Perhaps the worst part was the twice-daily two-hour scrubs, where nurses remove dead skin to prevent scarring.  Despite some anesthesia, Isaac’s pain was horrific.  “Daga,” he later told Mary “no kid should ever have this happen to him.” Isaac is a true angel-lover, and during those first few days, he wondered where his angel had gone.

When Mary heard the news, she had literally gotten on her knees and cried out to God and to the Archangel Raphael (patron of healing) to send an army of angels to help her grandson.  “I asked specifically that Isaac’s pain would be taken from him, and given to me instead.  But all we kept hearing from the hospital was bad news.”  So Mary began alerting friends, and passing the request to prayer groups.  Isaac’s maternal grandmother did the same.  “Pray for Isaac,” the message stated.  “Pray that he is free of pain.  Pray, pray.”  This is when all of you received the message, via our angel mailing list.  And you became prayer warriors too.

No one is exactly sure when things started to change, but less than a week after the accident, Isaac’s appetite began to return.  Since he needed protein, he became a fan of the Dairy Queen near the hospital.  His attitude was more upbeat too and his physicians felt that since his convalescence would be long and he would probably need skin grafts, he might as well go home and have nursing care there instead.  “How could this be?” family members asked one another. Isaac still looked so injured.  But the little boy insisted that he could go home because….he didn’t have any pain.  When Mary saw his burns, it seemed impossible. “His lips are blistered and raw…his entire face is raw,” she said that day.  “But he is in no pain. Oh God, How Great Thou Art!!”

Isaac did go home, and nurses came in each day to remove the dressings and to peel away any more dead skin. “They apply an antibiotic ointment over the entire area,” Mary reported that same week. “There is no more fever.  They check everything for infection and then they rewrap it and pull that pressure stocking over his head and face. From what I saw yesterday, it really looks good.”

About a week later, Isaac’s parents took him back to Loyola for a checkup.  The surprised doctor  had never seen anything like this.  “Isaac, I wasn’t expecting you to look like this at all,” he said.  “But you are almost healed! You don’t have to see me anymore, unless some problem pops up.”

Just twenty-three days after the accident, Isaac is back in school full time, catching up on his missed days, the family reports.  He has received cards, letters and gifts from all around the world, and he is amazed and grateful, and reads every one. “No more flashbacks or nightmares of the fire,” Mary says. “He has no pain. His eyes are fine. His nose is fine…his lips and ears are fine….it looks now just like a bad sunburn. The doctors say there will be minimal to no scarring, and no skin grafts needed! And he is laughing and being the character Isaac has always been. How awesome!”

Mary still doesn’t understand how this could be.  “But when something like this happens and your heart and mind are all scrambled with worry and helplessness, He says, “Be Still And Know That I Am God. All of these prayer partners brought us the miracle we were praying for…Unbelievable!  Isaac is laughing again.”

Thank you, Earth Angels.

–Can you lend your collective goodness now to another need?  An eight-year-old boy named Isaac Frank suffered second and third-degree burns a week ago from an explosion on a farm, and has been in Loyola Hospital burn unit.  He was sent home this week and apparently no skin grafts will be necessary (people have already been praying) but he is still in a lot of pain, and missed his First Communion.  Isaac is a real angel-lover, and his grandmother is a member of our list, and is asking for prayers.  She wishes she could carry the pain for him, and we all understand that, so can you ask the angels to bring him some comfort and healing?  And here’s our story:

“My mother, Virginia, and her mother were as close as a mother and daughter could be,” says Barbara Martin of St. Louis, Missouri.    “It would be safe to say they were soulmates.”  Because Barbara and her mother Virginia were also very close, the three women had a special bond.  “I spent a lot of time with my grandmother when I was a little girl,” Barbara recalls.  “I remember her singing me her favorite song, ‘The Tennessee Waltz’ as we lay on the living room floor on blankets for sleepovers.  She was loving, kind and totally devoted to her family. “

Barbara was sixteen when her beloved grandmother died.  She and her mother were both devastated.  Virginia was so broken up that it took a long time before she was able to remember her mother with happiness instead of sorrow.   Barbara grieved especially hard because her yet-to-be family would never know Gram the way Barbara had.

Time passed, Barbara eventually married and had a family.  When she was in her fifties, she needed back surgery.  “It was a success, and the best part about it was that, while asleep, I saw my grandmother!  She was young, wearing a white dress with a red silk sash around her waist, tied in the back with a big bow.  She had beautiful curls in her hair, and was dancing to ‘The Tennessee Waltz.’  I was in awe.”  When Barbara awakened from the anesthetic, she immediately told a nurse what she had experienced.  The nurse smiled—no doubt she had heard many such dreams in the recovery room.

Barbara’s mother Virginia, now a widow, insisted that Barbara and her husband come to her house to recover from the surgery, at least for a week or so.  Barbara’s grown children came in and out too, so for various reasons Barbara never told her mother about her vision in the recovery room.  Just a few weeks later, Virginia’s health began to fail.  It started with the pain of shingles, and she also developed diabetes.  In less than a month after her own surgery, Barbara was now taking care of her beloved mother.
“
Hospice set up a hospital bed for Mama in her bedroom, which made her much more comfortable,” Barbara says.  “She stayed awake most of the nights and was alert and talkative.  She knew she was getting ready to go to heaven.” Barbara’s husband and children took turns watching Virginia.  Checking on her constantly was part of their routine because, at times, she would attempt to get out of bed.

One night about three a.m., Barbara looked in.  “Mama had the most angelic look on her face,” Barbara says.  Virginia was staring at the ceiling, smiling, and her eyes were twinkling.  She turned slightly, saw Barbara looking at her, and motioned with both hands for her daughter to come to the bed.  Barbara did, and sat down beside her.  “Oh Barbie!” Virginia said, “I saw Grandma.  She was a young girl, wearing a white dress and she had a red silk sash around her waist, tied in a big bow in the back.  She had beautiful curls too.  And she was dancing to ‘The Tennessee Waltz!”

Barbara gasped.  The very same dream!  But her mother wasn’t dreaming.  She was completely lucid—and joyful.  Barbara had never told her mother about her own experience.  How could Virginia have known?

Virginia died peacefully just nine days later.  Today Barbara continues to believe that the three of them will meet again, and spend eternity together.  As for now,  “I am sure,” she says, “that my mother and grandmother are dancing in heaven to ‘The Tennessee Waltz’.”

Happy Mother’s Day to all.

One night, about six months after his loss, as he lay in bed trying to fall asleep, he opened his eyes for a moment.  There, floating almost casually above his bed was an angel. “The image was moving, and the face of the angel was surrounded by pillowy white clouds, almost like a wreath,” Jim recalls. 

Jim could scarcely believe what he was seeing. He blinked several times, but the vision remained.  Then slowly it moved across the ceiling.  “It had the most peaceful look on its face,” Jim says, “and it slowly faded away.  I lay there for several minutes, enjoying the calmest and most restful feeling I had ever experienced.”

Jim thought about the vision all week.  Was it an angel?  If so, why had it been sent to him?  He was just an ordinary person, wasn’t he?  Perhaps it had just been a figment of his imagination?  And yet there had been that indescribable moment of joy and unshakable faith…

That Wednesday, Jim attended a Bible study meeting and also went to church services.  As the groups broke up and people headed home, Jim asked the Bible instructor, a complete stranger, if they could speak privately.  “I told him what had happened,” Jim says. “I wanted to know if he thought I was going crazy, or perhaps seeing things that weren’t there.” 

The man smiled, as if he were not at all surprised by Jim’s words.  He walked to his books lying on the table, and picked up his Bible.  Turning to a marked page, he handed the Bible to Jim.  “I noted this over twenty years ago,” he said, “when I saw an image very much like the one you’re describing.”

Jim could hardly believe it. He looked at the underlined text. “And God sent an angel to comfort him.”  The brief verse described Jesus’ suffering in the garden before His crucifixion.

Jim was flooded with understanding.  God had not sent an angel to banish his own son’s pain, or even to lift it, for this was not in the heavenly plan.  But God had sent an angel—to his son and to every grieving person—to simply be there, with comfort and understanding.  “Life is sometimes difficult,” Jim’s angel had been telling him, “but you will never go through it alone.”

“My life has been nothing short of miraculous ever since,” Jim says. “Just thought you would like to know.”

Yes, Jim, I’m very happy to know that your life has become more peaceful.  And I’m sure your angel is still watching over you every day.

Fortunately, within minutes, many people in the area ran to assist them. It was a small town, and just about everyone knew everyone else. As some of the men hung onto the car, and others grabbed the Basslers to keep them from being pulled away by the current, everyone saw a handsome blue-eyed stranger drive up and stop. “Here, let me help. They’re going to be cold!” he said, grabbing two brand new sleeping bags from inside his spotless automobile. As the neighbors pulled Harold and Beulah out of the water, they tore off their outer clothes, and laid each one inside a sleeping bag. When the ambulance arrived, the attendants left the couple in the warm bags while they drove them to Nason Hospital in Roaring Springs, PA.

Excitement over, everyone now looked around for the handsome stranger. But he was nowhere to be found. How could someone have driven off without anyone noticing? And why had he arrived on a little-traveled road—with those comfortable sleeping bags—at just the right time?

Due to the warm bags preventing hypothermia, the Basslers survived their ordeal, and had several happy years together afterward. No one ever saw the stranger again. But there was one more peculiar postscript: Not only did the stranger disappear, the sleeping bags did too. Uncle Weldon Bassler attempted to retrieve them from the hospital, to have them cleaned and possibly returned to the mystery man. But he was greeted with blank looks from the emergency room staff.

“Sleeping bags?” more than one replied. “I don’t recall seeing them at all.”

(C) 2003 Joan Wester Anderson www.joanwanderson.com

Once at the hospital Thomas kissed Sarah (“I did think I might not make it out of the hospital”) and was rushed into Emergency surgery. He had lost so much blood that he could not have anesthesia so he was in a unique position of watching everything that went on. It was apparent that the operating team was working feverishly to reconnect all the arteries and tendons. Something else also held Tom’s attention. “During the surgery, a rather small nurse with dark brown, almost black hair and green eyes held my right hand and just kind of stood beside me,” he says. Apparently, this was the nurse’s only job, that, and offering encouragement to Thomas. “She told me on multiple occasions that I had to fight because there was so much left for me to do,” he recalls.

Once in recovery, Tom’s family gathered, along with the physician who had performed the surgery. He asked to speak to Tom alone for a moment, so everyone else left the room. “Tom, you lost so much blood that you should have died,” the doctor began. “You’ve been given a second chance at life now, and you need to make the most of it.” Tom asked for details of the surgery, and what kind of rehabilitation he would need to regain the use of his hand.

The doctor looked at Tom sadly. “Son, you’re never going to regain any feeling in that hand—and you’re going to need extensive therapy to even be able to use it.”

Tom was shocked. He was so young, and this was a bitter blow. Almost immediately, he thought of the dark-haired nurse who’d held his hand during surgery and spoken so encouragingly to him. “Could I see her?” he asked the doctor.

The physician looked puzzled. “I don’t know who you’re talking about” he said to Tom.
“Small and dark-haired..she held my hand…” Tom tried to explain, but the doctor was shaking his head.
“There wasn’t any nurse in the room at all. Just me and the other surgeon.”

Then Tom understood. The nurse had been right. There were many more things he had to do with his life, and God would give him the grace to do it all.

Today, Thomas has not only completely regained the use of his hand, but is married and the father of three small children. He has also been serving for the past six years in the Air Force, with no complications to his hand. “I do have a scar,” he says. “It is about 8 by 6 inches, and is in the form of a cross on the bottom of my left forearm.” It’s a daily reminder that God did give Thomas a second chance—and he plans to make the most of it.

(C) 2006 Joan Wester Anderson www.joanwanderson.com