Patti

Two years ago, I was very ill and facing surgery. I was terrified and was considering suicide to escape it all. While folding clothes in my laundry room, I became so overcome by emotion that I ended up on the floor crying. I knew that I was at the end of my rope and thought there was no hope for me to have any kind of future. Then I heard the voice of a man say, "Get up!", so I did. I assumed someone else was in the house with me, but no one was there. Then the same voice said, "Be still." I went to my room and sat there, staring at the wall but not seeing a wall at all. What I saw was myself, wearing a quilt made of what looked like photographs of all the painful memories I was holding close to my heart and the fear that was crippling me. I felt something in the pit of my stomach that is still with me today. It's like a spark or something...I can't really explain it.

The time came for my surgery and I felt stronger and more capable than ever. After it was over and I was in recovery, I started to pray. I thanked God for sending whomever it was who helped me and asked Him to show me how to be what He purposed for me. The very second that I stopped praying, a nurse came in and invited me to church with her on Sunday. She didn't know what led her to my room or why she suggested that I go with her. She only knew that she was compelled to do so, but I knew exactly what had happened.

The voice has stayed with me. He gives me clues to life's mysteries and sometimes he allows me to see things I wouldn't have been able to see without him. I'm not sure who he is because he has not told me. He did tell me once that "the lion awaits on the desert" and a short time later, Ariel Sharon announced his plans to run for the Israeli presidency. I knew he would win as soon as I heard his name, which I'm sure you know means "the lion of God of the desert". Yesterday, he said, "ben-wa-den" or something to that effect. I'm not sure what it means yet, but I will figure it out...or perhaps I should say it will be revealed to me.

Before all of this happened to me, I was a selfish, spoiled, insincere person. I never did anything before determining the benefits to myself. Now I don't do anything that I will be ashamed of when I answer to the Lord. It seems to me that I had to reach a moment in my life when I realized that I had no choices left, no real control over anything around me except my own behavior and beliefs, for the Lord to reach out to me. Perhaps all it took was for me to be naked and unafraid and He was there the whole time, waiting for me to call His name.

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