Detour Blessings, Part 1

"Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective." James 5:16

There was one girl who needed to see the power of prayer.

It was my first week back after my medical absence, and my diagnosis was still up in the air. A diagnosis is a pretty important thing really. It could mean the difference between that horrible headache being a migraine or an aneurysm. In my case, severe anemia could be the symptom of a virus, some sort of genetic disorder, a marrow targeted disease…It could be simple, or it could be serious.

I decided to tell my cabin about my situation. I guess they didn’t have to know, but it seemed like I ought to tell them, so early in the week I explained what I was facing. And let me just pause here to say that my teen cabin was absolutely and incredibly fantastic! I charge anyone the task of finding a more caring and compassionate group of girls. They were God’s gift to me in so many ways.

Suddenly I wasn’t a counselor for teen campers: I was a counselor for prayer warriors. One girl, though, was a little skeptical. She’d experienced a fair share of pain in her life, and the idea of a loving God who answers prayer was somewhat foreign. When I would pray with her, she never quite seemed convinced about the whole matter.

My day off arrived, the day I would find out if I was making blood again, the day I would learn if things were more serious. It was hard to leave my cabin of wonderful girls, but when I finally did, there were hugs and shouts of “I’ll be praying for you!”

The next evening, I stood at the back of Cedar Island as the preliminary songs were being sung for campfire. I wiped my eyes dry and went to sit with my cabin, most of whom shot me anxious looks. As soon as we were all dismissed to go, my cabin shot up from their seats and asked me the news. When I told them my retic. count was up and I was making blood, they literally screamed for joy. Pure happiness in cabin Shasta!

Later that night, I sat next to her and asked her if she had something I could pray for. She said it was pointless. I was a little taken aback, so I asked her what she meant. She told me her request, but she knew it was “impossible.” And in my head I praised God for His timing. Using that very day’s events, I began to talk to her about the power of prayer. We ended up talking for a long time, having a very holy conversation, all thanks to God and parvovirus. Then we prayed, and I thanked God for answering prayers, lifting up her own as I did. After amen, I hugged her. She thanked me with tears in her eyes, and I knew that God had touched a chord.

As I closed my eyes that night, just on the brink of falling asleep, I smiled and praised God for answering the request of healing. He had heard my prayer and was healing hearts.