About mid-week we got a report of a current racer on the field (whose name will remain undisclosed until she breaks the silence about it on her blog) who had come down with a case of spinal malaria. Malaria itself is bad if left untreated, but fortunately she was receiving medical treatment. Nonetheless, I’m no physician, but from watching countless episodes of House I happen to know that it is a dire circumstance when a disease crosses the blood-brain barrier.
So we’re somewhere between a teaching a worship when a staff member makes the announcement that this racer has spinal malaria. She doesn’t give too many details, but one thing stands out: We were specifically asked to pray, in Jesus’ name, that she wake up. Now again I applied what I had learned from House and discerned that this racer was slipping into a malaria-induced coma. No bueno. This girls life was at stake and we were being asked to intercede for her.
The following scene was… different, from what I’m used to. I tell you that everyone in that pavilion was pouring their hearts out in prayer. We didn’t even care what we looked like or if we were praying the “right way” or anything. Nothing mattered except that we had to intercede in prayer. How could we care about the way we prayed or anything when a fellow racer was dying! Even I myself couldn’t hold back from crying out in tears while I curled up in a ball on the floor and prayed. I had never prayed so hard, nor felt so rended for a stranger. Many other people prayed in ways they’d never prayed before.
Eventually a calm came and peace came on the room and we started being thankful for healing. I mean we hadn’t even received any new report. We were being thankful in faith that she was healed. Whether she was healed at that very moment I don’t know. I’m just telling you what happened at the pavilion. Anyways, eventually we went about our business again, each person keeping her in private prayer throughout the night. Some of us even pulled an all-nighter and prayed as we felt called to pray. I’m not saying that those of us who stayed up all night are any holier than those who slept, I’m just saying that some of us felt in our hearts that we should stay up and pray, and so we did.
I’m not sure when the next report came. I think it was later the next day, or early on the second day. But the report came: the girl was dying of spinal malaria was awake and on the phone with her parents!
So THANK YOU, JESUS, FATHER, FOR HEARING OUR PRAYERS AND BRINGING SUCH RAPID HEALING TO OUR SISTER!
