My Prayer Testimony
Isaiah 54:10 is true. Mountains and hills were being leveled in multiple lives, but God’s peace reigned. Although mother’s condition slowly worsened, peace enveloped us. Difficult decisions had to be made again and again, and unity prevailed every time.
We stayed with mother around the clock, sleeping on the floor of a waiting room when we were tired. She received excellent medical care. The nursing staff was compassionate and skilled. The chaplain and an area minister shepherded us with great tenderness. In the end, we knew it was mother’s time to go.
Even after mother lost the ability to communicate, we continued to talk to her. I read Scripture to her. At some point, a nurse told me that mother’s brain was no longer receiving information. I remember feeling another burst of panic. I felt utterly cut off from her. As I prayed, God assured my heart once again that although I could not communicate with her, I could communicate with Him. It gave me great comfort to know that God would be holding Mama’s hand on one side of eternity, and He would be holding my hand at the same time. We would be forever connected through Him.
It was an awesome revelation to me. I was connected to my mother as a parent to a child, but this relationship will not keep us linked forever. If one of us died a non-believer, our relationship would be cut off, except in memory. Our relationship will last through eternity because we have both chosen Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord. Our mutual faith in Him has guaranteed us a place in His eternal kingdom. I’m sure I knew this, but knowledge became understanding when I stood at the brink of eternity with Mama and said goodbye.
The last hours of mother’s death will stand in my memory as some of the sweetest I ever shared with her. We knew we were waiting for the end. The uncertainties of the previous three days were over. But it didn’t feel like a funeral. It felt like a family reunion. We sat around her bed remembering precious, funny, and important moments in our shared lives. We had spent the previous three days encouraging Mother to hang on, explaining medical procedures to her, and looking for signs of improvement or decline. That last day was spent loving her and remembering how she loved us.
As the last few moments of her life approached, I felt the presence of God as I have never felt Him before. I don’t know if heaven came down or we rose up, but there was a closeness that I will never forget.
On September 1, 2000, early in the morning, mother passed from this life.
As we returned to South Carolina to bury mother, I knew I would never be the same.
This first year since her death has been filled with many difficult ‘firsts.’ Saying goodbye and living it are two different things. There are some emotions still tender to the touch. I will spend the rest of my life remembering Mama, but I praise God for the sure hope I have that we will one day see each other again.
To someone looking at my life from the outside, things haven’t changed much. I live in the same home with the same precious family. I go to the same church. I shop at the same grocery store. But that does not mean that everything stayed the same.
When God revealed Himself so powerfully and tenderly to me during mother’s illness and death, something in me changed. God ignited a desire in me to seek Him with all my heart, my soul, and my mind. I thought I was already doing that, and perhaps I was – to the best of my ability at the time.
In the twelve months since mother passed, God has proven Jeremiah 33:3 to me. “Call to Me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” I called out, and He has answered. I cannot name all of the areas God has touched in my life this year. There are simply too many. He has left no stone unturned, and I pray He will continue to do His wonderful work.
Two things God used powerfully in my life this year were prayer and His Word. Within weeks of mother’s death, I felt compelled to look up and record verses on adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication. I have used this acrostic based on Jesus’ model prayer for years. I found a set of four small books in our church library. Each book had scripture on the four areas (ACTS). Before long, I had filled a notebook with verses from this book and the concordance at the back of my Bible. We did not have the internet back then, so I don’t even know if there were online concordances then! I would read these verses aloud to the Lord during prayer. It made for some awesome prayer times.
When praying God’s Word, I found several important things happen. I often felt my own words were inadequate to express the depth of feeling in my spirit when praying, especially when praising God.
When praying a psalm or other beautiful section of praise scripture, I am praying in agreement with the original writer, and I am much more satisfied that I have communicated to God the depth of my adoration. God’s Word says that we enter into His presence through praise. What better words of praise can be found than those God inspired.
When I pray God’s Word, I feel the presence of His Holy Spirit very strongly. This should not surprise us, since God’s Spirit lives in His word. I do not live by “feelings,” but I strongly desire to sense the Holy Spirit’s presence when I pray.
When I pray God’s word, the enemy of God flees. He flees because he cannot stand in the presence of God’s truth, mercy, grace and power.
When I pray God’s Word, I am holding God’s Sword of the Spirit so that He can work in my life and the lives of others. Praying God’s Word opens the right doors so God’s Holy Spirit can enter and do a positive work in our lives.
The scripture included in the following pages is just a taste of God’s Word for each day. My prayer is that God will use it to create deeper cravings in all of us that will lead us to read and pray His Word as His Holy Spirit leads us.
I truly hope these verses will enrich your prayer life.
September 1, 2001
Dear Jesus,
As we kneel before Our Father’s throne and bring our praise, our sins, our thanks, and our petitions, may we be encouraged to come humbly but pray boldly because we know we have been covered by your precious blood. May Your will be done. May all glory be yours. Amen
Please note: All scripture is New King James Version unless otherwise noted.
Susie Benjamin
During the evening of Saturday, August 25, 2000, I was overwhelmed with an intense feeling that something was terribly wrong. I was bewildered, and I called out to God in prayer. I opened my Bible, put my face in it, and began to cry. “Father, I don’t know what is wrong, but you do. Please help me.” As I read the Scripture that night, these two verses gave me great comfort:
Isaiah 54:10 (NKJ)
For the mountains shall depart
And the hills be removed,
But My kindness shall not depart from you,
Nor shall My covenant of peace be removed,
Says the LORD, who has mercy on you.
Jeremiah 33:3 (NKJ)
Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.
Though I did not know it, these two verses would describe this year in my life. My family was about to experience a major earthquake. During this year, God’s kindness, peace and mercy have been as real as the air I breathe, and He has shown me great and mighty things I did not know.
The next two days passed uneventfully, but on Tuesday, August 28, 2000, my phone rang at about 9:00 a.m. It was my stepfather calling from Ephrata, Pennsylvania, where he and my mother were vacationing. He was distraught. Mother had suffered a stroke and had been carried by ambulance to the emergency room of a local hospital. She was unconscious. A CAT scan showed two large cerebral hemorrhages deep in her brain which were still bleeding. Things did not look good.
I immediately called my church office and requested the prayer chain be activated. Several of my siblings were doing the same thing. I remember feeling fear and panic as I went to my knees in prayer. I felt so far away and helpless. As I told all this to God, assurance flooded through me that although I was not with my mother, He was. I could express all my concerns to Him, knowing He was right there in the emergency room with her. It was a tremendous comfort.
The next few hours were a blur. We received a second phone call. Mother was conscious. Hope was revived. My sister booked airline seats for us. At eleven o’clock that evening, eight of mother’s children arrived in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Mother was conscious and able to communicate with hand squeezes and nods of the head. I will be forever grateful for the inexpressible joy of being able to see her and be with her during the last three days of her life.