Roger J Morneau - Incredible Answers to Prayer: How God Intervened When One Man Prayed

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to my grandchildren, whom I love very much. While my pilgrimage through this land of the enemy is coming to a close, theirs is just beginning. My concern for their well-being in this present life, and through the eternal ages, weighs heavily upon my heart. Therefore, I have recorded in this volume some of the many outworkings of God's Holy Spirit in my behalf during the past sixty-plus years of my life, in the hope that here they will find encouragement in the Lord and the inspiration that will help them develop a living faitha faith that will increase their spiritual strength and develop an unfaltering trust in our heavenly Father, and in the power of His Holy Spirit.

Most of the names in this book have been changed to protect the privacy of those involved in the events depicted.

CHAPTER

This Is the House of Death

On December 1 , 1984, I was on the verge of dying in the intensive care unit of the Greater Niagara General Hospital in Niagara Falls, Ontario. I had congestive heart failure and atrial fibrillation that the physicians could not reverse. As the cardiologist stated a few days later, if my wife had taken 20 minutes longer in getting me to the hospital, I would have been dead before arrival.

It came upon me unexpectedly. My wife, Hilda, and I were visiting her mother for the weekend. Our trip from central New York had been pleasant, and we had had an enjoyable evening with Mother. Retiring at 10:00 p.m., I felt unusually tired and slept comfortably till about 3:00 a.m., when I awoke with sweat pouring down my face. Although I realized that I was having some discomfort in breathing, I attributed it to the bedroom being overheated.

When I opened the window about two inches, the cool winter air immediately improved my condition. However, I could not get back to sleep. I kept tossing in bed, and my breathing problem returned after a while.

I kept opening the window wider as breathing became more difficult, till by 7:00 a.m. I had it completely up.

After taking a shower, I became extremely tired and realized that something was definitely wrong with me. It took all the strength I could muster just to shave. Walking to the car required as much effort as if I were climbing a hill.

In the emergency room the staff quickly rigged me up with an oxygen mask, intravenous tubing dripping medication into my system, and a diagnostic monitor to check the activities of my heart. A cardiologist with the assistance of several nurses did everything that they could to keep me alive.

A short while later they placed me in the intensive care unit which was already filled to capacity. Because all the glassed-in chambers were occupied, they assigned me a bed in the open area close to the nurses' station.

I had, so to speak, a foot already in the grave, as my breathing had grown so shallow that I could hardly get any oxygen into my lungs. I now believed that I was going to die, and my conviction deepened when someone asked if I would like to have a minister come and see me. In my feeble condition I stated that I felt too sick to have anyone visit, except my wife, who was allowed to see me for I0 minutes every two hours. Besides, for almost 40 years I had made it a daily practice to seek out God and prepare myself to die.

Nearly four decades before, I had had the unique experience of having demonic spirits declare that I would go to an early grave because I had decided to accept Christ jesus as my Lord and Saviour and to observe the biblical Sabbath. (See my previous book, A Trip Into the Supernatural |Review and Herald, I982|, where I recount my unusual story.)

While I realized that my condition was critical, I was also aware that a number of other people in the ward were struggling to hold on to life. "This is the house of death," I told myself.

The Presence of God

Thirty-six hours passed, and I was still alive and now able to breathe without having the oxygen mask on all the time. My thoughts ascended to God in a melody of praise.

That Sunday evening the intensive care unit was in a state of great urgency, and the head nurse called for additional help to meet the situation. To my immediate right an elderly man appeared on the point of death as two nurses struggled to keep him alive. To my left, a man in his 30s, already having had three heart attacks, stated that he was probably living his last days.