Chapter VI

"Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt say."

Exodus 4:12 (KJ)

While I lived in my camper, I still suffered panic attacks frequently, nevertheless it was a season of closeness with the Lord. The trauma of the loss of earthly possessions began to subside and I grew accustomed to my small living quarters. I had everything I needed to survive.

Quite by accident I began to take in and care for stray dogs which people would put out or throw away, something which often occurs in the country. My own dog, a German shepherd named Delta, had been with me for years, during the good times and the bad. She was a house dog so when I moved into the camper she came with me of course.

An elderly neighbor built me dog pens to house the strays which I collected over the years. I knew the Lord worked in mysterious ways, but my task of taking care of cast away dogs had not been included in any vision of mine. Yet, those stray dogs would prove to be an instrument of God in the days to come.

Many times while I was outside feeding and watering the animals I would suffer panic attacks. It was a constant battle against an overwhelming urge to flee back inside the camper and close the door. Yet, I knew I had to feed the dogs or they would starve. I could have turned them over to the animal shelter but I knew they would be put to death and I didn't want that. I grew attached to them.

I remember one day as I was shoveling the poop out of the pens the words 'how the mighty has fallen' began to play across my mind. I knew I had indeed fallen quite a distance but I didn't think myself to be a King Saul. I recognized it to be an attack of the devil so I stopped, leaned on the shovel, turned my eyes to heaven and said, "Lord, I don't understand any of this...but I have to believe that you know where I am and you see what I'm doing." I knew He was sovereign and that when He was ready for my circumstances to change, my circumstances would indeed change.

For a year I lived in the camper. I went through the four seasons comfortably. Well fed, I was warm in the winter, cool in the summer and went to sleep each night with the symbol of the cross above my head.

I sensed the Lord's presence many times and on one occasion even my dog Delta got to witness His presence. I'll never forget the sound of her bark - a sound of surprise, even delight.

Those days I studied and prayed, took care of the dogs and watched television. I took over my mother's satellite when she stopped watching it, therefore I could receive the religious networks such as TBN, CTN, PTL and others. Overall I felt pretty blessed.

I recalled a revival meeting I had attended shortly before I left my job as supervisor of surgery. An evangelist named John W. Fletcher has been the guest speaker. After the last meeting ended I stood in a healing line, hoping for a touch from the Lord which would deliver me from the almost continuous panic attacks. I didn't know what was going to become of me if they didn't subside.

When he approached me as I stood in the line, he stopped and looked directly into my eyes. Then he said, "The Holy Spirit just told me that you have an unusual allergy condition... And that God is going to heal you of it."

My spirit bore witness that the message was indeed from the Lord for no one at the meeting knew me. I hadn't told anyone about my allergies, nor had I filled out a card or anything of that sort. My sister and I had attended together and the only time we spoke to anyone was when I bought a couple of books from a table at the rear of the tent. One of those books would prove to be invaluable to me years later.

The words directed toward me touched my heart and I could feel hope rise from within. However, after that meeting matters grew worse, not better. And not only from my life's viewpoint, but also for the evangelist. He had been caught up in the middle of the PTL scandal.

I thought often about the words of the Holy Spirit concerning my condition. But the hope I had that the Lord would soon heal me began to fade. He hadn't said when or how he would heal me; he had promised only that he would heal me.

While I lived in the camper I had plenty of time to reflect on events of past years. I still believed my healing would come, but I had no idea when. As the days, weeks, months, then the years passed by, I came to realize that God would not, nor could not, be rushed. I had his promise. That would have to do until his hand fulfilled what his word had promised.

As I was about to begin my second year in the camper, the small space began to pressure me and I grew restless. The very limited room to move about made me feel increasingly cramped. Without telling anyone of my feelings I decided to speak only to the Lord about how I felt. I said something to the effect: "Lord, you see how cramped I am...if you could find it in your heart to get me a little bigger place I would appreciate it very much... A place with walking room, Lord." And I let it go at that. I didn't want to complain; I just wanted to make a secret request.

My desire for a larger place was never mentioned to anyone else, not even to the psychologist who visited me weekly at that time. Time passed and I forgot about my request. I continued to live in the camper, secure in my belief that the Lord knew all my needs.

One day while inside the camper, I saw something quite out of the ordinary take place. I was sitting on my bed, either watching TV or reading (I don't recall which). On the floor beside the bed I had a sick puppy in a cardboard box. For a day or so I had been force feeding him by hand and keeping him hydrated and he had perked up and seemed to be recovering very nicely.

I was propped up on pillows, my attention focused on what I was doing at the time (either a book page or the TV screen) when from the corner of my eyes I saw something appear about shoulder height. What I saw was a wisp of smoky substance in the exact form of the puppy. Dumbfounded I watched it travel upward, then out of the top of the camper. It was the puppy and it had floated right past me.

I jumped from the bed and knelt beside the box. To my great shock, the puppy had died. "Lord," I exclaimed, "Dear Lord Jesus!"

Astounded and puzzled, I realized that there was much I didn't know, much I didn't understand. But, I could not doubt what I had just seen. I had been nursing a small sick puppy that appeared to be on the mend. Yet he died and his spirit in puppy form had floated right past my shoulder. Did all things really come from God? Did all things really return to him? It appeared to me that indeed they did. I had just been given the opportunity to see a little insignificant puppy return to its maker.

Another thing I learned was that my spirit knew almost immediately what I was seeing - long before my mind could assemble the events and come to a conclusion. Also what I had seen did not appear to agree with the word of the Lord as stated by Solomon in Ecclesiastes 3:20 (K J):

"Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?"

Therefore I cannot explain what I saw; I can only tell it as I saw it. Only the Lord knows the explanation and to date, he has not shared it with me.

I remember telling the psychologist what I had seen, for he had urged me to be completely open about everything in my life. Over the years, aside from the visions and dreams, the Lord had pulled back the veil from the spirit world and allowed me a brief glimpse. One by one I related the stories to the doctor beginning with an incident which occurred years before Christ Jesus became my Lord.

It happened at a time when I was Director of Nursing at a nursing home in 1979 and 1980; I'm unsure which year. One of my patients, an elderly woman proved to be a real 'hot shot'. Somewhere between the age of the eighty-five and ninety, she was very set in her ways. She had lived in a rural part of the county all her life, the hard years reflected in the leathery weather-beaten skin, the deep wrinkles carved into her face. She walked with the aid of a cane. Stooped in her shoulders she stood about five feet tall, maybe slightly less. Very outspoken, she didn't hesitate to share with me or the staff anything she had on her mind.

On her bedside table, she kept a worn-out Bible along side a large bottle of Garrett's snuff. She and I had several run-ins about the snuff because I was a fanatic on cleanliness. She dipped, then dripped...down her chin, onto the front of her dress. When I tried to talk her out of the nasty habit, she threatened me with that cane of hers.

Finally, I insisted that she would take her snuff at the nurse's station after meals and before bed time, rather than in her room. She would sit in a chair against the back wall of the station, directly in my line of vision from my office across the hall. She would dip, then spit, followed by a 'go to hell' glare in my direction.

I'm sorry to say, I never got back into her good graces. She disliked me and I knew it, but I wasn't bothered because I was there to run a clean, safe facility. If I had to step on a few toes to get the job done, then so be it.

Then, without warning one day she suffered a stroke and within minutes lay dying. My main concern when I saw she was near death was the need to transfer her to the local hospital before she expired. I did not like for the patients to die in the nursing home facility. It proved too depressing for the other residents. It was much easier for them to see one of their neighbors leave the home on a hospital stretcher than on one belonging to the funeral home.

When I realized how fast she was dying I rushed out of her room to call for the ambulance hoping against hope that it would arrive in time. Another staff nurse stayed beside her while I busily arrange the transfer. The look of death had settled on the elderly woman; her color was ashen, she did not respond to stimuli, she breathed only now and then in gasps. By heart sank because I expected each breath to be her last...that the ambulance would not arrive in time.

Suddenly I along with the other nurse saw something that made our hair stand on end. In one instant of time, full color flooded the patient's face, her wrinkles disappeared beneath rosy cheeks. Her eyes flew open and they were shining like the sun. She began to rise up to a sitting position and as she did she extended her arms towards the southern corner of the room. A brilliant light was there, a light unlike any I had ever seen. I can not describe the look of joy and love on that elderly face. Neither can I describe the shock and fright I felt. My knees buckled, my mouth fell open and I stared bewildered across to the nurse on the other side of the bed. She stared back at me in the same manner. Neither of us spoke.

Slowly my elderly patient drifted backward onto her pillow and died with that expression of joy on her face. I knew she was literally gone, departed out of this world. She had left with that person who had been clothed in light standing in the corner of the room. Within moments the ambulance attendants came in and took her away. The other nurse accompanied them from the room. I stood there quite motionless, very much shaken, pondering what we had just witnessed. I looked down at the bedside table, at the ragged old Bible and the bottle of snuff. About that time the other nurse came back into the room and said in a half whisper, "I've never seen anything like that before." Her voice trembled, as she questioned, "What was that?"

I shook my head. "I don't know... I've never see anything like it either."

She was a Southern Baptist and I was in my heathen years, yet we both were affected the same way. We both knew what had happened, yet neither of us could discuss it because it didn't make sense. The Lord of Glory had personally come to get her... That bent elderly woman who loved her snuff had been escorted to heaven by the King of Kings and the Lord of Lord's.

I went into my office and closed the door behind me. I had to be alone with my thoughts. I had to try and rationalize what we had seen.

The main thing I tried to figure out was why would the Lord himself come for her. That really stumped me. She was poor, a farmer's widow who had lived and died in poverty. Most likely she'd never traveled more than fifty miles from her home. What could she have ever done to merit a personal escort from God?

It took years for me to discover the answer, a really simple answer. She had loved God. She had loved His word, a fact to which the thread-bare Bible could attest. Apparently the Lord wasn't bothered by her snuff-dipping. He didn't look on the outside, but rather, looked on the heart. What he found there was enough to warrant His presence in the room when she died.

At the time this event took place, I was at loose ends in my own search for God. Sadly, it would take another four or five years for the search to end. However, one thing I took away from that experience that remains til this day is this - no one needs to be told when they're in the presence of the Lord.

The other nurse nor I ever discussed what we saw in the room that day. I'm sure that's because neither of us knew what to say. One day she did walk to my doorway, stick her head inside the door a few inches and ask, "Jo, are you saved?"

I merely glared at her. Who was she to ask me such a question. It made me mad enough to bite a nail into.

Another experience with the unseen spiritual world which I shared with the doctor was an event which occurred shortly after Jesus Christ became my Lord. It was in the afternoon and I had stretched out on my couch to doze. Suddenly my eyelids snapped open and I saw perched on the arm of the couch, just above my feet, two terribly ugly creatures. They were about eighteen inches tall, and very hideous in appearance. Instantly I knew they were demons. No doubt I had been their target for most of my adult life.

As I stared at them they vanished. I whispered, "Dear God, what ugly creatures!" It didn't frighten me, but it was not a pleasant thing to see. I didn't know why the Lord had allowed me to see them, and I received no reason for it at the time. I didn't dwell much on it, because as stated, it was not a pleasant experience.

Some days later I was in a Wal-Mart's store a few miles from home, when quite by accident, I took a shortcut through the toy section. Suddenly I stopped dead in my tracks. There in front of me on a toy rack were little plastic creatures almost identical to the actual creatures I had seen perched on the arm of my couch. They were being sold as toys for children.

"Lord," I said, somewhat startled, "these toys look just like those demons I saw." It was amazing to me that someone had the ability to produce in plastic what I had seen in the spirit.

After I returned home, I sat down and thought about what I had seen. Why had I gone through the toy section? Why had my eyes caught glimpse of those toys? What was the Lord showing me? What was he telling me?

I began to recall the times in my writing career when I would enter into a 'mind zone' where the words would literally pour out. Often I would read a page and exclaim to myself, "where did this come from?" For example, in one episode I wrote two complete manuscripts totaling four-hundred pages (approximately) in nine days.

I realized I had been getting help from unseen sources. Then I compared this with the absolutely horrible time I had with my final contract trying to complete the last books. I had not had my demonic helpers to assist me along by pouring words through my sick willing mind.

Today when I see horrible grotesque creatures on television programs, in movies; I know they're not just figments of someone's imagination. More than likely the man-made creatures have a living counterpart within the world of darkness.

It's very sad what has happened to the culture of this country. Even more tragic is the impact it has had on the children of America.

However, all my experiences or glimpses into the spiritual world have not been so troubling or negative. Twice the Lord assigned me tasks to be accomplished by the power of the Holy Spirit and those were very precious to me.

In order to relate them fully and properly, I need to speak of my sister Louise (the sister who was instrumental in getting the camper.) Now, Lou, like me, had an eternal life-altering encounter with the Lord Jesus. Hers took place shortly after the death of our sixteen year old nephew, Jeff, who was killed in July of 1984.

His death occurred on a street she usually traveled to and from the hospital where she worked as a nurse. The accident also happened at the time of the night when she would be driving home from her job. Our nephew had been saved by the Lord when he was twelve years old, so his eternity with Christ was assured.

But not so with Lou. Much like myself, she was rebellious, strong-willed, hard-headed; a person very determined to live life "her way". When Jeff died, her attitude toward life changed radically. She has confessed many times that if she had been involved in the accident that night and killed, little doubt in her mind, she would have gone to hell.

Not long following the funeral of Jeff, she submitted her life to the Lord Jesus, and was changed dramatically. The Lord had used our nephew's death to shock her into a sense of reality. He had saved me in January of that year, so for six months I had been talking to them about Jesus, but no one seemed to listen. The tragedy opened ears.

But Lou and I were not two meek loving sisters. Over the coming months and years, we had some real knock-down dragouts in our walk with the Lord. We both were prone to the self-righteous syndrome, Pharisee spirit which spilled over into every aspect of our lives. Neither of us were any joy to be around during those episodes. However there are events that took place that neither of us could question.

One of which took place shortly after I had been totally disabled by the panic attacks. There was a young lady who began to stop by Louise's home to talk with her about the problems in the young woman's life. Lou began to tell her about the Lord.

One day Lou and I were both at my mother's house and she began to tell me about the visits and of the young woman's confusion. As Lou talked the Holy spirit spoke to me and said: "Tell Lou the next time the visitor comes to her house to call you. You are to go, lay hands on her and pray. I will take care of the rest."

I told Lou and though she didn't like it much, she didn't want to grieve the Holy Spirit, so she agreed. I certainly wasn't too crazy about the idea myself, because I didn't know how I would ever get to Lou's home although she lived only a few hundred feet down the road from me. I just didn't know how I would respond when the call came.

A few days later the call came. The phone rang and Lou told me that the young woman was at her house. I was horrified. Nevertheless I changed into the blue and white outfit the Lord had told me to wear, picked up my Bible and started toward Lou's house. Panic absolutely devoured me. I was so nervous I could hardly put one foot in front of the other. I struggled step-by-step clutching my Bible, wondering what would I do if it hadn't been the Lord who spoke to me. What if I laid hands on her and nothing happened. She would surely think I was nuts and that would be mild to what Lou would think.

Suddenly, a car came into view way down the road coming toward me. Without thinking, or knowing why, I began to hide my Bible from the view of the passing driver. I can't explain the horrible sense of shame that swept over me. Nor could I explain why I hid my Bible. I felt as low down and slimy as a snake. I didn't know why the Lord didn't just step on me and get me out of my misery. "I'm sorry, Lord." I whispered, but I didn't feel any better. After that stunt I figured to continue on was a waste of time, but I continued anyway. Finally I reached the house, opened the door and went inside.

The moment I stepped inside the door, the panic left me and a peace descended upon me. I sat down and talked with the young woman a few minutes then I told her the Lord instructed me to lay hands on her and pray.

She sat down in a straight-back chair and I walked behind her and put my hands on her shoulders. Then I began to pray. Suddenly the power of God filled me; His presence filled the house. I had never experienced anything like it. Electricity flowed down my arms, out my hands and into the young woman. Lou stood petrified, eyes wide. The young lady began to weep uncontrollably as the cleansing fires swept her entire body. A God-given repentance followed and within a matter of seconds she was saved, sealed and cleansed.

Lou and I merely stared at each other while the young woman continued to sob and praise the lord. Neither of us had ever experienced such an event or witnessed such power. For sure, I had not entered her home with that anointing. It had come from outside me; it had come down like a wind and swept through me. I can neither control it nor retain it.

It was the most marvelous encounter with the power of God I'd had during my walk with Jesus. I knew that was indeed the power that could do anything - heal the sick, free the captive, raise the dead. In the scripture it states: "And the power of God was present to heal." I knew that was the anointing that Jesus Christ lived with each moment of his life on earth.

I remained only a few moments at Lou's house after the anointing lifted from me. I fought the panic all the way back home. My life went on pretty much the same as before, with one exception. Prior to that day, I had seen the Lord, been given visions and dreams, and experienced His awesome presence. Now, I had experienced His power. I felt very blessed indeed...in spite of everything, I was learning.

The next time I witnessed his power was in a much different situation, and without prior notice.

It happened one morning before daybreak. Loud screams and cries awoke me, and I jumped from my bed and looked out the window. I saw my niece jumping around on my mother's patio, waving her arms, screaming for me to "Come quick!"

I rushed over to my mother's house where I found Lou, ashen, doubled over in pain. From all I could gather during the commotion I suspected she was having a kidney stone attack, but of course I wasn't sure. She was screaming "I'm dying!" And her daughter was crying hysterically. I began to have a panic attack.

I asked, "What do you want me to do?" She didn't have insurance. I saved a small amount of money so I offered it to her so that she could go to the emergency room.

Like me, she was extremely fearful of doctors. Being a nurse sometimes has that effect. Although she didn't suffer from allergies as I did, she had been on the receiving end of some real bad doctoring in her life. She would have bled to death after her hysterectomy if I had not insisted that her bleeding was abnormal. She wound up back in surgery because a bleeder had been overlooked. She had to spend a while in ICU because of the blunder.

She shook her head on going to the ER. Then she yelled at me, "Can't you do something?"

I yelled back, "I don't know what to do!" I was so panic stricken I couldn't think. I had the get back home. I said to her, "I am going home so I can think. . . I'll pray and ask the Lord what to do. I'll be back as soon as possible."

Once home, I rushed inside, went into my prayer closet and fell on my knees before the Lord.

"Oh Lord," I cried, "What am I to do!"

His presence came immediately. He answered me with these words:

"Go back. . .Take your oil with you and anoint her on the inner quadrant off her left abdomen. When you've done that, you tell her that her spirit is in the same shape as her body. Then say the words. . . IsKa. . DisKa... Do.... and I will heal her."

I was totally beside myself. The Lord wanted me to go and tell my high-strung pain-racked sister that her spirit was in the same condition as her body. Most likely she would knock my head off my shoulders. And if that wasn't bad enough, he had given me those three words to say.

"Lord," I said, "you want me to say Iska, DisKa. . . Do?" I couldn't believe I'd heard him right.

He replied with a firm: "Yes. "

I rose to my feet and said, "Okay, Lord Jesus. . .it's going to make me sound like Jimmy Durante, but nevertheless at your word I will do it." I picked up my bottle of olive oil and headed back to my mother's house.

When I walked back inside Louise were still doubled in pain, crying out, and her daughter was beside herself. I motioned to Lou and said, "Follow me. "

She followed me down the hall into the bedroom that had been my daughter's when she lived at home. It was the furthermost room from the living room so if we got into a brawl, neither my mother nor niece could hear it.

Once we entered the room I motioned to a chair and told her to sit down. When she was seated I told her the area I was to anoint with oil and she made that part of her abdomen available.

I then put a drop of oil on my finger, then started toward the spot to make the sign of the cross on her abdomen, directly above where her left kidney should be. As I applied the oil, I said, "Lou, the Lord told me to tell you that your spirit is in the same shape as your body. "

She didn't utter a sound. She just glared at me. Then I said, "IsKa... diska. . . Do." I immediately caught the "have you gone nuts" look in her eyes but before she could voice her opinion the power of God came down. It was as if fire shot down my arms, out the tip of my finger and into her body. She was healed. That very moment the pain left her and never returned. There on her abdomen where the oil had been applied in the sign of the cross, appeared a round blue area about the size of a nickel where God's power had hit her.

She said, "I'm healed. "

I nodded. "I know. "

She said, "I thought you'd lost your mind when you said those words, Iska. . . Whatever. . . "

I replied, "The Lord told me to say them, so I said them. "

She asked me, "And he said for you to tell me that my spirit was in the same shape as my body?"

Again I nodded. "That's what he said. "

She acknowledged at that point, "That's pretty bad shape I guess. "

I made no reply. That was between her and the Lord.

In a few minutes we returned to the living room where our mother and her daughter waited. Lou said, "The Lord healed me." Shortly afterward she and her daughter left for their home.

I went back to my trailer praising God each step of the way. I had just witnessed another mighty display of his power in the most remarkable healing. Again, I realized that the power came from outside, not from within. Lou carried that blue spot on her abdomen a week or longer before it began to fade, but we both carry that experience with the Lord to this day.

I began to understand that the Holy Spirit works in many ways indeed. He indwells us to conform us to the image of the Lord Jesus and is the constant, and never ending companion of the Godhead that is with us from conversion. But, the enduement of power comes from without and cannot be grasped or held by mortal hands. He comes to perform a task and when the task is done, the power lifts. When the power of God is present to heal. . .healing comes. The wind bloweth where it listeth.

I'll also realized that it didn't matter how I looked or what I said in the task concerning Lou. It only mattered that I did exactly as the Lord commanded me to do, in the way he commanded me to do it; to speak exactly the words he commanded me to speak. By so doing, the Lord healed her completely.

Lou had suffered from a kidney stone, one quite large, in the pelvis of her kidney. When God's power shot through her my spiritual eyes could see that stone crushed to powder. He was allowing me to see what his power could do. I was very impressed and awed, as was Lou.

We went for a while when we didn't fight or argue, accuse or judge.

I'll also shared other experiences with my doctor.

When I worked as an ER nurse, I used every opportunity to witness for Christ Jesus. If I perceived that any of my co-workers or the doctors were in darkness, I felt I was there to lead them to the light.

There was one particular doctor, a real hard case, who very much liked to discuss religion, but in truth, displayed no desire for salvation. I used all my best arguments on behalf of the Lord, but nothing I said broke through the barrier of darkness. I even used dark humor such as the old saying, "Do you know why there will be no sickness in heaven?" And then the answer, "Because there will not be any doctors there to treat them."

Nothing worked with this particular doctor. Finally, one day as our conversation drew to a close and no headway had been made, I said dramatically, "Heaven will be lonely without you." My old flesh was really full stride.

As I turned and walked away feeling pretty smug. . . That is until the Lord popped me upside the head and said in no joking tone:

"Don't ever say those words to anyone again!" He paused, then added, "Heaven will not be lonely for those who refuse my gift of salvation. They will not be missed."

Immediately I asked his forgiveness. The abruptness of his reaction had startled me and left me shaken. He was angry with me, and rightfully so. At the time I thought I understood his anger, but years later I realized how shallow my understanding had been. At the time of his rebuke, I apologized then told him I would never say it again. And I never have.

Heaven will not be lonely for those who refuse to spend eternity with God. And for those who knew them on earth, it will be as though they never existed; family and friends will not grieve or mourn for them. They simply will not be remembered.

That experience was the first time I'd sensed the Lord's displeasure, and it was a fearful thing. I wondered how I could have uttered such stupid words. From then on, I used extreme caution when speaking of the Lord to those around me in the ER. The Lord warns us that every word we speak will be accounted for and by our own words we will be either justified or condemned. The words that justify are, "Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner---" or, "Lord Jesus, save me. "

The next story that took place while I worked in the ER is quite different. It has to do with a young male patient who had destroyed his life with drugs. He was considered to be beyond hope by those who came in contact with him. Every few days the sheriff's deputy would have to bring the young man from his jail cell into the ER for treatment of self-inflicted wounds. He would cut himself with anything he could get his hands on that would cut.

It was an awful sight, a bloody sight. That young man inflicted deep horrible slashing cuts on his arms, legs, abdomen; cuts that required hours of suturing. I noticed from the first visit on that no matter how awful the cuts were in appearance, he never severed a tendon, or a ligament or artery. That was strange because some of the cuts reached the bone. He was a wild-eyed mess who had to be restrained during treatment.

The paperwork to transfer him to the state mental hospital was in the court, so we knew he would soon be gone-- encouraging news for the doctors who spent hours sewing him up.

The last time I saw the young man, he had again inflicted terrible cuts to himself. As I washed the wounds to prepare for suturing, I thought of the demon possessed man who lived in the tombs during Jesus's days on earth, a man the Lord set free. I concluded it must have been a similar situation.

I looked directly into the wild eyes as I continued to cleanse the wounds, and said, "There's only one person who can help you."

He glared at me. "Who?"

I answered slowly and deliberately. "Jesus Christ... He can set you free from this torture."

He looked so puzzled, confused. But somehow the words penetrated. "Would he help me?" He asked in disbelief.

"Why don't you ask him." I said.

"How?"

I asked, "Do you know who Jesus is?"

He nodded, "I used to go to church when I was little."

"Okay," I said, "say from your heart.. Lord Jesus"

He repeated, "Lord Jesus..."

I said, "please save me."

He repeated, "please save me." His voice began to tremble and his eyes filled with tears.

"Deliver me from this torment," I continued to lead him.

He repeated, "deliver me from this torment." He began to weep and his countenance changed before my very eyes. The wildness was gone from his eyes, a peaceful expression covered his face.

I concluded with, "Call on Jesus... Trust him to hear you."

When the young man left the ER that day, he never came back. I never knew what happened to him but I held him up in my prayers before the Lord. I knew the Lord did something that day in the ER because I saw the transformation take place with my own eyes.

Next, I will relate another story that took place while I worked in the ER. It was the early part of my shift when an older woman, very poor and very overweight came into the ER. She suffered extreme shortness of breath. She had been sent over from a doctor's office for hospital admission. She walked in but a wheelchair was immediately provided to her, and we rolled her into an emergency room for just looking at her told us that she was in great difficulty.

The doctor arrived shortly, about the same time the woman took an obvious turn for the worse. Within minutes we had her in intensive care where everyone worked to save her life. During those first hectic moments of activity my eyes focused momentarily on a necklace she wore. The gold-tone plating had long since worn off and it was chipped and marred. Where it touched her skin a deep green ring had formed.

She began to beg for water, and the doctor nodded that it would be alright for me to give her a sip. I poured a cup of cool water and we raised her so that she could take a sip. As she swallowed, her eyes widened and she whispered, "I'm dying." She sounded so very surprised, even shocked. There was no fear - just surprise.

Though we continued to work with her, within scant moments, she was gone. We continued to work, but after a few moments, the doctor shook his head and it was over. Everyone left the cubicle but me. I began to straighten the unit, then the bed where she lay. Looking at her brought the sting of tears to my eyes. She had died without friend or family nearby. She had been alone and obviously very poor. For some reason I could not explain, that green circle around her neck from that tarnished old necklace, broke my heart.

"Lord Jesus," I whispered, sensing that she had been one of His, "Would you please put a beautiful golden necklace around her neck; one that will never tarnish?"

Immediately I sensed His presence there in the cubicle with me.

He said: "I will." And I knew he would.

When I see her again, and I will, I know she will be wearing that golden necklace that Christ Jesus placed on her that day.

And these are some of the encounters I've had with the Lord that I shared with the psychologist. Sometimes he would ask me questions... Other times he would just look at me.