By Li Qin
“Mom, my older sister was in a car accident and she’s at the Military District General Hospital in emergency care. The doctor said … he said that her injuries are really severe and they may not be able to save her. He said her family should get to the hospital as soon as possible and make preparations….” My youngest daughter was breaking down in tears over the phone. My legs suddenly went completely weak and I nearly fainted; tears streamed down my face and I felt like I had been stabbed through the heart. Just how badly was my daughter injured? How could I go on living if I lost her at such a young age? In the midst of my pain it occurred to me that since I’m a believer, I had to pray and lean on God—I knew He would certainly help and guide me.
I immediately kneeled down in prayer to God: “Almighty, one true God! Absolutely everything is in Your hands—my daughter’s life is also in Your hands. She’s been in such a terrible car accident today, and I’m leaving up to You whether she lives or dies, whether she’ll be able to go on living. I will submit to Your rule and arrangements. Amen!” After praying a passage of God’s words sprung to mind. “Who of the whole of mankind is not cared for in the eyes of the Almighty? Who does not live in the midst of the Almighty’s predestination? Whose life and death come from their own choices? Does man control his own fate? Many people cry out for death, yet it is far away from them; many people want to be those who are strong in life and fear death, yet unbeknownst to them, the day of their demise draws near, plunging them into the abyss of death; many people look to the skies and sigh deeply; many people cry great, wailing sobs; many people fall amidst trials; and many people become the prisoners of temptation” (“Chapter 11” of God’s Words to the Entire Universe). It’s true! God created mankind and He also rules over and has in His grasp the fates of all people. Life or death, changes in fortune are all in God’s hands, and so was the fate of my daughter. God’s words strengthened my faith and gave me something to lean on, and so the nervousness and pain in my heart eased considerably. I shifted my mindset and got ready to go to the hospital. Just then my younger daughter called me again and said excitedly, “Mom, she’s finally regained consciousness!” Hearing this, I knew it was God’s great power and I thanked Him over and over again in my heart. I also saw that when I was resolute in my faith and was willing to accept and submit to God’s orchestrations and arrangements, to put my daughter in God’s hands, I saw His deeds. A feeling welled up within me. When faced with a situation like this, there’s something that I need to experience and I should pray and rely on God; through that experience I should seek the truth and learn a lesson.
When I got to the hospital I saw my daughter lying in the hospital bed—her entire body was bandaged with just her swollen head sticking out, and her once-radiant eyes were open just a slit. I was stunned for a good while and I couldn’t hold back the tears from welling up and flowing out. With great effort she was able to feebly say, “Mom!” Tears fell from the corners of her eyes. Seeing my daughter that terribly injured was so painful for me.
My younger daughter later told me that her sister had been on a bus at the time of the accident. She had been sitting in the front seat next to the driver when that vehicle and another long-distance bus suddenly collided. She was thrown out through the glass window and just as she was hitting the ground the bus overturned on top of her. One of the front wheels crushed her left hip from the rear. At the time the people on the scene were just dealing with the people inside of the bus and had no idea that there was someone under the bus’s wheel. By the time she was discovered and gotten out from under there she had been burned black by the scalding hot oil leaking out of the gas tank, and only then was she rushed to the hospital for emergency treatment. Hearing all of this was terrifying—my daughter had very nearly met her end!
Seeing my daughter with burns all over her body really pained me. I was even more distressed when I learned that the doctor had surgically removed some of her burned skin and the bone had even been exposed in some places. However, I also knew that it was out of my hands—all I could do was silently pray to God and ask Him to give my daughter strength and faith.
The next day it just so happened that some specialists from a well-regarded hospital were coming to the hospital for a consultation. They looked at my daughter and gave the following assessment: a fracture in her left back, skin would need to be grafted, the smaller joint on her right index finger was completely burnt and needed to be removed as soon as possible along with both lower legs so that an infection didn’t spread above the knees. The attending physician said they needed to amputate her lower legs first and wanted me to sign off on it right away. As I held the paperwork in my hands I felt really unsettled—I just couldn’t imagine what life would be like for her after losing both lower legs and wondered how she could possibly withstand such a blow. Reticent to sign, I called out to God nonstop within my heart, asking for His enlightenment and guidance. Just then I thought of the story of Lazarus from the Bible, who had been dead for four days and his corpse was starting to smell, but when the Lord Jesus uttered a single sentence, “Lazarus, come forth” (John 11:43), he was raised from the dead. I felt some faith within me then. I thought, “That’s right. The Almighty God that I believe in today is the returned Lord Jesus—He is the appearance of the one true God, and God has authority and power. He can raise the dead, so whether her burns will become infected and whether she can keep her index finger and lower legs is all up to God. I need to have faith and rely on Him and put my daughter in God’s hands.” After thinking through this I mustered up my courage and said, “Doctor Xia, I have a request. Could you first do skin grafting on my daughter’s finger and see if it can be saved? If so, then her lower legs will probably make it too and there wouldn’t be any need to amputate them.”
Doctor Xia immediately responded in anger, “You have absolutely no medical knowledge. How can burned skin be saved, and how are scorched joints supposed to be treated?” He then left in a huff.
That evening Doctor Xia got the hospital director, Mr. Liu, to come talk to me. He said severely, “How can you be such a stubborn old woman? We’ve been running this hospital for ten years now and we’ve treated plenty of patients. Their family members always cooperate with the doctors and sign their paperwork—you’ve been the only one who’s so stubborn!” I didn’t say a single thing because I thought of these words from God: “The life of the resurrected Christ is within us. We really lack faith in the presence of God, and may God put true faith within us. The word of God is sweet indeed! God’s word is potent medicine! Put to shame the devils and Satan! If we grasp God’s word we will have support and His word will quickly save our hearts! It dispels all things and sets all in peace. Faith is like a single log bridge, those who cling abjectly to life will have difficulty in crossing it, but those who are ready to sacrifice themselves can pass over without worry” (“Chapter 6” of Utterances of Christ in the Beginning). God’s words provided me with strength allowing me to look to Him and lean on Him with even more confidence. His words helped me understand that God alone is the source of our life and He is the only One who holds ultimate authority over our lives and deaths as human beings. I knew that my daughter’s life was in God’s hands and not in any human being’s hands. It didn’t matter if it was a hospital specialist or a highly skilled surgeon—a person’s life or death isn’t decided by them. Although from a medical standpoint there’s no way flesh destroyed by burns can be revived and burned joints can’t be treated, with God, everything is possible. He had final say over whether her treatment could succeed because that’s the kind of authority and power that God possesses. I knew that as long as I went by faith and leaned on God, nothing was impossible.
Early the following morning Doctor Xia said to me, “Director Liu and the head of the hospital talked it over and agreed to proceed with the treatment you requested, but if the skin becomes necrotic, we take no responsibility. If we discover any necrosis within two days after surgery we’ll have to remove the finger as soon as possible so prevent infection, and then we’ll have to amputate the legs. All of that is in this contract—you need to sign this first.” I was very happy that the doctor was willing to try treatment first and I silently offered up my thanks and praise to God.
On the fifth day the doctor started performing the skin grafting procedure on my daughter and I just prayed for her, putting the surgery entirely in God’s hands. I resolved not to blame God regardless of its success or failure. After a very long five and a half hours had passed the doctor came out of the operating room and said, happily surprised, “Surgery was a success!” I knew that was God watching over and protecting my daughter and I couldn’t stop thanking God within my heart.
Two days after that, Doctor Xia came to change my daughter’s bandages, and when he unwrapped her left back saw that 90% of the grafted skin was healthy. He said happily, “I never imagined this procedure could be so successful!” He then unwrapped the gauze on her finger and said in surprise, “That’s amazing. Her finger is doing fine!” Learning that she would be able to keep her finger was incredibly exciting for me, and I offered up my gratitude and prayers to God. “Oh God, Your power is so great that the doctor was shocked by this. I have truly seen how wondrous Your deeds are!” I then said to the doctor, “Doctor Xia, her lower legs won’t need to be amputated, will they?” He thought for a moment and said, “The skin grafting on the finger was a smaller undertaking; the lower legs were a bigger deal. However, we can give it a shot. In case it hasn’t worked we’ll still have to remove them as soon as possible—an infection can’t be allowed to move up to the thighs.”
That evening I leaned over my daughter’s hospital bed and whispered to her, “It was God who took you back from the brink of death. You should give thanks to Him and praise His almightiness!” Tears rolled down her face. After that I asked her to sincerely pray to God and lean on God from within her heart, and I taught her a hymn of God’s words: “Almighty God is an all-powerful physician! To dwell in sickness is to be sick, but to dwell in the spirit is to be well. If you have but one breath, God will not let you die” (“The Onset of Illness Is God’s Love” in Follow the Lamb and Sing New Songs). These words from God gave her strength and faith as well as the confidence to continue on with her treatment. In the past she had always said that she was too busy with work to have faith, but this accident gave me the opportunity to bear witness to her on God’s work and words, and she herself experienced God’s love and mercy as well as saw His great ability. She was really deeply moved and said that once her wounds had healed she would also become a person of faith and read God’s words often. I was so happy and saw that this had been a blessing in disguise!
Her condition improved much, much faster than the doctors expected. They said in surprise that it was simply a miracle! One evening Doctor Xia called me into his office alone and asked me curiously, “Do you have some sort of religious belief?” In China, an atheist country, acknowledging belief in God can bring about suppression and persecution from the Chinese Communist Party, so at first I didn’t dare answer his question. But after seeing God’s wondrous work for my daughter and the incredibly grace I had enjoyed from God, I knew that I should bear witness for Him. So I responded proudly, “I believe in Christ of the last days.” His response was, “So that’s the Lord Jesus.” Seeing he had no ill will I responded with, “Who I believe in is Christ of the last days—He’s the returned Lord Jesus and the appearance of the one true God. I trust you’ve seen God’s deeds with your own eyes!” Doctor Xia nodded his head and asked me to continue praying for my daughter’s following surgeries. I then had even more of a sense of how immense God’s power is, that a doctor whose only faith was science was so surprised and convinced!
After a couple of weeks had passed Doctor Xia started to perform the skin grafting surgeries on my daughter’s lower legs. Those were more complicated procedures so I felt some concern, not knowing if they would succeed. In my prayer and seeking I thought of Job’s experiences. Through his trials of losing all of his possessions, his children, and developing boils all over his body—incredible physical and mental suffering—he remained completely reasonable. He made no demands of God because he knew that his possessions and his children had all been bestowed by God, and God taking them away was something he had to obey. That’s why Job had no worries or concerns throughout his trials, but instead accepted and submitted to God’s rule and arrangements with an honest heart. He even said, “Jehovah gave, and Jehovah has taken away; blessed be the name of Jehovah” (Job 1:21). He stood witness for God with those words. Considering this strengthened my resolve: Whether or not my daughter’s surgery was successful I couldn’t make demands of God, but instead had to be a person of reason, submit to God’s orchestrations and arrangements, and believe that no matter what God does, it is righteous.
A couple of days after her surgery was completed, the flesh on my daughter’s legs that had been on the verge of rotting and was turning purple had become completely healthy tissue again, and it had spread very quickly. The second time her dressings were changed her bone, which had been exposed, was completely, totally enclosed. Doctor Xia was shocked and I was even more excited—I silently thanked God over and over again. I could also hear my daughter saying very quietly, “Thank You God!” Throughout the entire skin grafting process she hadn’t made a single sound—I knew this was God protecting her, and that it was God bringing her back from the brink of death!
After being discharged from the hospital she recovered very quickly. Even though she has some mobility issues and sometimes needs to use a wheelchair, she’s entirely self-sufficient. On top of that, not only has she accepted God’s salvation, but she’s also performing the duty in the church that she’s able to. The fact that she was fortunate enough to survive such a terrible accident and keep her finger and legs was all due to God’s great power and His wondrous deeds. I give thanks to God from my heart for His protection and salvation for my daughter. Only after experiencing this did I truly understand how fragile our lives are, and our lives can be gone in an instant when disaster comes upon us. Faced with illness and death, no amount of money can help someone—only God is our true pillar, and only by having faith in Him and worshiping Him can we gain His care and protection. My daughter and I will both keep our faith and seek the truth for the rest of our days in order to repay God’s love!
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