Miracles

Reported by Fr. Sean Templeton, Lakewood Anglican:

I am happy to report what can only be explained as a miracle. I shared this with the congregation yesterday and thought it too good not to share with you. I hope you find it encouraging.   

 It is far less often than I would like that I can bear witness to a miracle but today Leah and I can do so. Some of you know last night (Tuesday) I rushed from our Mission Council meeting with Leah to a Toledo hospital. Leah had received a text from Kelly Fahle that her husband Mike was in the hospital. You may remember that we baptized their daughter Anne this past summer (pictured below, Mike is on the far right).

 The news from the text was not good. Due to a chronic-hereditary illness, part of Mike’s pancreas had died and was rendering him septic (blood poisoning). The doctors said that this could be fatal. They assessed it as likely fatal because of the dead tissue. They did multiple scans and blood tests to confirm his condition and treated him with antibiotics to try to stabilize him for possible surgery the next day. 

Our Mission Council prayed for Mike (who is only 46). I called and asked Fr. Joshua Ajayi to pray for him and Mark Hottel as well as some others. Of course, Leah and I prayed also prayed as we rushed down the Turnpike. When Leah and I arrived around 11p.m. Mike was awake but on some serious pain-killers (and still in pain). We talked. He reflected on his life and what would happen to his wife and young daughter. He also expressed remorse at not being a better witness for Jesus.

 I then conducted the Sacramental Rite of Anointing of the Sick (Extreme Unction). As one of my Anglo-Catholic priest friends recently taught me, I took off my cross and had him hold it over his chest and anointed him generously with the Oil of the Sick and laid hands on him. After we prayed, he said he felt something and was at peace. He later described it to me. He said that he felt a hand over his hands clutching the cross, but opened his eyes and my hands were elsewhere. He said that as I prayed he felt a hand reach into him, as a hand reaches into a bowl of water (except he was the water). Having completed our prayer, Leah and I left Mike in the Lord’s hands and drove home continuing to ask God’s mercy and healing into the next morning.

The next morning Mike called me. He sounded like his usual self. He said, “whatever you did, it worked.” I reminded him that it most assuredly was not my doing – I was only being obedient and acting for the Church. He acknowledged that, thanked me for our prayers, and proceeded to tell me that the doctors had come in to do tests and determine how to proceed with surgery but the dead part of his pancreas was no longer dead! It was alive again. Furthermore, there was no sign of the previous day’s infection in his blood! He was far from septic. His numbers were returning to normal. The doctors were amazed and plan to release him soon but want to do a study on him. They are puzzled, but we know what happened. God healed him!

 Suffice it to say, just as in Jesus’ time, healing goes on today. Miracles still happen and God honors our prayers and obedience. He works through the Sacramental Rites of the Church. Let us thank God, for this miraculous healing and give Him glory.

 Let us Pray,
Almighty God and heavenly Father, we give thee humble
 thanks because thou hast been graciously pleased to deliver
 from his sickness thy servant Mike, in whose behalf we bless
 and praise thy Name. Grant, O gracious Father, that he,
 through thy help, may live in this world according to thy will,
 and also be partaker of everlasting glory in the life to come;
 through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.


 The Rev’d Sean Templeton
 Lakewood Anglican, Vicar