The God of suddenly!

 

Two weeks and counting! Three awesome testimonies has been shared and am sure they have encouraged you to trust more in God and give thanks for His many wonders among us. My thanks to those that sent in testimonies, I pray that you will continue to testify about the goodness of God.

 For the sake of clarification, I will not publish the real names of those sending in testimonies to maintain a sense of privacy.  However, if you do not mind using your real name, notify me when you are emailing me your testimony. If you want to share but can't seem to find time to write it down, email me a request for a call section. We will discuss on phone and will send you a copy for verification before publishing it. May the love of Christ continue to bind us all together Amen.

John 10:10 (ESV) "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly." 

The testimony shared today by Jo illustrates the bible verse above, please read on:

Saved from suicide

                    

Some years ago, my husband and I had some problems that led him to desert the children and me. He started an affair and married another woman which made me feel unloved, lonely, sad and frustrated. Life as I knew it ended, providing basic necessities was difficult nor was I able to pay school fees as at when due. It was a trying period in which my days seemed dark and hopeless, confusion reigned supreme and could not move forward. There was a number of sympathizers around me but not one of them could help, rather they pitied me.

One day, my heart was so heavy, felt alone and depression had taken hold. Questions that had no immediate answers flooded my mind. One of such question was “Why am I living?”  My mind was blind to the goodness of God, and thought that “death was better than my present struggles”.

As soon as the decision to kill myself was taken, I stood up and counted out ten tablets of Valium 10mg, a medication meant to help me sleep better at night. I also got a cup of water to use in swallowing all the ten tablets at once. With the cup of water in my left hand and the drugs in my right, I proceeded to kill myself but suddenly all my children ran into the room straight at me. They collided with me and I fell down, the water and the medication I had intended to swallow was scattered around me on the floor. My children still been little kids were oblivious to the fact that I was about to take my life, shortly after then, my reasoning returned and was reminded that God blessed me with 5 beautiful children who needs their mother. God showered me with mercy and sent those children to run into me.

Several years later, I relayed the story of my suicide attempt to the children and they did not remember the incident but gave glory to God for saving my life. Today, I have cause to thank God that He kept me alive, God showed me great love. All my Children are alive and married to good spouses and they also take good care of me. Praise God! What can I offer but my whole life to God in return, He is the helper of the helpless. We can never be alone with Christ in our life, He never leaves nor forsakes us. We just have to trust in him that His plans for us are good, to give us hope. Blessed be God Almighty for His mercies. Alleluia!



Note:
Don't forget to check my reflections page for what I was reminded of this week on faith or click on this link: http://itestifytoyou.blogspot.com/p/my-reflections.html





 

Power of Praise

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Psalms 150:6

 

Below is a testimony of how praising God in a difficult situation brought about a breakthrough.

 

 

Susan shares her story:

 

 

Living with sickle cell anemia was a roller coaster ride. Growing up with a disease that was not well known and understood affected me physically and emotionally. The stigmatization of being called a "sickler" made me feel harassed and sickly. I actually overcame and grew up with the help of God and the love of my family.

As a sickle cell carrier, getting a spouse is a totally different ball game, but God gave me mine,  God gave me a husband that loves and stands by me even during most terrifying crisis. My husband is God sent. Being a universal donor, I can't count the number of times he's donated blood for me.

We now have 2 children, which is a miracle. 

My second child, Tim, is the physical manifestation of God's grace and the fact that God loves our worship.
 

As usual, I experienced several crisis while pregnant with long hospital stays. While pregnant, I was exposed to strong analgesics, MRI's, X-rays and the strongest painkillers were used to alleviate my pain. Through it all, God protected my son. At 26 gestational week, I noticed reduced fetal movements, and called the attention of my doctors to it. I didn't get to see the gynecologist until the pregnancy was 29 weeks. By then, I may not feel my baby move a whole day.
 

Tests conducted showed that my baby had irregular heartbeat, in short my baby was stressed. I was rushed into surgery and out came my precious baby. He didn't cry and it was the tiniest baby I've ever seen. He weighed 0.9kg( 900 grams). At that moment I was so afraid to look at him. He was all bones and veins. The doctors worked, resuscitated him and moved him to NICU.

When I was able to visit my baby, I saw him in the incubator, looking so helpless, fighting to take the next breath. He was struggling to live. I won't ever forget a statement a nurse made, she said "oh is this baby still here?"
 

Just looking at my baby there, his chest going in and out, I felt so inadequate, a total failure. I wanted to pray but couldn't. I also could not relate to the fact that it was by the mercies of God he was born alive, and his being alive was a miracle.

 

Picture taken 2 weeks after birth

 

 

I was eager to feed and take care of my child but knew nothing about care of premature babies as their management is different from a full term baby. The pediatrician advised me to express and store my milk. I was elated when he was able to feed on my milk after a few days.

He had spent 2 weeks in the NICU, when we got an urgent call in the midnight to come to the hospital. At this point, I stopped trying to pray and  turned to praising God. All through the drive to the hospital that night we were praising God even though we did not know what news awaited us.

On getting to the hospital, we were told Temiloluwa had an infection in his intestines. The doctor called it Narcotizing Entero (NEC), Jaundice and Sepsis. The main reason we were called was that they needed to do an exchanged blood transfusion. My husband was able to donate blood for this purpose. He had five blood transfusions, cardiac arrests and hypoglycemia during his stay at the hospital.

I was informed that my baby would no longer be feed with milk. Looking at him struggling to live in the incubator was difficult. He looked so sick with a hard bloated tummy. I was fighting down tears and the fear of losing him. I had previously downloaded some praise and worship songs on my phone, so I literally walk around with the phone singing of God's faithfulness. Most of the time, I put the phone close to the incubator so my son can hear the songs.

After spending over a month in the NICU, we were approached by the doctor that they have tried their best and are considering a transfer to another facility for continued management. I remembered clearly how my husband refused and told the doctors to try more and if they insist, we should be given 4 more days before being moved to another facility.

At this point in time, the nursing and caring staff couldn't get a vein for intravenous feeds anymore, so I was asked to bring him milk. During the four day period, God intervened through a consulting doctor who ordered quite a few tests. Based on the test results, his antibiotics was changed and overnight, my baby started responding to treatment. 

To the glory of God we were sent home after 64days in NICU. He weighed 1.67kg.

Tim is now a year old. He's moving fast to catch up with his peers and he's a living testimony of God's goodness, greatness and mercy.

This testimony cuts very close to home for me. Throughout the duration of his stay in the hospital, there were quite a number of people praying for him across 4 continents. We experienced the mercy of God and His grace through answered prayers. Yes, God answers prayers.

Note: All names have been changed in the testimony above.


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Thank you.

The name of the Lord

God has given us many promises, one of which is that of protection. The bible is filled with many instances of God's protection and deliverance. It is supposed that  Moses wrote Psalm 91 at the beginning of the 40 years in the wilderness to comfort and  encourage the Children of Israel.

Am assured of God's protection over me and my family anytime I read Psalms 91 and 121. God's divine presence protected Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the fiery furnace and Daniel in the Lion's den. Jesus saved the disciples when a storm arose on the sea. Psalm 50: 15 says" And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver the, and thou shalt glorify me".

Below is a praise report shared by Rebecca:

I was traveling to Lagos, Nigeria a few weeks ago. The trip was safe until we approached the Lagos toll gate. All of a sudden, the driver of the vehicle I was in started shouting break failure, swerving from left to right.The vehicle was heading for a parked bulldozer and other vehicles around us were turning in from left and right. We were all shouting, while the vehicle was running fast. Desperately I held on the car and shouted “Jesus stop this car “. The car stopped immediately and we all breathed a sigh of relief for Jesus saved our lives. We came out of the car safe and sound. The name of Jesus is a strong tower the righteous run into Him and are saved. God said “CALL ON ME IN THE DAY OF TROUBLE “, we called on Him and He answered and saved us from untimely death. Praise God!

God is indeed faithful and His ears are attentive to our cry.

Welcome

On a mild summer day of June 2015, a thought popped into my mind that the Bible is a record of God and His greatness both in the Old and New Testament, so why not have a forum in which the present acts of God can be recorded and shared.  After many months of thoughts and prayers I decided to move ahead despite my feelings of inadequacy, when God reminded me that His strength is made perfect in weakness.

From Genesis to Revelation, there are many instances in which people gave glory to God either in Songs or verses. David was very eloquent in praising God in Psalms. An example is Psalm 145. God is a big fan of testimonies. He mandated Moses to put in the Ark of Covenant (Testimony) the Ten Commandments, a pot of manna and Aaron’s rod. The Ark represents the presence of God and the items placed in it serves as a reminder of works of God to the Children of Israel. Jesus in Matthew 8: 4 commanded a man healed of leprosy to go show himself to the priests in the Temple and to render an offering as required in the Law of Moses as a testimony of his healing. The beggar at the beautiful gate walked into the temple leaping and praising God which called everyone’s attention to his healing.

Revelation 12:11 “And they overcame him by means of the blood of the Lamb and by the utterance of their testimony”. So let’s shout out our testimonies and declare that God is great and His greatness is unsearchable.