Love is Louder

On By Charis PsalloIn Uncategorized
Fearless
Fearless

When they received bad news from the fertility specialist my son-in-law (I’ll call John, as in John the Beloved) said to his young wife, “You know, the bigger the problem the bigger the miracle God can perform -and you know He can’t resist a good miracle.” They now have three beautiful little miracles to love and cherish.

This week we petition the Lord for another miracle -that these precious children would be raised by their healthy daddy.

When we arrived for our granddaughter’s fourth birthday he was already feeling very sick with what he thought was the flu and a pulled hamstring. Twenty four hours later surgeons were desperately trying to remove “brown gunk” from necrotizing fasciitis -flesh eating disease. They left an open incision from his knee to his waist and he has been on life support since Sunday morning after his blood pressure crashed.

But the most amazing things have happened as we trust God moment by moment.

When he heard the news shortly before the main morning service started, John’s pastor walked away from the pulpit of a large church to be at the side of his friend and a family in need. He has stayed with him in ICU, with several of John’s friends all night, every night since. The waiting room is filled with friends and people walk the halls nearly twenty-four hours a day praying for our beloved John. When the doctor’s reports grew more pessimistic they prayed harder.

Requests for prayer went out over social media and we are hearing from literally thousands of people around the world that their church, or home group, or school, or personal network is praying for this young family. We have never felt so loved.

God is doing something highly unusual here. As people come to pray they are themselves being touched by the love of God, repenting (choosing to change their thinking) and encountering a love and peace that does not make sense under the circumstance. People are being healed of deep wounds. Relationships are being restored, and more and more people are following the story on the media.

I’m mostly at home caring for the children with their other grandmother, while our daughter is at the hospital 20 hours a day. I went with her one night and was totally surprised by the atmosphere of peace in John’s room and the shouts of joy in the hall as the team prayed for the numbers on his monitors to change -and they did.

On Monday our little two-year old grandson was chattering to his distracted mommy who came home long enough to cuddle them herself, before returning to the hospital. Suddenly he changed the subject and said, “We don’t have to be afraid because Jesus is with us. Jesus is with us. Mommy, we don’t have to be afraid because Jesus is with us.”

Today she and I took the children for a walk, to take a breather. I had my camera with me (It’s a habit.) The little guy ran ahead and squatted down to trace “alphabets” that someone had written on the pavement. When I got closer I could see that it said “BE FEARLESS.”

The words on the other end of the bridge said, “LOVE IS LOUDER.”

I have no idea who wrote those words, but they felt like a gift from God.

The reports up until today have been quite negative. But God…

The love of God shining through people we have never met, through friends, through family who have travelled to be with John even though he is unconscious, have shouted down those dismal reports. Today we see improvement. Today the doctor said he was dying, but now he will live.

There is something more going on here than our limited human vision can see. John is a man who is willing to lay down his life for the Jesus he loves –and the people God loves. The love surrounding him is palpable. Some people are seeing angels in the room  as they pray for him. He is the kind of man whose whole life is a message about God’s love and goodness. I know that if the Lord asked him to give his life to save the church, he would do it.

God is up to something. When his Holy Spirit surrounds his church His holiness reveals weaknesses where we have relied on the flesh and where it has become corrupt. He shows us how parts of the body of Christ have been without blood supply or functioning in the way God intended and other parts are not communicating with each other. Impurities that have failed to be removed by non-discerning “kidneys” can all be healed in the light of Jesus’ relentless love. He tells us we are in a war for unity and purity and love in the body of Christ and we have not been taking this fight nearly seriously enough. It takes a willingness to turn, to change, to seek the Lord. Without serious day and night prayer the church in this part of the world will succumb to hidden decay. We need God’s light and his love that shines and burns like a laser.

Love is louder!

Love is Louder
Love is Louder

“John” is very much loved by many, many people. If you would like to pray with us for him we are asking right now for his blood pressure to rise on it’s own so he can get off the medications that restrict circulation to his feet, for restoration and preservation of his toes, for an increased platelet count, for his kidneys to start to function and for rapid healing of a massive open wound.

But more than that we want to give thanks to a God who is good, who tells us in writing on the sidewalk that we don’t have to be afraid and who tells us that love is louder than fear.

19 thoughts on “Love is Louder”

  3. I’ve not ceased from praying dear friend ~ye experiencing the communion of heaven and earth! Fear not, doubt not, look to him in every thought ~ I’m sorry that this is happening ~ God be with you all.

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  5. What a testimony to God’s love and answering prayer. It is in the bitterness of life that the Lord shows his sweetness. John will live and not die and declare the glory of the Lord. Praying for his wholeness.

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  7. Grace Mcduff

    I have been praying for him this week, and rejoice in each report of improvement. I will continue until the “work is done”. God Bless you all.

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  9. “John” took a turn for the worse this morning. He was too unstable to fly to a bigger city with a heart lung machine. In fact he was too unstable to move across the hall to the O.R. so a surgical team crammed into his tiny room and removed more infected tissues. His lungs are not functioning and he is on full life-support.

    But he is alive!

    I don’t understand this tough, tough journey you are taking us on, Lord. But you are sovereign. You are good, and you love relentlessly.

    Please keep praying, for John, for your local fellowship, and for the church in Canada.
    Drop the Canadian politeness and contend for the church as much as you would cry out for your own son!

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  11. Kari

    I have been praying for “John” and your family since i have been made aware of this earlier this week. The Lord is good, He is Sovereign, and He is in control. Continue to lean on Him and Him alone for it is only in Him that we are given strength. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you. Much love and peace.

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  14. Blessed by "John"

    I thank God, that He has given us this story of a faith, a faith being lived out, walked out, grieved out for the world to see the reality of the power of God through Jesus Christ. Having the privilege of knowing “John” because he befriended, mentored, counseled and loves my own son, may I tell you our story? . . “John” was one of God’s answers to my prayers for my special and wonderful son. Eventually I was introduced to “John” by my son, But even more miraculous, God sent “John” on ahead of my son to a city where ‘Who could have known, but God?” both me, and a year later my son would move to. A place where we knew no one let alone any other Christians, So you see God used “John” in a miraculous and faith building way in our lives. Because only weeks after moving here “John and my son’s paths crossed.” God knows what/who we need and when long before we ever do. And it gets better . . . because I was concerned about my son’s romantic connection with someone met on the internet and completely unknown to me, I prayed it would not hinder my son’s love for Jesus or he would not have his heart broken by another rejection. But God had sent “John” to our new city, who had invited my son and his girlfriend to his church and soon counseled with and eventually married my son and his wife. When God (too quickly for my weak faith) blessed them with a pregnancy, in my fear I was little or not help but “John” prayed with and stood by them in their fearless faith. Later “John” with my son and his wife stood to dedicate my grandson, their first child, to Jesus Christ before our church family,
    Today our hearts ache with desire for “John’s” physical healing. Our hearts are breaking for his wife and children for you, his mother, his father, his wife’s parents everyone that loves him, but in our brokenness there is the blessed truth of God’s wisdom, grace, mercy, peace and most of all what is louder than fear – LOVE – God’s perfect love.
    Sovereign God we bow before you and thank you for “John” we ask for your great mercy on his body, for peace for him and his loved ones, for the extended group that love and are praying for him, we fight in faith for your miraculous touch of healing, in the name of Jesus, by the covering of your precious blood,shed for us, we pray.

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