A Treasury of Miracles for Women (2 page)

“I'll never marry anyone else,” Sherri told her mother. “No one could ever love me like he did.”

“You don't have to convince me.” The older woman was also a widow and she gave Sherri a sad, understanding smile. “Sometimes there's just one special person for a whole lifetime. Once that person's gone, it's better to be alone than try to replace them.”

Thankfully, Sherri was not alone. Her mother moved in with her after the funeral and together they cared for Luke. No matter what trial fell upon the young boy, Sherri had an optimistic way of looking at it.

“That's okay, son,” she'd say when Luke came home sad about a situation with a friend. “One day he'll realize how much fun you really are and then he'll be knocking at the door every afternoon.”

Or she'd encourage him when he struggled with learning to read. “You can practice reading to me every night, Luke,” Sherri told him. “Won't that be a nice way to spend time together?”

Sherri had something deep within her that many mothers understand. An ability to recognize the speed at which time passed. Knowing it was flying by didn't make it any easier to stop, of course. But for Sherri, it meant making the most of every moment.

She more than anyone knew how quickly things could change.

When Luke turned seven and joined the town's Little League team, Sherri sensed from the beginning his strug gle. In an effort to make things right for him she researched stories about major leaguers who struggled with the game when they were kids.

“Did you know that the most famous outfielder of all time didn't play a lick of ball until he was twelve?” she'd tell him. And together they'd laugh over the possibilities. “One day I'll be cheering from the stands and there you'll be—suiting up for the big leagues.”

Game after game, week after week, his mother came and cheered him on. Even if he only played a few minutes at a time.

Then one week, Luke came to the game alone.

“Coach,” he said. “Can I start today? It's really impor tant. Please?”

The coach pondered the child before him and thought of Luke's lack of coordination. He would proba bly strike out and swing at every ball that came his way. But then the man thought of Luke's patience and sports manship during the weeks he'd played but an inning or two.

“Sure,” he said and shrugged, tugging on Luke's red cap. “You can start today. Now go get warmed up.”

Luke was thrilled and that afternoon he played the game of his life. He hit a home run and two singles and in the field he caught the fly ball that won the game.

The coach, of course, was stunned. He had never seen Luke play so well, and after the game he pulled him aside.

“That was a tremendous performance,” he told the child. “But you've never played like that before. What was the difference today?”

Luke smiled then and the coach could see his child like brown eyes welling up with happy tears.

“Well, Coach, a long time ago my dad died in a car wreck. My mother was very sick. She was blind and she couldn't walk very well. Last week … she died.” Luke swallowed back the tears and then continued. “Today … today was the first time both my parents got to see me play.”

Letting Go

K
ari Clausen was a woman who clung to the people she loved. Growing up, she and her sister were insepara ble, maintaining a bond that was even stronger as they be came adults. It was the same way with her husband, close friends, and her aging parents.

And it was especially so when it came to her children.

Kari was over-protective and fearful every day for their safety. It was something she despised about herself but it re mained all the same. There was no added peace from her faith in God or the fact that Cole, five, and Anna, three, had never suffered more than a skinned knee.

“Help me have a looser hold on them, God,” she would pray. But inevitably she took to worrying again. There were nights that summer when she couldn't sleep because of fears that one or both of her children would get hurt.

Or worse.

And so when tragedy did come, Kari was expecting it. But nothing in her wildest imagination could have pre pared her for that June morning when everything about her life changed in a single instant.

That morning Kari and her husband, Mel, were packing their belongings for a move from West Hills, California, to nearby Thousand Oaks. For days Cole and Anna had passed the afternoons playing outside while their parents filled cardboard boxes and loaded them onto their trailer.

By afternoon they were nearly done and Mel was in the back bedroom with a friend who was helping them pack.

“Mommy, can you tie my shoes?” Cole ran down the hallway holding a pair of sneakers. “Me and Anna are gonna play out back, okay?”

Kari swept Cole into her arms, held him in her lap, and tied the child's shoes. “You bet,” she said, tousling Cole's straight brown hair. “Just be careful and make sure you stay in the yard.”

Cole grinned, his green eyes twinkling. Then he disap peared out the back door with Anna close behind. Kari picked up a handful of mail on the kitchen counter and found a magazine she'd been waiting for.

Perfect,
she thought.
I'll go outside and read it. That way I can keep a better eye on the kids.

But at that instant a loud crash rang sickeningly through the house, vibrating the floor beneath Kari's feet.

“Cole! Anna!” Kari screamed as she raced out the back door.

What she saw made her heart stand still. The three-hundred-pound steel ramp at the back of the trailer had come down onto the ground. Little Anna stood nearby frozen in place, her eyes wide with shock.

There was no sign of Cole.

“Where's Cole?” Kari shouted at Anna, but the child remained motionless.

Kari ran toward the ramp and there, underneath, was Cole's limp body. Blood was oozing from his nose, mouth, and ears, and the heavy ramp was resting on his head. He showed no signs of life.

“Mel!” Kari screamed. “Help!”

Her husband had heard the crash and was at her side almost immediately. Summoning a strength that was be yond their own, they lifted the ramp off Cole's head. Blood began pouring from his sunken skull, and Kari swept him into her arms.

“My God, he's dead!” Kari was hysterical, her voice a shrill scream. She felt faint and she passed Cole to Mel. “Help him, Mel. What do we do?”

Only Cole's tennis shoes weren't covered with blood and Kari had a sudden, certain feeling that her child was no longer breathing.

“Get the car keys. We've got to get him to the hospi tal,” Mel said as he ran with Cole toward their family car.

Kari forced herself to respond. She grabbed the car keys from the kitchen counter and left Anna with her husband's friend. Then she sprinted toward the car, jumping into the driver's seat. In seconds, they were on the nearest highway racing toward Union Memorial Hospital.

“He's gonna die, Mel; I can't drive fast enough.” Kari's hands shook and her heart raced within her.

“He's still breathing.” Mel's voice was loud and insis tent. “He's not going to die. You need to pray, Kari. Focus on driving and pray.”

Kari prayed for several minutes, begging God to spare Cole's life. Then she remembered her favorite hymn, the one she sang whenever she needed to feel God's peace. Quietly, with tears in her voice, she began to sing the hymn that had been her favorite since she was a little girl.

“Great is thy faithfulness … oh God my father, there is no shadow of turning with thee …”

The quiet song brought a calm over Kari's heart and al lowed her to breathe more easily. She paused and glanced at her son, motionless in Mel's arms. “How is he?”

“Still breathing.”

Cole had still not moved and Kari thought for sure he would be dead by now. But if he was still breathing, there was hope. There had to be. She continued to drive as a re alization hit her: there was not a thing she could do to help Cole now. He was completely in God's hands. The same way both her children always had been, even when she'd been consumed by worry.

In fact, worrying about them had done no good at all.

For some reason, the truth of that calmed Kari even further. Though tears streamed down her face, she drove as fast as she safely could, praying constantly for God's intervention and believing with all her heart that he was working in Cole's life even at that very instant.

“Pray for a miracle, Kari,” Mel said quietly. “He's breathing slower.”

“I am.” Kari swallowed back a torrent of sobs. “God's in control.”

Suddenly, a few blocks from the hospital, Cole coughed and began making gurgling sounds. Blood spewed from his mouth as he struggled to breathe. Mel spoke soothingly to him and the boy opened his eyes.

“Daddy! Help me …” The boy's words were slurred and his eyes rolled back in his head. “I want to sleep.”

No, don't sleep, Cole. You might never wake up,
Kari thought.

Cole moved restlessly in his father's arms, blood still gurgling within his throat.

“Cole,” Kari said as she kept her eyes on the road. “Do you know that Mommy and Daddy love you so much, son?”

Cole made no response.

“We love you, Cole,” Mel added. “And God loves you, too. He will always take care of you.”

The child's eyes closed once more and both Kari and Mel privately sensed they were losing him. Kari thought about the time just a few months earlier when she and Mel were tucking the children in at night. They had just fin ished saying their prayers. Mel explained to the children that it was Good Friday, the day when Jesus died many years earlier.

“I already know about that,” Cole piped in. “Our teacher at school told us Jesus died on the cross for us and we can ask him to live in our heart.”

Kari and Mel had smiled at their son, nodding in uni son. “That's right, Cole.”

The boy grinned. “So I did it.”

“You did?” Kari asked curiously.

Cole nodded enthusiastically. “Yes. I said a prayer and asked Jesus to live in my heart.”

Now, as they rounded the corner and turned into the hospital's emergency room parking lot, Kari felt strangely comforted by the scene. Almost as if God wanted her to feel peace in the knowledge that Cole's place in heaven was secure.

As Kari pulled up near the entrance, she glanced at her husband. There were tears in her eyes and a deep sense of serenity. All her life she had worried while Mel had been strong and confident. Now there was fear in Mel's eyes and as they rushed from the car Kari gripped his elbow. “Mel, he's in the Lord's hands.”

Mel nodded, blinking back his own tears. “I know. All we can do is trust him.”

Others in the emergency room stared in horror at the blood-covered child and his frantic parents as they were ushered into an examination room. As they laid him on a table Cole began to cough and cry. “I'm choking.”

Kari felt sick as she realized it was true. He was choking on his own blood.

She and Mel leaned over their son. “It's okay, baby. Mommy and Daddy are here. You're going to be okay.”

Kari took hold of Cole's small hand as once more his body went limp and his eyes closed. Around the room a handful of nurses and doctors rushed to get the boy's vital signs and insert an IV into his arm.

“What happened?” a doctor asked as he stood over Cole and felt for his pulse.

Mel explained the situation, and as he did Kari sobbed quietly. She was no longer panicked. Just deeply sad at what seemed like the certain loss of their son. There was no way he could survive being hit on the head by the heavy ramp.

She forced the negative thoughts from her mind and prayed silently for the only way out of the disaster. She prayed for a miracle.

When Mel finished the story the doctor explained that Cole would need to be transferred to Indiana Regional Medical Center across town, where they had more sophis ticated equipment for severe head injuries. “We'll transport him in five minutes.”

Kari quickly called her parents and asked them to come. “And please pray, Mom,” Kari cried. “Ask everyone to pray.”

Later she would learn that before dark that evening, hundreds of people at churches in three states were praying for her son.

Kari, Mel, and two nurses stood in the room with Cole as they waited for the ambulance. The boy's skin color had grown frighteningly pale and both nurses were struggling to locate his pulse.

“We're losing him,” one of the nurses shouted. “Get the doctor in here.”

Kari was still holding Cole's hand and she squeezed it tightly. “Cole, honey,” she said through her tears. “No matter what happens, your daddy and I love you very much and we're praying for you.”

She let go of the child's hand and stepped back to make room for the nurses. At that instant, Cole moved. Kari nar rowed her eyes and Mel took a step closer to him.

Then, suddenly, in a surreal manner, Cole's small shoulders rose so that he was nearly sitting straight up. His eyes were still closed and it seemed as if someone were sup porting him with invisible hands behind his back. His long, black eyelashes fluttered and his eyes opened, staring blankly.

In a weak but clear voice he said, “Jesus, please take care of me …” Then he closed his eyes and sank back onto the hospital bed, still once again.

The nurses looked at each other and then at the Clausens in disbelief.

Kari and Mel stared at their son, stunned by what had just happened. Before anyone in the room could discuss Cole's movements or his simple words, ambulance atten dants rushed in and whisked the boy away.

The rest of the evening passed in a blur. Friends and family gathered in the hospital waiting room while doctors performed a CAT scan on Cole's brain. Early tests showed that he had suffered extensive damage.

“We'll let you know more information as soon as we have it,” one doctor told them. “But I have to be realistic with you. His chances don't look very good.”

Two hours later, a neurosurgeon found Kari and Mel in the waiting room and gently explained the X rays of Cole's head. The trailer ramp had shattered his skull, sending bone fragments into the area of the brain that controls speech, hearing, and memory.