Have you ever prayed and felt like God didn't answer prayer any more? Bill Courtemanche was like that.He had had a faith as a youngster, but had had a problem with alcohol, and had drifted away. One day a gun went off near his ear. He became completely deaf in one ear and lost 40 per cent of his hearing in the other. He learned to lip read, but still had problems.
He rededicated his life to Christ, and felt his faith had grown strong over the years since. But then there were problems in his local church. A 36-year-old mother died of cancer. Things continued to go wrong.
Bill knelt at the front of the church, pouring out his heart to God. "Lord, what is going on? Why do we have all this suffering? Do you even hear our prayers?" Suddenly he felt a terrible burning in his ears.
"I felt like my head was on fire, like it was about to explode," he said. He went home and slept for a while. When he woke up, the burning and nausea were gone. Then he noticed. After 17 years, he could hear with both ears.
He went to an audiologist, who told him there was nothing wrong with his ears.
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Later, Bill's mother was found dead in her bathroom. Paramedics worked on her and took her to hospital, where her heart stopped a second time. She was placed on life support.
Bill sat by her bed, praying for her, reading to her and "doing the things you do when you don't know what to do."
He explained his dilemma to a chaplain. His mother was technically brain dead. He did not want to say yes to removing her life support and let her die, but she was only alive because she was hooked up to machines.
The chaplain said life support machines were man-made and only God could terminate a life. If she was meant to go home she would die, and if she wasn't, she wouldn't.
They fixed Saturday to remove her life support. On Saturday, they told Bill to kiss her goodbye. When he did, she woke up. The doctor said it was a miracle.
It turned out that although she was supposed to be brain dead, she had still managed to hear.
She told Bill "You know the most annoying thing? You know how hard it is to sleep when someone sits there all night reading to you?"
God loves to answer prayer. Don't limit Him.
