When God works there are always tests and trials. Test to see if we really believe that He is working in our lives and will do what He said and trials He allows to remind us that we have an enemy of our souls. We found our selves facing one of these situations almost as soon as we started on our way to Texas A&M from Arkansas.
We left my Mom’s house on our way to Lake Ouachita State Park, where we were planing to stay for a week and then continue south from there. We discovered that we were out of propane and that we would need to refill it before we could fill the fridge. No big deal, we just needed to fine a gas station that did refills. So we drove keeping an eye out for a refill stop, but nothing came up. So Craig decided to just do an exchange. We pulled into a little gas station in the middle of nowhere, I took Israel (Our dog) for a walk and Craig went to get the propane exchanged.
As I was heading back to the bus I could see that Craig was brushing off the bottom of the “new” propane tank as someone was trying to ask about the bus, when I got closer I looked just in time to see a big Black Widow spider come off the bottom of the tank. Craig squished it and got the tank in place and the man that was talking with him left.
As it turned out before Craig could get all the spiders off the tank one had bitten him on the arm. Having grown up with spiders I knew that Black Widow bites can be very bad, even life threatening in some cases. So I started praying that God would heal Craig’s arm, we treated it with first aid salves and things we had on hand, but we knew that we had nothing to really stop it’s effect.
We left the gas station and no sooner had we left that we were pulled over by a AR state trooper as we had not removed our old Oregon license plate on the front of the bus when we got Arizona ones, OOPS!. Well we got that sorted out but not before Craig told the officer that he had just been bitten by a black widow spider, to which she responded, “You need to go the ER, don’t you know you could die! At the least you could lose your arm!” This was not encouraging at all, though I’m sure its quite true, but we really were in the middle of nowhere, there was no ER and we didn’t have the money to pay for it if we were to go, so we kept praying.
In less then half an hour you could see where the bite was, as it started to turn purple and grow in size. We had just enough coverage that I got a call out to my sister Sarah and asked her to pray as well. We had no choice but to keep going, so we did. We kept praying asking God to heal it, while watching to see how bad it would get. The purple stopped expanding at around 1 centimeter round and in three days we could not even tell that he had been bitten.
I know that God answered our prayers.
Psalm 71 New King James Version (NKJV)
God the Rock of Salvation
71 In You, O Lord, I put my trust;
Let me never be put to shame.
2 Deliver me in Your righteousness, and cause me to escape;
Incline Your ear to me, and save me.
3 Be my [a]strong refuge,
To which I may resort continually;
You have given the commandment to save me,
For You are my rock and my fortress.
4 Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked,
Out of the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man.
5 For You are my hope, O Lord God;
You are my trust from my youth.
6 By You I have been [b]upheld from birth;
You are He who took me out of my mother’s womb.
My praise shall be continually of You.
7 I have become as a wonder to many,
But You are my strong refuge.
8 Let my mouth be filled with Your praise
And with Your glory all the day.
9 Do not cast me off in the time of old age;
Do not forsake me when my strength fails.
10 For my enemies speak against me;
And those who lie in wait for my life take counsel together,
11 Saying, “God has forsaken him;
Pursue and take him, for there is none to deliver him.”
12 O God, do not be far from me;
O my God, make haste to help me!
13 Let them be [c]confounded and consumed
Who are adversaries of my life;
Let them be covered with reproach and dishonor
Who seek my hurt.
14 But I will hope continually,
And will praise You yet more and more.
15 My mouth shall tell of Your righteousness
And Your salvation all the day,
For I do not know their limits.
16 I will go in the strength of the Lord God;
I will make mention of Your righteousness, of Yours only.
17 O God, You have taught me from my youth;
And to this day I declare Your wondrous works.
18 Now also when I am old and gray headed,
O God, do not forsake me,
Until I declare Your strength to this generation,
Your power to everyone who is to come.
19 Also Your righteousness, O God, is [d]very high,
You who have done great things;
O God, who is like You?
20 You, who have shown me great and severe troubles,
Shall revive me again,
And bring me up again from the depths of the earth.
21 You shall increase my greatness,
And comfort me on every side.
22 Also with the lute I will praise You—
And Your faithfulness, O my God!
To You I will sing with the harp,
O Holy One of Israel.
23 My lips shall greatly rejoice when I sing to You,
And my soul, which You have redeemed.
24 My tongue also shall talk of Your righteousness all the day long;
For they are confounded,
For they are brought to shame
Who seek my hurt.