more time with you,” he replied, “I’ve waited so long to talk with you again.”
The irony of the tall, strong man before him calling him Daddy was more than enough to dissuade him. Eventually, even getting to know his grown children couldn’t keep his eyelids from falling. As if being sleep’s prisoner for fifteen years wasn’t enough, he began to succumb to its call. His eldest son lifted him from the bench in the yard—as easily as if he were a feather—and carried him to his bed. His wife and children gathered around him once again as it became obvious he would soon be asleep. They had talked and sat with him for an entire day and night, keeping him awake through the following morning.
“We love you so much Daddy,” his daughter said, and all echoed their affection for him, just as tearfully as when he first awoke.
“I’ll be awake in a few hours,” he lied, sadly aware of the warning he’d overheard the doctor giving his family only hours ago, thinking he was out of earshot.
“He may return to normal after today,” his doctor had said, after performing a few tests. “But I fear it’s not likely. His brainwaves aren’t normal—they’re still too close to those we find in a comatose patient. I don’t understand how he’s awake and responsive with such minimal brainwave activity.”
“It’s a miracle,” said his wife, and the doctor agreed.
“Yes, but even miracles don’t last forever. I’m afraid when he next falls asleep, he’s not likely to wake again. I’m so very sorry.”
When he could fight it no longer, he simply closed his teary eyes. As he did, he heard his grown children and wife quietly mourn losing him once again. And yet—sleep didn’t come as he expected. He wasn’t able to open his eyes or feel his body, but he was able to hear. He listened as his children and wife each came near and whispered to him, as he lay still as death.
He wondered, “Is this what a coma feels like—did I somehow forget? Will I be trapped forever, able only to hear—wishing every day for death?”
As alarming as the thought was, he didn’t feel distressed; in fact, an unexpected peace seemed to envelope him. He realized all he’d wanted out of life had come to pass. He’d seen his children grown, each so familiar with the joy of serving Christ, each raised by the loving hand of his wife and his God, graceful through all. He saw his wife, and knew her needs—physical, spiritual and emotional—had been met by God, and also by the support of their grown children.
“I can die now,” he thought, “I am complete”. Immediately he was bombarded by the memory of his thoughts from the night of his accident—and he knew how foolish he’d been.
“How does a promotion compare with this: to see my children grown and successful: committed to God and enjoying the peace only He can bring—to see my wife, cared for and surrounded by them, a loving family knit so close together? If I’d been promoted, it could in no way have added to this great treasure.”
Inwardly, he wept for how he’d taken so much in his life for granted. He understood how he’d often abandoned this peace for some pathetic imitation he’d fleetingly desired. He saw how he frequently he’d traded God’s treasures for pale substitutions, mere shadows of what he truly wanted. The perspective was unbearable to him.
“How could I have missed it?” he asked himself, gradually sick with the bitter taste of regret in his mouth. “How could I have been so blind?” He begged God to grant him one last request. “Tell them Lord—show them what I now see. Don’t let this revelation go to waste.” Then, amazingly, he heard God reply. At first he wondered, “Am I dying?” Quickly, he shoved the thought aside to listen to the voice in his mind’s ear.
“Yes, I will tell them. I will call them, and I will tell them this same message I’ve been telling you for so long…this message you chose not to hear. Why did you ignore me, dear child? I told you every day, and showed you in a thousand ways, but you were too busy to listen. How loudly must I whisper before you hear Me?”
He wept bitterly to hear such revealing truth. “I told you so often…” he heard God again, “but don’t be bitter now. Let go your regret…”
It was too much to take in at once. The words rung all too loudly in his mind as he lay there, motionless. And as amazingly as falling asleep and not waking for fifteen years, he awoke that night without falling asleep at all.
“…relax…relax…” he thought he heard God’s voice telling him. Then louder, more brashly, “You have to lie back and relax.”
He tried again to sit up, and a nurse far too powerful for her small frame leaned her forearm against his shoulder. “Lie down,” she continued shouting, clearly unconcerned with offending him. “Your family is fine. Your wife is waiting in the next room.”
“What—” he stammered, “what’s happening?”
“I told you. You’ve been in a car accident, and you’ve had emergency surgery. The drugs are still wearing off. You’re not going to remember any of this, so lie back and relax.”
But he did remember; he remembered everything.
“What kind of accident?” he asked, “Did I hit a tree? Was I in a coma?”
“A coma? You haven’t had time for that. Now lay still and relax, or you’ll pull your stitches. Your wife will meet you in recovery soon enough—she got here almost as soon as the ambulance. I told her you’re going to be fine, but she’s worried just the same,” the nurse said, shaking her head.
“No coma? The accident…was today?”
“The ambulance arrived just a few hours ago,” replied the nurse, pressing even harder into his shoulder.
“Thank you, Lord,” he whispered quietly, eyes closing. At last he made sense of the words his children in his dream had remembered, the words he’d spoken but couldn’t recall. They’re instructions, not memories—God sent me instructions in my dream. And unexpectedly, other words rang again in his ears—the words God had whispered so loudly to him that day—so loudly it nearly killed him.
“I told you every day, and showed you in a thousand ways… How loudly must I whisper before you hear Me?”
The End
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When God Whispers Loudly Page 2
