The phone rang. Dad put down his garden tools, wiped the sweat from his face and rushed into the house to grab the phone before its final ring. With his mind on his Saturday morning chores, he didn't notice the sliding glass patio door was closed.

Mom found him in a pool of blood with glass shards laying beside him. Frantically, Mom called 911. The dispatcher couldn't send any help, it seems that my parent's address was on the wrong side of an arbitrary bureaucratic line. Mom would have to call someone else.

Afraid there wasn't enough time to make another phone call, Mom managed to get Dad in the front seat of the car to take him to the hospital herself. Instead of getting on the freeway and driving to downtown Ft. Worth, she took a side street to a hospital that was closer.

Traffic was heavy. Blood was pouring into the floorboard of the car. Time slowed down. Dad was bleeding to death. Mom was desperate.

My Dad was dying and Mom felt helpless. Traffic was at a standstill. Mom saw the looks on the driver's faces as they pointed to the bleeding man, her husband in the car next to them. She honked the horn, but no one pulled over to let her by. No one offered to help. At that moment she would have done anything to get Dad the help he needed. It was surreal. The strong man who had always provided for her and always protected her was wilting away before her very eyes. He needed help. She had to get him some help.

Have you been there? Have you ever been in the position of knowing you're the only one that can help, and you do everything you can, but you still feel helpless? Maybe it was a traffic accident, or cancer. Or maybe it was standing by helplessly as your children made bad choices that are ruining their lives. Have you ever been in the spot where you had no where to turn, and you were willing to do anything?

I can only imagine my Mom's relief as she turned into the entry way of the emergency room at the hospital. Attendants put Dad on a Gurney and wheeled him in. I was a freshman in college when this all happened. I can still remember the tremor in my Mother's voice when she called to tell me about it.

Dad was pretty beat up. His face was scarred and the glass had cut a major blood vessel in his leg. In the early hours, it looked like he would live, but the doctors weren't sure if they could save Dad's leg.

Dad was confined to a wheel chair when he went home, but he kept serving the Lord. Each week, some men from the church would help him get up on stage and he would preach his sermon. One Sunday, he forgot about his leg and walked to the pulpit, stood and began preaching. The congregation gasped. God healed him. He never used the wheelchair again.

Dad doesn't talk about his healing much. While acknowledging the fact that God performed a miracle in his life, saved his leg and healed his body, he prefers to talk about a greater miracle. The day God saved his soul and made him a new man.

Over 100 years ago, doctors first noticed that people, who could not speak after an injury to the speech center in the left side of their brains, could still sing. In the 1970s, researcher in Boston started using what they termed “singing therapy” to help stroke survivors regain the power to speak. The treatment advanced slowly because most people did not want to go around signing every word, and technology was not advanced enough to show that actual changes in the brain resulting from therapy. Now Boston hospital, is conducting a new series of studies of melodic intonation therapy, which is showing real promise for stroke victims.

One of the people the therapy is working for is 16-year-old Laurel Fontaine, who suffered an unusual devastating stroke at a young age. Laurel underwent conventional speech therapy for as year, but could only speak a word or two at a time. When her mother convinced the hospital to enroll Laurel in the research project, she saw dramatic improvement. After four months of singing therapy Laurel speaks clearly, though she occasionally struggles to find the words she wants.

Laurel provided the research teams with an extra bonus. She has an identical twin sister, and researchers can compare image of the girls’ brains. Before Laurel began melodic intonation therapy, the structure in the right side of her brain, which controls singing, was small. As the therapy progressed, the structure multiplied and thickened, providing the doctor with concrete evidence the therapy was has a positive impact. Between her sessions, Laurel is just happy to be able to have the gift of speech back. She said, “I’m singing in my head and talking out loud without singing. I do it, like, really quickly.”

--Singing Therapy Helps Stroke Patients Speak Again, http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/12/26/144152193/singing-therapy-helps-stroke-patients-speak-again ; December 26, 2012, Illustration by Jim L. Wilson and Jim Sandell.

Who knew? We’ve know for a long time that music has great spiritual benefit, but now we know it has other benefits as well.

Ephesians 5:19 (CEV) When you meet together, sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, as you praise the Lord with all your heart.

The Advertising Standards Authority of the Brittish government told the a congregation based in Brad-on-Avon to stop placing claims that God can heal illnesses on their website and leaflets. The ASA determined the leaflet proclaiming “Need Healing? God can heal today!” was misleading. The group known as HOTS or Healing on the Streets says their purpose was to promote Christian healing “as a daily lifestyle for every believer.”

The ASA said they had been alerted to the messages by a complainant, and concluded they could encourage false hope and it was irresponsible of the Christian group to make such a claim. The HOTS group said the complete message added that the group was a Christian group that prayed in the name of Jesus. They told readers they believed God loves people and could heal them, and they wanted the opportunity to pray for the sick.” The group said they will appeal because though they tried to reach a compromise, they could not agree to a ban on expressing their beliefs. A spokesman added, “All over the world as part of their normal Christian life, Christians believe in, pray for and experience God’s healing; our ministry, in common with many churches, has been active in praying for God’s healing (Of Christians and non Christians) for many years.”

--Bath Christian group’s ‘God can heal’ adverts banned, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-16871116 ; February 3, 2012, Illustration by Jim L. Wilson and Jim Sandell.

James 5:15-18 (HCSB) (15) The prayer of faith will save the sick person, and the Lord will restore him to health; if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. (16) Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed. The urgent request of a righteous person is very powerful in its effect. (17) Elijah was a man with a nature like ours; yet he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the land. (18) Then he prayed again, and the sky gave rain and the land produced its fruit.