Whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive. (Matthew 21:22)
Suddenly, it stopped! That lancing pain piercing my chest with every respiration had finally stopped. I was only eleven years old, but up to this I had been praying to die. I was lying in a hospital bed on Long Island, New York, and it was during Thanksgiving vacation; we were away from our Takoma Park, Maryland, home.
The year was 1931 before the use of antibiotics. X-rays had revealed that one lung, and all but one-fourth of my other lung, was filled with consolidation of lobar pneumonia. The physicians had just told my parents they could do no more. At this news, an immediate wire was sent to the Seventh-day Adventist Church headquarters, stating my problem and requesting prayer.
And then my pain stopped. Later, it was found that their hour of prayer coincided exactly with my instantaneous health. I had been healed by the power of prayer! It was then that I decided to devote my life to medicine.
Ever since that time, I have seen God’s guiding hand and have realized that, “Ask and ye shall receive.” actually means, “Ask and you’ll get My attention, but what you receive will be My will– do with it what you can.”
– Phyllis L. Presley, LLUSM class of 1945