According to the bible, or so I hear, a watch-night is like the night vigil before a feast. And since that is what happened to me last night, I am calling this the watch-night surgery. I had an appointment with a new eye doctor at a distance that was out of my comfort zone. That distance alone was enough to scare me but the reason I was going to see the specialist was even worse. I had heard that the surgery for that condition used to cost $5000.00 in the days before costs increased.
Only God knew how much it would cost if the doctor should make that diagnosis. Put together, these factors meant that I went to bed a little anxious. And despite my physical tiredness, having walked more than five thousand steps in the afternoon, my troubled mind prevented sleep. There I was, tossing and turning, mapping the road to the doctor’s office in my mind’s eye. One hour turned to three hours and before you knew it, midnight had passed.
That was when God cued me to prayer. Why had I not thought of it earlier, I scolded myself. I started to pray and although my faith for healing was in its infancy, I felt God. It felt as if He was prompting me to pray for the healing of my eye. He seemed ready to perform a watch-night surgery on my eye. What did I have to lose? It was that I realized that my being unable to sleep was from God. I smiled. God was giving me a taste of my own prescription. He has a fantastic sense of humor.
My Watch-night Surgery Was A Positive Problem
You may recall that we started a positive problem series on how we must embrace all situations, even if undesirable. We said then that as long as you are born again, every situation comes to you from God, not from satan. Satan deals with his own children while God relates to his own children. Any situation that comes to you from God will turn out to your advantage even if it is bitter at the start. And people were starting to embrace the concept, with some remarkable results.
Well, last night, it was my turn. God decided to test me. Was I merely preaching or was I ready to do as I said? First, he took my sleep away. I mean, I was already sleepy before I went to bed and yet I could not fall asleep. That was not the first time I was worried about things. I would just apply scripture to be anxious for nothing and promptly fall asleep. But not last night and it took me a few hours before I realized who stole my sleep.
In the past, I would have been angry at God. But not last night. Okay, God, you took the sleep. Is there a purpose? Of course, I am a God of purpose. Pray for your eye. Oh, okay. Now, faith for healing is not my strong point because, as a doctor, I tend to lean on my understanding. So if God were asking me to pray for healing, I would need greater faith than normal for this watchnight surgery. He gave me the grace to see my eye healed as I prayed.
God Used This Positive Problem To Build Faith
After I thought I had finished, I still could not sleep and asked Him what else was there to do. Pray in tongues. Oh, it is like that, is it? By then, it was almost 6 am and my appointment was for 9.30 am a good 50 minutes away. I prayed in tongues for a while and fell asleep. Two hours was better than none. I made a promise to write this before nightfall today if I received my healing.
Now, you may not need to add a vow to your prayers but with such a high bill for human surgery, I was highly motivated. I needed God to perform His watch-night surgery, which He did beautifully. By the time the specialist saw me, he had to conclude there was nothing wrong with that eye. It even surprised me by scoring a 20/20 vision. This is me keeping my vow to God for His performing a watch-night surgery on my eye.
Your Faith Can Grow With A Watch-night Surgery
But that is not all that resulted from that problem of sleeplessness. I was almost in a panic that I would fall asleep on the long drive. But that did not happen. Thirdly, my faith grew. You know how James says that problems help us to develop character and how we should count problems as all joy? That is correct but I see from this watchnight surgery that problems can also build faith. And all this because of the problem of lack of sleep when I badly needed it.
My eye is perfect, my faith is strong and I now know I can drive on two hours of sleep. I don’t want to brag but if God keeps bringing me problems, the devil might soon be afraid of me. Thank you, Jesus, for the problem that brought on the watch-night surgery. But please do not just read this. Run with it as you pray that God will bring you your own problem. It may be that you will receive your own watch-night surgery, if not in your eye, then on your finances or wherever. You can become a person of faith.
Maranatha!