Intercessory Prayer Group

Our family made a memorable trip last summer to Sri Lanka, for our youngest daughter Heidi Lewis to see where she was born. The trip also included an experience that brought a vivid reminder of the wondrous ways that God answers prayer.

After spending two weeks in Sri Lanka, seeing the sights and visiting old friends on the resplendent island where we resided in the late 1980s, we were scheduled to travel to Sweden, where we would visit close friends in the town of Visby. On our last day in Sri Lanka, after completing a 10-day circle tour of the island, we were back in our hotel in Colombo, where I felt generally weak and had a fever. I had been having stomach and abdominal pains off and on for more than a week, but they were not severe, and I figured that I was probably reacting to all of the spicy food I had been eating—thoroughly enjoying the Sri Lankan rice and curry—over the last several days.

I didn’t want to call for the hotel doctor because I surely would have been asked to stay back for tests while the rest of my family traveled to Sweden early the next morning. Instead, I prayed that evening, as did my wife Laurie Lewis, that I would feel well enough on Monday to travel comfortably with my family. When I awoke early Monday morning, the fever had broken and I felt fine, apart from a small spot that was tender if I pressed on it. I was similarly pain-free throughout the entire day of travel, and we arrived at our hotel in Visby, Sweden, some 22 hours after leaving our hotel in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Our specific prayers had been answered. But they were answered with more grace and power than I realized at the time. On our second day in Sweden, I was starting to feel uncomfortable, and the following day I went to the local hospital to get checked out. Later that day (Wednesday), I had an appendectomy. The Swedish surgeon told me later that the appendix had ruptured several days earlier—that is, before I left Sri Lanka; he couldn’t say just when. I learned later that infections from a burst appendix, if left untreated, can spread and become life threatening.

So here I had asked God for a day of relatively pain-free travel, and I received that and more: I was spared from a potentially dangerous spread of infection. During the day of travel from Sri Lanka to Sweden, the infection was somehow stopped from spreading. The burst appendix seemed to have been put on hold until I arrived in Sweden, where the medical care is excellent. Medical facilities in Sri Lanka have improved greatly over the last 20 years, but they haven’t yet reached the Swedish standard.

This is but one story of answered prayer. Others have arisen in a different context, namely, from St. George’s intercessory prayer group, which was formed several months ago, allowing parishioners and others to request prayers of any length. Prayer requesters have the comfort of knowing that a dedicated group of individuals are praying for their needs on a daily basis. You can submit requests to this prayer group, which is coordinated by Seville Allen, by sending her an e-mail at ceoallen@erols.com, or use our online prayer request form.

-- Wayne Lewis