Prayer, Medicine and Miracles

By Dave Walker

Dave Walker was an ambitious anesthesiologist, determined to be the best in his field. Yet it was only when he had an encounter with the living Christ and started praying with his patients, that he witnessed healing far beyond what medicine alone could provide.
As you read, you will walk with him through his first encounter with a dead man, witness the drama of rescuing a young man stabbed in the heart, share his alarm and fervent prayer as the hands and feet of a young woman turn blue, then black while she battles septicemia. You will hear the praise of an exuberant crowd prayer walking through a prison, and feel the contemptuous scowl of a man in "solitary". You will sit with him with men from a homeless shelter and hear their stories of how Jesus saves. You will share in the power of prayer to rescue a man in ICU from multiple organ failure and marvel at the work of God through a young woman condemned to die.
In this gripping account of the intervention of a loving God who brings healing in the lives of those we pray for, you will find yourself encouraged, edified and challenged. Above all, you will see the hand of God moving through the power of prayer. This is a story to inspire believers and encourage doubters.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dave Walker
• Release date: Sep 23, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370253289

Dave Walker

Dave Walker practiced anaesthesia in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, for 22 years before moving to the Middle East for six years. While in practice he developed a special interest in intensive care and was Administrative Head of Grey’s Hospital ICU for a number of years. In the Middle East he was Head of the Anaesthetic Department at Tawam Hospital, United Arab Emirates. He currently lives in Howick, South Africa. He is married to Dorelle and has three daughters and seven grandchildren. He has ghost written two books, published three books and has the second novel of Jason Langley MD in process.

Book preview

Prayer, Medicine and Miracles

Faith adventures of a praying doctor

by DAVE WALKER MD

Copyright 2017 David Walker MD

Smashwords Edition

When I published my first book, God in the ICU, I received many requests for more stories. This is a response to those requests.

In many ways it has been a hard book to write. I had to give it some sort of time line, and yet I did not want to repeat what I had written in God in the ICU. I have got around that by using historical events to pin the incidents in some kind of time frame. Nevertheless, I inevitably had to repeat some of the biographical progression, which I have covered here in far less depth than I did in God in the ICU, in which it plays a greater role in the unfolding story. If this is the first book of mine that you are reading, what you read here will, I’m sure, in no way detract from the story in God in the ICU.

Contents

Preface

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Epilogue

More Reading

Extract from God in the ICU

Preface

Like a magic lantern show, the images come and go. On occasion the lantern sputters, darkening momentarily while murky pictures hasten from my mind: vague memories of games with my brother, now long dead; a vision of panting up the crumbling scree on the slopes of Kilimanjaro in the pre-dawn gloom; laughter and pain at the camaraderie and conflict confronting a boy in his teens. At other times, bright and clear, a story unfolds -- a little boy on the front seat of an old car as it dashes through the night, listening wide-eyed to his dad; monitors screaming as a young girl lies in a pool of blood on the ICU bed; hands pressed against the grates of prison windows, desperate for contact with the outside world.

These are the images that make up who I am, just as you have images that make up who you are. We humans are strange, four dimensional creatures, living in our past as well as our present. Behind each face, each reaction, is an unseen history. What we were, what we experienced shapes what we are, how we react.

Yet, mystery of mysteries, how we perceive our history changes the way it molds us. The lens shapes the viewer.

No doubt, if I had told my story three decades ago it would be different. Yet the Bible tells us that gray hairs are an old man's glory, so perhaps I can tell it with greater wisdom and insight now. In any case, I can laugh at things that did not seem funny at the time and weep now, at stories that left me unmoved then. Whatever the case, my life has been full. Abundant life is not a life of ease, or permanent highs. It is exhilarating peaks and shattering valleys, joy and pain, freedom and brokenness sometimes, paradoxically, together.

As you read my story perhaps, since we all belong to that exclusive race called 'human', you will experience, not only me, but something of yourself in the stories.

Chapter One

Beginnings

I looked down on the body of the first dead man I'd ever seen. He was muscular and must have been strong; a man in his late 40s, now lying stiff and cold on the dissecting table of the Anatomy laboratory. The long room was cold, filled with the acrid smell of formalin. I had walked from the sunshine of optimism and adventure into a ghoulish place that seemed dark and threatening. Like most young men, I felt indestructible. Death was unthinkable -- at worst, a far off reality. Yet here I was looking down on it as starkly real.

I wondered what he had died from -- he looked so virile and tough. And what of his family? Who was mourning this man, who now was laid out as an object to be dissected and analyzed by a group of medical students? Were there young children? A mourning wife? And where was his soul? Was he with God? The chill in the room was echoed in my spirit. I felt reluctant to put a scalpel to his skin.

The year was 1960. I was in my second year of training as a doctor, fulfilling the dream I had nursed from the age of seven. This was my first Anatomy class. I was maturing fast.

How did I get here? As I look back, I can see the hand of God moving — imperceptibly at the times, but obviously, on looking back.

It all started as an 8-year old boy....

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How would you like to come with me to Umniati, Dave? It'll be a long drive, but we can both go to the power station and we will see Mr. Jack.

What, just me? What about Ray? Ray was my mischievous younger brother.

No, Ray is still a bit small. Just you and me. My heart jumped for joy. My dad was an electrical engineer and needed to travel occasionally to inspect the rural power stations. Umniati was one of them. And I was going with him. This was man's stuff.

We set off early in the morning, arriving in time for lunch with Mr. Jack and his wife.

Mr. Jack was a thin florid-faced man with bright bedraggled carrot-red hair and a wiry mustache to match. He spoke in a sharp, gravelly voice that sounded as if he was about to choke. He had a predilection for chilies, and at lunch he ate them whole. When he did, his face grew even redder and he started sweating profusely; his voice grew sharper and higher as if he was about to be strangled. In my eight year old mind he seemed to be on fire, consumed by an inner furnace that blazed through his face and hair. It was fascinating to sit next to a fire man -- almost like being in one of Grimm's Fairy Tales. I half expected his wife to have a spinning wheel and a little gnome in her bedroom.

It was dark when we set off back to Salisbury. My father had a phenomenal memory for poetry and memorized many epics which he enjoyed reciting. On this occasion, as he drove, he recited The Shooting of Dan McGrew by Robert Service. I sat on the edge of the bench seat of our big old car gazing at him as he recited. The light from the dashboard shone dimly on his face and glinted in his eyes which were trained on the road ahead. Only his lips moved, telling a story that transported me to another world.

Part of me was sitting by my dad. Another part was in a low-lit saloon bar, lounging at the counter with a burly group of tough miners and prospectors while

Back of the bar in a solo game.

Sat dangerous Dan McGrew

The car headlights caused the trees to loom, then flash by, but I hardly noticed as a stranger, fresh from the creeks dog dirty and loaded for bear stumbled into the bar and ordered drinks all round. Dangerous Dan McGrew drank last.

There's men that somehow just grip your eyes,

And hold them hard like a spell;

My father drove on, but his words took on life in that world of bare floorboards, rough wooden tables, smoking lanterns and macho men.

And such was he, and he looked to me

Like a man who had lived in hell;

With a face most hair, and the dreary stare

Of a dog whose day is done,

The steady rhythm of Dad's voice heightened the drama. Who was this man? And what did he have to do with dangerous Dan McGrew?

My father's lips poured out a story of real men fighting over a girl, and I was there with the toughest of them.

Finally, Dan McGrew lay bullet-ridden on the floor while the stranger was dying in the woman's arms. The story was over but, like any good tale, it lingered in the atmosphere, hanging like the cigarette smoke in the saloon, as I sat quietly beside my dad.

Today, there is much made about gender confusion. That trip defined me as a man. Though I was only eight, from that day onward I knew I was male -- and was made for manly things. It was the foundation for a life of adventure. I knew that men took risks. Real men are prepared to do dangerous things in spite of the hazard.

As I developed, I knew that men risked not just physically, but emotionally and spiritually too. This also meant doing what is right no matter the cost. Real men formed their own opinions; they didn't just follow the crowd. Of course, all this came much later. It was fleshed out and