My Chains are Gone…I’ve Been Set Free!
By Kim Faulkner
On a Saturday in late July 2024, what started with my husband, Paul, complaining that he was finding it difficult to breathe, became a full-blown health crisis which resulted in him being hospitalized for a severe chest infection.
In the space of one day, further tests revealed that he could have an infection of his mitral heart valve, and as his condition deteriorated over the weekend, he was admitted into ICU. At that point, I recalled praying just the week before, for Jesus to touch my life so that I would sense the reality of His Presence; but little did I think it would come under these circumstances.
This felt like a blast from the past - 13 years ago we had made the same trip to A&E because Paul had difficulty breathing, and it turned out to be endocarditis, an infection of the heart valve, and it resulted in a three-month hospital stay!
This time, his second stay in hospital also lasted three months, when he was finally discharged in mid-October.
But God clearly remembered my prayer, because amidst the uncertainties of seeing Paul deteriorate week by week, I felt the reality of His Presence, trusting not in what was around us - the differing doctors’ opinions, the repeated trips to the ICU and the devastating effects of the medication - but the sure knowledge and sense that Jesus was walking alongside us.
I remember sharing with a friend who was journeying with us and sympathizing with the daily anxiety of seeing Paul deteriorate, “When we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus rather than what is around us, then all is calm.”
Paul’s surgery to remove the old implanted valve with a new valve, was finally able to take place in the second month of his hospitalization. He was much weaker and there were fears that he might not be able to withstand the anesthetic. When the kids and I saw Paul on the night before the surgery, we were all trying our best to be positive.
As a wife, seeing someone you love so ill, was sad, and I went to bed that night praying that God would be present in the operating theatre and that He would comfort Paul.
Then early on the morning of the surgery, I saw a vision of Paul in the operating theatre surrounded by the surgeons and the implant team, and all around them were illuminated angels overseeing the procedure. I woke up to look up a verse from Psalm 34:7:
"The angel of the LORD encamps all around those who fear Him and delivers them. Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; Blessed is the man who trusts in Him!"
This amazing assurance from God that He was with us, and that His angels were watching over Paul, sustained the children and me during that long day. The surgery lasted far longer than expected. It was eight hours before he was taken out of the theatre and I had to wait another two hours before they allowed me into the ICU. I was told that they were not going to wake Paul as planned, and that they would keep him under till the next morning.
Whilst the road to recovery was long and arduous, the assurance from Jesus that He would always be present, together with the continued prayers and encouragement from friends in HVMC and other Christians, showed us we were not alone.
However difficult a journey, His abiding presence fills us with peace, as we are assured of His sovereignty and provision.
Paul and I give all Glory to the One who is able to save.
“My chains are gone, I’ve been set free!” The day that Paul was finally discharged from hospital and NUHS@Home and allowed to remove the hospital bands he had been wearing for months.
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