‘God stories’ of divine intervention

In “God Stories,” journalist Jennifer Skiff shares the extraordinary experiences of people who have felt the power of God's presence in their lives and been forever changed. An excerpt.

Introduction
Why am I here? Is there more? Does God exist? These questions nag at us incessantly throughout our lives. But the answers are elusive, always just out of reach. Today we are fact-driven people: we need evidence before we form opinions and often dismiss events that can’t be logically explained. Yet we desperately want the security that comes with having a certain future. The search for that security has divided people into two camps: those who look for solace in organized religion and its promise of an afterlife, and those who consider themselves spiritual but not religious — they believe their souls are going somewhere, but they’re not sure exactly where. Regardless of what camp you’re in, we all want the same thing. We want confirmation that what we believe is true. We want proof of modern-day encounters with the Divine.

I’ve been offered proof of God’s existence at regular intervals in my life through experiences so profound they’ve given goose bumps to atheists. These epiphanies have blanketed me with an inner peace, washing away my fears and giving me hope for the future. The intense joy I feel at these times eventually dissipates and I drift into a safe complacency. As time passes and life events take their toll, I start to question again until yet another unexpected collision with the Divine awakens me like a plunge into cold water and replenishes my faith. I know I’m not alone. Because the proof we’re given is not tangible, it’s often held tightly for a short time and then released. But our appetite remains insatiable. Like ants to a grain of sugar, we crave more. And that’s what has brought us here.

As you turn the pages in this book, a chill may overwhelm you, your eyes may fill with tears, and the hair on your arms may suddenly stand as the answers to the questions you’ve always wanted to know become apparent.

My reason for writing a book of this nature is not the obvious one. I’m certainly not an expert on the subject of God or religion. The idea first came to me when a minister asked if I had any “God Stories.” I asked her what she meant, and she explained that a God Story was a miraclelike experience that proves God exists.

No one had ever asked me that question before. I did have stories. I hadn’t dared to tell many people about them, but I definitely had had what I believed to be encounters with the Divine. The concept piqued my interest as a journalist, and I wondered if many other people had stories too. To find out, I began to poll my friends, and what happened next surprised me most. I realized that a Divine intelligence that many call God is connecting with millions of people every day.

One of my own encounters happened when I was thirty-two years old. It was a time of overwhelming sadness and disappointment. Professionally I was thriving — working as a correspondent for CNN, the biggest news network in the world. But personally I was very unhappy and felt like a failure. I was married for the second time, and for the second time I was planning to divorce.

It was at this time that I began experiencing a debilitating pain in my right leg. After months of consultations with doctors who couldn’t determine what was wrong, I was sent to the chief of orthopedics at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, where it was confirmed that I had a tumor in my bone marrow. I needed to be operated on immediately.

When I awoke from surgery, my doctor told me he had been able to save my leg temporarily, but I did in fact have bone cancer. And although it sounds terrible, I felt a sense of relief knowing I would no longer have to continue on with my life.

And then something strange happened. Within forty-eight hours of my diagnosis, I began receiving cards, flowers, stuffed animals, and gifts of delicious things to eat. I had no idea how so many people had learned I was in the hospital. A person I hadn’t seen since I was a young girl wrote to tell me how I had influenced her life. Notes arrived from different parts of the country from people I didn’t know telling me they were praying for me. My friends and family cried and overwhelmed me with their affection. I was engulfed by a warm blanket of love.

Nearly a week after the surgery, I was in my hospital bed envisioning my funeral when my doctor rushed into my room, breathless. He looked at me and smiled a big, wide smile. “I never get to say this,” he said, shaking his head and throwing his hands into the air. “Benign!”

“Benign? What do you mean, ‘benign’? I thought it was malignant.”

“It was,” he said. “The slide we looked at told us it was malignant. The lab results have just come back, and they say it’s benign. We’re going with benign!”

The entire experience was all the proof I needed. I had been given signs before, but this was obvious. There was a God for me, one who made it clear it was important I continue on with my life — to work toward positive change in the world and to see and understand all I had been blessed with.

Some people spend their whole lives questioning, while others are offered what they believe is proof. The confirmation for actress Jane Seymour came while she was filming a movie in Spain. She was given antibiotics for a bronchitis infection and immediately went into anaphylactic shock. “The next thing I remember, I was panicking and then I wasn’t panicking,” she said. “I was very calm. I was looking down at my body. Then I realized that I was out of my body and that I was going to die. So I asked whoever was up there — God, a Higher Power, whatever one wants to call it — I just said, ‘Whoever you are, I will never deny your existence. I will never let you down. I’m not going to waste one minute of my life if I have it back.’ ” In this book you’ll find out what happened next that changed Jane Seymour’s life forever.

"God Stories" is a collection of such Aha! experiences. The stories are told by people from every walk of life — all celebrating that breakthrough moment when they received dramatic confirmation of the existence of a Divine Power. The result is pure inspiration: a compilation of extraordinary experiences that have renewed spirits and affirmed faiths.

In California, Senator Dick Mountjoy’s spiritual awakening came at a time when he was embroiled in a political battle and in the depths of professional despair. A stranger approached him, put her hand on his shoulder, and asked if she could pray for him. His life changed in that instant. He describes how a warm feeling quickly spread throughout his body and a sense of calm fell over him. From that moment on, he felt a continuous sense of comfort and all his worries slipped away.

In Maine, a young mother describes the chilling moment she realized that she and her children were going to die. She was driving down a country road when two drag racers came over a hill directly in front of her, taking both lanes. She didn’t have time to avoid a head-on collision. In "God Stories," she tells how God intervened and saved her life.

Shirley Blake describes a brutal rape as her epiphany. She was fifty-nine years old. In what can only be described as the most frightening moment in her life, she says she heard God’s voice reassure and comfort her. In this book you find out why, today, she says the experience was enlightening.

I realized the significance of this project when I started collecting stories. My goal was to be interviewed by the media in hopes that the publicity would direct people to my website, where they could submit their stories. At the beginning of this process, I was interviewed by a newspaper editor in his office. When he wrapped up his questions, I asked him if he had a story. He did, and as he told it, he cried. I was completely taken aback and didn’t know what to do. And then, as I listened, I realized how privileged I was that he was sharing his story with me.

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