DURING the years I was at work in the slums of a large city, the following cent example of a simple, confiding faith, came to my knowledge. The story is authentic—the facts precisely as stated. A poor little child of about eleven years old, developed a terrible malady which demanded an instant operation. He was taken to the hospital, where the great surgeon who examined him had to tell the little waif that, although there was just a fighting chance for his life, he would in all probability die on the operating table.
The seats of the operating theater, rising tier above tier, were filled with students, who had come to witness the greatest surgeon of his time use the knife. The little patient was brought in, and during the performance of certain preliminaries, placed in a large chair. Looking around at the great throng of men, he said timidly to one of the assistant doctors: “Please, sir, I am a Christian, and I should be very glad if one of you gentlemen would just say a little prayer for me. You’ve told me I’m in great danger, but a little prayer to Jesus would help me ever such a lot in my trouble.”
The surgeon patted him on the head. “We’ll do our best, my little man,” he said kindly. “You must try to be brave.”
“Yes,” answered the lad, “I’ll be brave, sir. But I’d like a little prayer to ask God to help you to use the knife right, and to help me too.”
There was a profound silence. Nobody moved, so the little child knelt down and said: “Dear Jesus, will you please have mercy on me now and if I die take me to be with You in heaven? I’m only a poor, weak little boy; but please, I’d like to live. So, dear Jesus, will You please help this kind gentleman, so that he will be able to do his work right? Amen.”
Having said his prayer, the boy got on the table with a quiet, smile lighting up his face. The an aesthetic was administered; but as long as there was any consciousness the boy was heard praying.
The great surgeon stood at the head of the table, fully aware that he was about to perform an operation that would test his skill to the utmost limit, an operation that required exceptional coolness, calmness and delicacy of touch. Yet for a moment or so he was visibly agitated. The students exchanged significant glances. Never had they seen their great chief unnerved before, and the fact of his being so now augered but ill for the life of the city waif. Yet as he looked at the still moving lips of the prostrate boy a great calm stole over the doctor. He commenced to operate, and immediately realized that the child’s prayer was being answered. Coolness of head, steadiness of hand, and delicacy of touch, all came as they were needed. The boy’s life hung on a mere thread, but the surgeon did not snap it. Though quite the most critical he had ever undertaken, the operation was performed with perfect ease and complete success.
The next morning the surgeon stood in the ward by the bedside of his little patient. Taking his hand he said: “Well, Tommy, the Lord Jesus heard your prayer yesterday.”
A happy, confident smile lit up the sick boy’s face as he answered: “Yes, I knew He would.” Then his face clouded over and he said: “And you were very good to me, and I have nothing to give you, nothing at all.”
Then a happy thought came to him, and his face lit up again as he whispered: “But I can keep on praying to Jesus for you, can’t I?”
A great lump came into the doctor’s throat. “Yes, you can,” he answered huskily, “and that will be heaps better than any kind of money, for God knows I sorely need the continual prayers of a brave little soul like you.”
ML-01/25/1920