El McMeen shares a "God-at-Work Moment"

El McMeen

Readers following my articles may expect this piece to be the second installment promised in my previous article. For reasons that will become clear, I must depart from that plan and share with you some different testimony. I thank the fine people at Cross Rhythms for hosting a website that allows people to share revelations, joys and concerns on a real-time basis. Too many times God speaks to people, but because the events are not written down or communicated, they are lost.

I write this column on February 3, 2007. This is the second anniversary of the death of my sister Frances at age 62. She was taken by metastatic bone cancer. The cancer started in her jaw, was treated, but spread to her bones. In the early fall of 2004, she had gotten the devastating diagnosis that the cancer was inoperable. (I am still extremely grateful to the good people who provided visitation to my sister every day of the week during her illness--including members of the Church of St. Paul and St. Andrew, on West 86th Street in New York City.)

My sister grew up in a family that attended church regularly, and she studied the Bible. She had an advanced degree in library science, and had a questioning and inquisitive mind. She liked to obtain all appropriate "information" before making decisions. I wasn't sure about the level of her personal relationship with Jesus, in the circumstances of this terrible illness. She may have felt comfortable confiding in friends on this subject, and I fully understand that. (A younger brother is, after all, just that - even if he is in his late 50's.)

Late in her illness, when Fran desired to be released from the pain and anxiety, she asked a minister whether it was a sin to wish for death. (She was not thinking of suicide.) He advised that it was not a sin. I take great comfort for her soul that she asked this question-but even more so that she asked the same question to another minister! It was just like my sister to want a second opinion. Even in that sad situation, God bless her for wanting maximum support for such a spiritually weighty matter.

As I was thinking about all this, my mind drifted into the heavenly realm. Suddenly, I was interacting with one of my heroes - the late Nobel Prize-winner Albert Schweitzer, who had given up brilliant careers in music and university teaching to establish and operate a hospital in Lambarene in what is now Gabon, Africa.

We were arguing about who was greater. Unlike the disciples, in Luke 22:24, each of us was insisting that the other was! (Schweitzer had a MUCH tougher argument to make on this subject, obviously!) There was such joy in getting together and appreciating the incredible love and glory of God, and our own humble service in His behalf.

Then, we got into casting crowns. We were each saying, "I can throw mine farther than you"-again, such amazing joy in getting rid of those crowns and basking in the joy of God's presence, and his gifts to us. I'm not sure of the accuracy of the theology here; I'm just recounting what I saw in my mind!

Now, here is the reason I'm recounting all of this. At the very moment that we were casting crowns in my thought/vision, I looked out the window, and objects started floating down from the sky. For real! They were shaped like small flying saucers, and were going back and forth in the air, as they slowly worked their way toward the ground. There were about six of them.

I said to myself, "what in Heaven's name is going on here?" They came out of nowhere!

I was in the tub, and without my glasses on-so my eyesight must have been about
20 x 400.

So, God did it again, and graciously brought another round of those saucers--and one right next to the window so that I could see it.

It was a sliver of snowy ice-about two inches in diameter. At the very moment I had the vision or thought of casting crowns in the heavenly realm with a hero of mine, a breeze must have lifted some snowy ice from our roof into the air, and let pieces float gently past the window, until they settled on the ground. Those pieces were in a disk-like shape-reminiscent of crowns!

During the whole period I was there before that moment, this had NOT happened. Everything had been still. Nothing was falling: no snow; no disks or slivers of anything.

What a compassionate and creative God we have! What an incredible gift to receive on a day that could have been one of great sadness. I had to share it with you.