“Granny, I can’t believe he’s okay. When I saw that storm drain, saw the water pouring out …”
Rebecca shuddered, closed her eyes as she imagined what it must have been like for him. They’d found his bike two miles downstream, a mangled mess of bent metal.
“He must have been in the exact, perfect position, some cosmic stroke of luck or something, in order to survive that.”
“The Lord had his hand on that boy,” Granny murmured.
“Yeah, I know what you mean.”
“No, Becca.” Granny’s voice was soft but there was an edge to it now, and she tucked a finger under Rebecca’s chin, looked her square in the eye. “Hear what I’m saying. The Lord had his hand on him. For whatever reason, he kept Devon safe. He has a plan for that child, and he used all of us—you and Marla and Rev, Josh and JJ, me and everybody else—to make it happen.”
Rebecca was quiet for a moment, let it all sink in. Granny was right. She knew it in her bones, knew it wasn’t luck or quick thinking or anything else that had saved Devon.
It was God.
It was prayer.
For the first time in her life, she realized, she truly believed. She didn’t believe halfway, or in the possibility.
She believed.
God had done this. God had answered her prayer.
He wasn’t some pie-in-the-sky, mythical figure watching from the clouds. She swallowed as she let herself accept what she’d known deep down all along, but had been too full of pride to admit.
God was real.
Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. The thought popped suddenly into her brain, and she thought she remembered it from one of Granny’s framed scripture verses.
“You know what, Granny?” she said, her voice barely a whisper. “I do believe. I think you’re absolutely right.”
She looked at her granny, there in her cream-colored pants and white button down, clutching her pocketbook and smiling at her in surprise. Turning toward her, Rebecca held out her hands.
“You know that prayer you were talking about, the one where you invite Jesus in?” Rebecca said.
Granny let out a breathless giggle, and then so did Rebecca, and then the two of them were laughing and crying and hugging and she felt something, like a shift in the air or a warm, comforting breeze, settle on them. The most perfect joy she’d ever experienced filled her heart.
This is hope, she realized. This is what it feels like.
And there, right in their own small corner of the hospital waiting room, Granny took Rebecca’s hands in her own and they sank to their knees in prayer.
???
“Well, hey, you two,” she heard several minutes later, and she looked over to see Josh and JJ walk over from the elevator, smiling down at them like it was the most natural thing in the world to see two people on the ground in prayer. Maybe it was.
Josh had a cheerful yellow vase of fresh flowers in one hand and a handful of get-well-soon balloons in the other, and JJ had both arms around a giant plastic basket filled with candy, doughnuts, popcorn, a few tennis and baseballs, a small tackle box, one of those jumbo lollipops, and what looked like a whoopee cushion tucked in on the side.
“That looks like every boy’s dream,” Rebecca said, wiping her eyes as she helped Granny to her feet.
Josh laughed. “JJ picked out every last thing in that basket. Right, Son?”
He ruffled JJ’s hair, and JJ grinned widely.
“Hopefully Devon’s got a sweet tooth,” JJ said.
“I thought we’d bring these to his Memaw,” Josh held out the flowers, looked at Rebecca. “Want to join me?”
Granny gave her a sidelong look and smiled mischievously.
