Today, I am here to share my testimony about my son, who was born with Spina Bifida. I pray that my testimony will encourage you to believe that God, according to Ephesians 3, can do exceedingly and abundantly above all we could ever think or ask. God is still a miracle-working God.
Luke 18:27 says that the things that are impossible with men are possible with God. I want to remind you that God specializes in the impossible; only believe.
Twenty-two years ago, in 2002, my husband and I had a bouncing seven lb baby boy who was born with spina bifida. Spina Bifida is a condition where the spine doesn’t develop properly within the first three weeks of pregnancy, and a lot of complications can happen as a result of the spine not being correctly formed in the womb. The severity of the complication depends on where the spine was damaged.
There are four types of Spina Bifida. David was born with the most serious one. He has many complications; among them are club feet, Paralysis, incontinence, no feelings in the lower limbs, and deformity in the legs.
When David was born, I saw ten toes and ten fingers. His little face was so cute. But due to the severity of his condition, they whisked him away immediately to the children’s hospital as there was a massive lump on his back, which they call a sac; it was filled with fluid, and in it lies the damaged spinal cord and nerves.
I think it was about two days later that I was released from the hospital, and I remember my husband and I headed straight to the Children’s Hospital to look for our son. We were told that the doctor wanted to speak with us upon arrival. So, while we were there waiting on him, I was looking at David and, in my mind, I was like, God, I know you can heal our son.
Before David was born, I used to watch a program on TLC called Baby Story, and for that entire month, they showed babies born with Spina Bifida. I believe God was preparing me for it. Spina Bifida is due to a lack of folic acid in the body. Studies have shown that they are not sure anymore if lack of folic acid is the real reason, but anyhow, when the doctor came to us, he said, “I am not going to do anything to this child because David is going to be a vegetable for the rest of his life. The doctor went further to say he won’t be able to say mommy or daddy and won’t be able to do anything; in other words, he’s just going to leave him to die.
On the program that I watched before giving birth, they would do surgery on the back and push in the sac that contains the spine, nerves, etc., and close it up. Even though the child will still have some form of complications, the surgery would help in specific ways. One way is that the baby won’t have a lot of infections, and the baby won’t have that big sac out on the back draining spinal fluid. But because the doctor already gave him over to die, he didn’t care to do anything. I pondered what he said in my heart, but my faith in God was not shaken. I know the God of the Bible for myself, and He has proven to be Jehovah Rapha, The Lord our healer.
After the doctor told my husband and me all the bad news, his opinions, what he would not do, etc., I didn’t let it shake my faith. I said to the doctor, ok, But God is able, and every time the doctor said something terrible, I would say, ok, But God is able. I remember I went back and looked at my son and said, “God, I know the God in whom I believe, and I know that you are able.” After spending time with our son, I prayed for him before leaving late that night.
You see, I chose to believe the Lord’s report. That night, I went home, took up my Bible, got a red pen, and went through the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. I looked for every healing scripture in those books and wrote the word healing beside them. Every day, I would read them and remind the Lord that He is the same yesterday, today, and forevermore.
Whenever I went into my prayer closet, I read those healing scriptures aloud, looked up, and said, “Jesus, remember you did that.” I never ceased to pray, and I never ceased to read those healing scriptures. I even laid my Bible on David, prayed, and reminded God that he is a miracle-working God. I had my consecrated olive oil, and every day after cleaning David, I lotion his body with it, prayed, and told God those scriptures. I remember one day when I was cleaning David, I pinched his leg to see if he would feel anything cause, remember now, David has no feelings from his waist down. So, I pinched him, and I saw a reaction. I don’t know if it was a false reflex, but I remember I did it again, and David flinched. You see, the doctor told me the only way he would do surgery is if life came in the legs, so because I believe in God, I felt this was some hope.
Later that evening, When the doctor came to do his rounds, I told him with expectation, hoping that he would perform the surgery. He said no because that little flinch is nothing, and he once again said, “David is going to be a vegetable for the rest of his life, so he won’t waste his time doing anything. So, I asked what would happen to his back because he had to be dressed every day due to the spinal fluid draining from the sac. He told me nature would heal it, which was a lie. Over time, God miraculously dried up the fluid as I dressed it daily.
Listen, I still chose to believe the report of the Lord no matter what they said. I believe in the 66 books of the Bible; there is no lie in them. As Isiah 53:1 asks the question, “Whose report will you believe?” When the doctors can’t help you, and it will take a miracle to survive your sickness, whose report will you believe?
Listen, I know without a shadow of a doubt that God is still a miracle-working God. I know without a shadow of a doubt that speaking God’s word in and over every situation by faith moves mountains.
David was born in December. I remember getting a phone call early on New Year’s Eve as we prepared to visit our son. I got a call from the hospital saying that we should hurry up and come to the NICU immediately to spend some time with David because they don’t know how much time he has to live. As David’s situation took a turn for the worse, and he could die at any moment. Because they were treating David for many things, he wasn’t given food after a while, only drips. They said we must speak with the team of doctors assigned to David upon arrival.
People, when God has a purpose for your life, no demons from the pit of hell can abort it. From the day of David’s birth, people have been praying for us. David was born on a Wednesday night, and church was in session. My friends who took me to the hospital called church for prayer, and they did pray. Even Our pastor prayed for us and with us on New Year’s Eve morning while on our way to the hospital. Prayer was sent up for David daily! Thank you, Jesus, for a praying church! That same day, they had to take David off the oxygen because he began breathing on his own. Hallelujah, God is great!
After a few weeks, David got discharged, and I remember when we took him home. It was at night. After an hour or so, he began to look pale blue to me. So, I asked my husband what he thought. He said he did look pale, but because I was so glad to have him home, I said no, he was okay.
Because I lived at the children’s hospital with David, I was there every single day after I gave birth from 7 a.m. until 9 pm, so I thought I was seeing doubles from a lack of sleep. My husband said mm, we are carrying him back. They always talk about mothers’ intuition. Well, this is father’s intuition. So, my friend & her husband came and got us, and we took David back to the hospital. They sent us to the doctor’s office by the NICU to see the doctor. OMG, the doctor took hours to come. Now, remember we reported the child as being pale blue. We waited for hours until they came and told us that only one doctor was working on the side we were on, and he was busy. When the doctor finally came, he took David into a room and examined him. When he came back out, he said we needed to pray because David was losing oxygen, and they must admit him now.
We left the hospital around 5 am. When we returned later that morning, we were told David was in the big children’s ward. When we saw him once again, he was placed on a no-food-only drip. We met a friendly new doctor who told us all the bad news and more. But it still didn’t shake my faith. Listen, even though my faith was intact, I cried a lot, but I also prayed a lot, especially throughout the nights with the healing scriptures.
David suffered so many things at the children’s hospital, back in my hometown, so much to the point that a doctor came to me one day and said he would like to speak with me outside. He said, “Every day I come to see David, there is never good news.” The nurses say David is not eating, so they feed him through a tube; they say his vein is hard to find, so they shaved off the side of his head to use the vein. I remember David having a seizure right in front of me, and I never knew that it was a seizure. It was another mother who screamed and said Mother, your baby is having a seizure I called out to the nurse on duty, who told me that she was the only one on the ward and I had to wait, and she never attended to him until she finished her rounds. But God kept David through it all because the devil can’t kill purpose!
Back to what I was saying, after a long talk, the doctor said he was permitting me to take David home, and I said OK. David left the hospital weighing 3lbs; he looked like a preemie. When we got home, I boiled some water for him and then went to the supermarket to get some baby formula. I will never forget when I said God, please tell me which baby Formula I should buy, and a lady came up out of nowhere and pointed to one and said buy that one, and I did. When I tell you, God was with us every step of the way, even to this very day.
When I made the feeding and fed David, my God, he drank that feeding so fast you wouldn’t believe it. Now, this is the same child that they said was not eating, so they had to feed him through a feeding tube that they had put in his stomach. My son drank that formula and the water that I gave him like he was dying from hunger and thirst. David ate very well and ballooned up to a proper weight quickly. My husband and I have faced many challenges and obstacles, even up to this day, but God has never left our side. He was and still sees us through it all as we trust him daily with David’s life. We cried many nights, but God kept us, and he preserved our son’s life.
Since David had to attend the hospital clinic until he was 12, God allowed that same doctor who gave him over to die to see him before he retired from the hospital. He was in disbelief that David could speak, understand, and say, Mommy and Daddy. In that appointment, the doctor sat back in his chair and stared at David. He even asked him a lot of questions, which David answered. Doctors from David’s team said to me years ago that they don’t know how he’s alive and breathing considering his situation. They are going to get his docket number and read up on his case because they just can’t believe he’s alive. Remember I said David has the most severe form of Spina Bifida? But despite all the challenges we face and continue to face, God has been faithful to us, and we trust him daily. But I just wanted to share the heart of the testimony.
Fast-forward to 2024. David is alive and well; he will be 22 in December. He just migrated here to America. We are trusting God even now to send help for him. And I know even now, things are working in our favor. Amen! Even though David continues to have many challenges, he has passed the worst. Glory to God! My husband and I have been through a lot, but God remains faithful!
David is a light in our family; his smile lights up every room. His life has encouraged many, and you will never find David sad or depressed over his condition. He has such great faith in God as I taught him from God’s word that we must always believe that God can do exceedingly and abundantly above anything we could ask or think.
I always tell David that no matter how things look or feel, we must always believe God’s word and trust him. David lives by faith; he has read the entire Bible more than I can count on my fingers. When he sees his big brother going about his business daily, he would often say to me, Mom, when God heals me so that I can walk, I can go many places just like my brother.
Let me tell you something: if I didn’t know God for myself, I would become a believer just because of seeing God deliver David from everything that was sent to take his life. David is a Miracle; we get to live with a miracle. That’s why I can tell you that God can do the impossible; only believe. David didn’t get any help with his condition, which comes with many challenges. So, how is he living today? He is living on God’s life support.
He is indeed a living, breathing Miracle that was born for a purpose, just like the blind man in St John 9:1–12; Jesus saw a man who had been blind since birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus replied: Neither this man nor his parents sinned. But this happened so that the works of God might be revealed in him. Amen!