{"id":23935,"date":"2026-03-11T15:24:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T15:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/guideposts.org\/articles\/uncategorized\/easter-awakening\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T18:26:32","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T18:26:32","slug":"easter-awakening","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/guideposts.org\/articles\/prayer\/holiday-prayers\/easter-awakening\/","title":{"rendered":"Easter Awakening"},"content":{"rendered":"

My alarm went off at 4:30 a.m., as usual. I took a peek out the window. The weatherman had been right. An icy rain fell over the Great Smoky Mountains. The roads would be bad today, no doubt about that.<\/p>\n

I shaved, showered and gave my still-sleeping wife, Natalie, a soft kiss on the forehead. Two mornings a week, I\u2019m up before Natalie. This was one of them. She could sleep in a little till she had to take our youngest daughter, Chelsea, to Smokey Mountain Elementary School.<\/p>\n

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I was at Elders Superette, our family-owned convenience store on Highway 441, by 5:30 a.m. Plenty of time to open the pumps and get the coffee going for the commuter rush, or our country equivalent of it.<\/p>\n

In the window I hung a \u201cLive Bait\u201d sign that Natalie had made for me. The colors were in vivid lavender, Natalie\u2019s favorite. She uses it every chance she gets.<\/p>\n

I was prepping another round of coffee a little after seven when two ambulances and a fire truck shot by outside, sirens shrieking. That\u2019s a sound that will get anyone\u2019s heart pumping.<\/p>\n

They were headed in the direction of Smokey Mountain Elementary School. Probably a wreck,<\/em> I thought. Hopefully it wasn\u2019t anything too serious.<\/p>\n

Natalie would have dropped Chelsea off a few minutes earlier.<\/p>\n

I turned the radio to the police scanner: \u201cAsheville, this is Cherokee. We need a medical chopper at 441 by Smokey Mountain Elementary School.\u201d<\/p>\n

A chopper! That didn\u2019t sound good. Choppers only flew in from Memorial Mission Hospital in Asheville, 60 miles away. They wouldn\u2019t make the trip for anything but a really serious accident. How would they land in this mess?<\/p>\n

Right then the telephone rang. It was Alice Pressley, our pastor Ned Pressley\u2019s wife. \u201cDewayne,\u201d she said, \u201cI\u2019m on 441 by Smokey Mountain Elementary School. Natalie\u2019s been in a wreck.\u201d<\/p>\n

My hands trembling, I dropped the phone and rushed outside. I was locking up the pumps when Pastor Ned pulled into the parking lot.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlice just called,\u201d he said, hopping into my car. \u201cI\u2019m praying, Dewayne, I\u2019m praying. Let\u2019s go.\u201d<\/p>\n

Through the fog, the telltale flashing red lights came into view, then the shocking scene: A big Ford pickup had T-boned Natalie\u2019s Nissan Sentra, completely crushing it from the driver\u2019s side.<\/p>\n

I jumped out of the car, suddenly unsure of what to do next. Where was Natalie? Not still trapped in the twisted heap of the Nissan?<\/p>\n

Someone grabbed me. I was told she was in the back of the ambulance already. EMS techs crowded around her. One of them\u2014a guy I know\u2014stopped me before I could get to her.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re doing everything we can, Dewayne. Chopper can\u2019t land because of the fog. We need to get some fluids into her before we take her to the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

I raced over to Smokey Mountain, ran in and pulled Chelsea out of class. Then I called our other daughter, 17-year-old Brittany, on my cell.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour mom\u2019s been in an accident,\u201d I told her, keeping my voice level. I didn\u2019t want either of the girls to hear the fear in it. \u201cWe need to meet her at the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

We got to our local hospital minutes after the ambulance. \u201cShe\u2019s getting a blood transfusion,\u201d a doctor told us. \u201cWe\u2019re sending her on to Memorial Mission in Asheville by ambulance soon as we can.\u201d<\/p>\n

The girls and I were silent, but I never stopped praying all the way there. I knew the girls were praying too. I wanted\u2014needed\u2014to believe that Natalie was going to be okay. That\u2019s what I kept telling myself every last mile to Asheville.<\/p>\n

By the time we got to the hospital, a heavy snow was falling. It was thundering too\u2014an eerie, ominous sound.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt looks like she\u2019s bleeding internally,\u201d the doctor there said to me. \u201cWe want to do exploratory surgery to check for any internal injuries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soon family and friends started to arrive. I have never been shy about talking to God, and as I sat in that waiting room, I poured my heart out to him.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive,\u201d it says in Matthew. I felt like I needed a physical reminder of that promise. So I wrote it down on a piece of paper and slipped it into my pocket.<\/p>\n

Finally the surgeon came out. \u201cHer pelvis is broken, she ruptured her spleen, broke a lot of bones and there are a lot of smaller injuries as well,\u201d he told us. \u201cBut all of that can heal. The real question is whether her brain was damaged. A CAT scan will give us some answers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can go into the post-op room and see her now,\u201d a nurse said to the girls and me. \u201cBut just for a minute.\u201d<\/p>\n

I tried to keep on staying strong for the girls. The last thing they needed right now was to see me cry. But it was hard.<\/p>\n

My wife lay amid a mass of bandages and tubes. And I could see that her head had been badly cut. I took her hand and whispered into her ear, \u201cThe girls are still young. They need their mother. I need you too.\u201d<\/p>\n

That was all the time we had.<\/p>\n

Then, good news. It seemed that our prayers had been answered. Natalie\u2019s CAT scan came back clean.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t look like she suffered any brain trauma at all,\u201d her doctor said to me. \u201cWith any luck, she should wake up by tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

That night, the girls and I drove to my parents\u2019 house back in Whittier, 50 miles south of Asheville. Another half-dozen miles and we would have been home, but none of us could bear the idea of seeing our empty house with all its reminders that Mom was gone from it.<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t worry,\u201d I told Brittany and Chelsea. \u201cMom will wake up tomorrow, just you wait and see.\u201d<\/p>\n

But she didn\u2019t. The doctors ran an MRI, which shows a lot more detail than CAT scans. The news was bad\u2014just the reverse of what we\u2019d heard the day before.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been trauma to the brain,\u201d the doctor told me. \u201cIt could be irreversible. We just don\u2019t know at this point.\u201d Then he took a breath and looked me in the eye. \u201cWe don\u2019t know if your wife will ever wake up,\u201d he said quietly.<\/p>\n

My mind spun and I gripped the chair until my knuckles whitened. This couldn\u2019t be happening. Not to Natalie, who was bursting with life. Not to her family, who loved her more than anything in the world. And not to me, who couldn\u2019t imagine the world without her.<\/p>\n

On Palm Sunday, three days after the accident, Pastor Ned called on everyone in our church to spread the word about Natalie\u2019s condition. Prayer circles sprang up all around the state and beyond.<\/p>\n

I tried to stay positive for the girls and they in turn did their best to be upbeat.<\/p>\n

\u201cMom\u2019s going to be fine,\u201d Chelsea said time and again. \u201cJust wait and see.\u201d<\/p>\n

We were always careful to be extra-positive at Natalie\u2019s bedside. The girls talked about school and their friends. We read aloud from the cards that were streaming in from all over. We hummed \u201cAmazing Grace,\u201d my wife\u2019s favorite hymn.<\/p>\n

But we couldn\u2019t tell if she heard us or not. No smile, no words, no squeeze of the hand. No sign of life.<\/p>\n

Natalie\u2019s niece Courtney brought a stuffed floppy Easter bunny for her, a bright lavender one. Pastor Ned brought an anointed prayer cloth and we pinned it to the bunny.<\/p>\n

\u201cMom\u2019s favorite color,\u201d Chelsea said. \u201cI can\u2019t wait till she sees it.\u201d<\/p>\n

How could I tell her that that might never happen? How could I prepare them for something I couldn\u2019t imagine myself?<\/p>\n

Good Friday came. Natalie had now been unconscious for more than a week. The head surgeon called Brittany, Natalie\u2019s mom, Nelda, Natalie\u2019s sister, Angie, Natalie\u2019s niece and me together.<\/p>\n

\u201cI need to be absolutely frank with all of you,\u201d he said. \u201cNatalie\u2019s chances of coming out of the coma at this point are about one in a million.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was as if all the air had suddenly gone out of the room.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs there any other hope?\u201d I asked finally. \u201cAnything at all?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d the doctor said seriously. \u201cDivine intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n

The meeting broke up and we headed back to the ICU to stand a vigil that seemed increasingly hopeless.<\/p>\n

Of course, I still had that piece of paper with those words from Matthew that I\u2019d written out on the first day of our ordeal. \u201cAll things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.\u201d By this point, it felt like they were written on my heart itself.<\/p>\n

I put my head down and prayed a Good Friday prayer unlike any I had ever prayed. God, on this day Jesus put himself into your hands, unconditionally. I am doing the same. If it\u2019s your will, I know you can bring Natalie back to us. If it isn\u2019t\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Thy will be done.<\/em><\/p>\n

Easter morning. The girls and I were driving from my parents house to ours to wash up before our return to the hospital. My cell phone rang. It was Angie.<\/p>\n

\u201cDewayne,\u201d she said, \u201cNatalie\u2019s awake!\u201d<\/p>\n

The girls and I forgot all about washing up. I floored it for Asheville. We rushed into the ICU. Natalie lay just as she had when we\u2019d left her the evening before, even down to the prayer shawl and bunny that were nestled on the sheets beside her.<\/p>\n

But Natalie\u2019s eyes were open. Beautifully, gloriously open, taking in this Easter morn.<\/p>\n

We all gathered around her bedside. Brittany leaned in and gave Natalie a wink. Natalie\u2019s right eye fluttered back. Then Brittany puckered her lips, blowing her mom a kiss. Natalie puckered her own mouth slightly.<\/p>\n

I leaned over and ever so gently kissed her forehead.<\/p>\n

Word flew around town, and more friends and family arrived.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s Natalie\u2019s favorite hymn?\u201d a friend from Natalie\u2019s job asked.<\/p>\n

I told her.<\/p>\n

Halfway through \u201cAmazing Grace,\u201d a tear ran down Natalie\u2019s face, like a drop of God\u2019s grace itself.<\/p>\n

There are things that just can\u2019t be explained by medical science, only by faith. What happened to Natalie, I believe was surely one of them.<\/p>\n

And I\u2019m not the only one.<\/p>\n

One of the doctors was very straightforward with me afterward. \u201cThis is none of my doing,\u201d he said. \u201cThis comes from a higher power.\u201d<\/p>\n

This Easter is the third anniversary of Natalie\u2019s accident. Today she is fully recovered. But none of us in the family will ever be the same. I don\u2019t think anyone who was in that hospital room that Easter, or during the weeks that led up to it, or anyone who knows Natalie and what God has done for her, will be.<\/p>\n

As for me, on those mornings when I\u2019m up before her, I still always give my sleeping wife a kiss before going to work. I linger now sometimes, knowing just how much a kiss can mean.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My alarm went off at 4:30 a.m., as usual. I took a peek out the window. The weatherman had been right. An icy rain fell over the Great Smoky Mountains. The roads would be bad today, no doubt about that. I shaved, showered and gave my still-sleeping wife, Natalie, a soft kiss on the forehead. 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