I just thought I would share this testimony in case there would be someone who might benefit from it. About six weeks ago, I woke up with a strange, intense pain in my arm going from just below my wrist and radiating into my elbow. I realized that it had actually been bothering me in my sleep. When I looked at my arm, I saw a black circle with a line streaking from it going to the other side of my arm. I am a nurse and usually get up about 4:45 AM to get to work, so I was still a bit groggy and I thought "This is the strangest, darkest bruise I have ever seen." But then I looked at it again and I realized it was not a bruise. No bruise would have been that dark color with the streaking, even if I had hit my arm in the night. I looked closer and I saw what looked like two tiny puncture marks in the middle of the circle, and I realized something had bit me. I have never been bitten by a spider before, but my nursing sensibilities kicked in. I know anything that can bite and cause necrosis (the death of the tissue) that fast is serious. I'm single and live alone, and so there was no one to show this to or consult with, and I was supposed to work that day.
I thought of Mark 16:18 and something just came over me to pray. My prayer was simple, "Lord, you know I have to work today and I don't have time for this. You said you have already healed me. I accept it and thank you for it." The pain began to subside almost immediately until, by the time I arrived at work, I didn't even think about it. Throughout the day the black began to fade, but the outline of the circle and the streaking turned brown and looked like something between a birthmark and a scar. I was relieved that the situation wasn't worse but I also remember thinking, "Will this leave a scar on my arm forever?"
Right now I live about five hours from my home church, and so I only get to be in service every few weeks. I went home about two weeks after that event and got to show my family my arm and tell them the story. My sister immediately started looking up pictures of spider bites on the internet and found pictures of brown recluse spider bites. There were many that looked just as mine had looked. What was striking, however, were the pictures a few days after the bite. The person's skin and flesh was being eaten away by the poison. Many people required skin grafts because of having to have flesh surgically removed.
I cannot say what bit me because I never saw anything, but I began to rejoice all over again because then it really hit home what God had saved me from. The next day at lunch after the service, my father, the pastor of my church, told some of the brothers about it, and one of the men showed me his hand where he had been bitten by a brown recluse spider. He described the pain and look of the bite just as I had, but he had to go to the doctor for treatment and he was left with a very deep scar on his hand.
Another thing happened also, because I had the "scar" on my arm, I had the chance to witness (with proof!) to someone at work of God's healing power. God knows what He is doing! Now six weeks later the scar is so faded that even I have to really look to see where it was that I was bitten.
I am so thankful that God gave me the faith to believe His Word in that moment. I listen to my prophet almost daily, and my faith is deep because of that. Faith cometh by hearing the Word of God. We need faith for all things in life, and God is able to provide for all of our needs—from salvation to spider bites! I encourage all my sisters and brothers to take this Message for your healing, not only physically but emotionally, mentally, spiritually. He will hear your faintest call! I can be a witness because I have seen something. He has never failed me yet and I am not worthy, but I am so grateful. God bless you all.
Sister Andrea