Hi, Friend!
As we continue in our countdown towards the most-listened-to episode of Season One on the Heal Podcast, I am excited to introduce you to Denise Osborne Dickerson. Coming in at number 12 on the list, you can check out her episode wherever podcasts are found at Episode 84 of the Heal Podcast.
Whether it’s the Christmas season or not, we all love a Christmas miracle story. But what we don’t realize, both in the Bible and in real life, is that in order for a miracle to take place, there must be a tragedy that precedes it. Think about your favorite miracles in the Bible – if they had not taken place, people would have died, suffered horrendously, or at least had a really bad day (think thousands of hungry people listening to Jesus when he fed the 5000). Just like those stories, Denise was set up for her miracle with a Christmas accident and a Christmas tragedy.
A few years before, Denise had lost her youngest son Kody, in a car accident. Since that blow, she and her family always checked in with each other, making sure they texted to know that the other person made it home safely. That’s why when Denise was involved in her own car accident, the whole thing was too eerily familiar. On December 23, 2011, Denise stopped to help a family who was stuck on the side of the road. As she was helping them, a car lost control on the ice, crushing Denise between the oncoming car and her own car.
Denise’s legs were crushed in the car sandwich, and she lost more than the total amount of blood in her body. There were multiple instances where Denise lost her heartbeat or stopped breathing. While her family hung on pins and needles, thinking they were losing another beloved to a car wreck, Denise was having an altogether different experience. In an NDE (Near Death Experience) when she flatlined, she saw a vision of her son, Kody. I’ll let you listen to the episode to hear what she saw, but she woke up a changed woman.
And she would need that anchoring experience of hope, too, for she woke up to the carnage of her body, including the amputation of one of her legs. Though the recovery was brutal, Denise is now an emblem of hope, working as an amputee advocate with Martin Biotics, donating blood and encouraging others to do so as often as she can as a blood donor advocate, and now working on her own book (hopefully to be published soon).
And when you listen to the episode, yes – my husband and I followed through on donating blood in Denise’s honor! It was good timing, too, because shortly after I became pregnant, and you can’t donate blood when you’re pregnant.
Check out this episode for a pick-me-up on how gracious God is!
Listen to learn more about:
· Denise’s NDE, what she saw, and what the experience taught her about God and heaven.
· How you can help save lives (like Denise’s) through blood donation.
· How God can redeem your worst tragedies, even a near-death car accident like Denise’s, into his greatest miracles.
Listen now:
Click here to listen on iTunes.
Click here to listen on Google Podcasts.
Click here to listen on Spotify.
Click here to listen on Stitcher.
Click here to listen on Amazon Music.
Favorite Quote from the episode:
· “When they thought I was stable enough after they had repaired everything but my pelvis, they decided to try to bring me out of the coma, so they did that, and I came out, and my fiancé was there next to me, and they took the tube out, and after being intubated for eleven days, you can’t talk. It was just a very very dull whisper that I could get out, and he just looked at me funny. After I kind of got my bearings on where I was, and I said something about my legs, and he said, ‘You’re different.’ And I pointed to my legs, because I had realized, and I said ‘Yeah.’ And he said, ‘No, you’re different.’ I got a tear in my eye, and I said, ‘I am. I saw Kody!’”
Links from our conversation:
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For freedom,
Tera