ON THE MIRACLE ROAD... June 6, 2012

Ever since I was a young boy I have heard my dad tell of the miracle that happened when I was born.  I shall tell it in my own words and from my recollection of the story that I heard my dad tell so often.

Steven Ray Roach

I was born in 1959 on March the 9^th at Gould Memorial Hospital in Presque Isle, Maine.  My mom had a very hard time giving birth. I guess you could say, the Doctor and I had a wrestling match the day I was born!  He won! But the complications we experienced caused me to be paralyzed. My mom said, recently, that she had been speaking with a nurse about a year ago that was on duty the night I was born and she said to her it was the most horrifying childbirth she had ever witnessed!  As you can imagine, it was a very difficult time for my very young parents. I told someone one time that dad was so young when I was born that I always thought my dad was actually my brother because we were so close in age!

The prognosis was not good.  The Doctor said to my dad, “There is really nothing we can do to help your son. It is just an unfortunate thing that has happened.”  My mom and dad were very distraught! The nurses began to teach my mom how to feed me with the bottle, working my mouth and jaws so that I could ingest milk.  

As a young boy my dad was raised in Oakfield, Maine and attended the Baptist Sunday School and my mom attended the Apostolic Church in Mars Hill, Maine, pastored by Dennis Barnes.  So, both my parents had a knowledge of God. But it was during this time that they both realized how much they needed God more than ever before.  My dad would tell how he knelt down beside my crib one day and prayed, “God, if You’re really real and You will heal my son, I will do anything for You!”  God took him at his word!  I remember him saying that it was only a few days later that I began to come out of the paralysis and eventually I was COMPLETELY HEALED! It was an undeniable miracle! That was the turning point for my mom and dad.  Dad gave his heart totally to the Lord with a desire to fulfill his end of the bargain. Dad had said, “God....I will do anything for You!”

Dad became very involved in the church on the corner of Silver and Main in Mars Hill and one day he was baptised through the ice in the frog pond across the street from the church. God gloriously filled him with the Holy Spirit! Dad was the type of person that when he did something, he would put his whole heart into it! It wasn’t very long until mom and I and dad were on our way to St. Paul, Minnesota where dad began his Bible School training at Apostolic Bible Institute. After college, my dad had a very successful pastoral ministry pastoring churches in several parts of the country for 46 years!  So many times I recall him telling the story of my childbirth and how it was the turning point in his life.  Because of dad and mom’s decision to follow the Lord, they raised a family of five children in a strong Christian environment.  Each of us was dads “favorite” and all of us are serving the Lord today.  All five of us are involved to some capacity of ministry in the work of the Lord.  Jason and his wife, Dana, and three girls are pastoring the church where my dad pastored in Brockville, Ontario. Joel and his wife, Misty, and their two daughters are pastoral assistants to John and Jody Genn who are pastoring a church in Lone Grove, Oklahoma. My younger sister, Rene, serves as a church secretary. She and her husband, Donnie and their two children are an integral part of their church in Wright City, Missouri.  And Esther and I are planting a new church in Brownsburg, Quebec. I thank God for our family!

Everyone comes to a crossroads at some point in their life where they need to make a decision.  It’s a point where you totally sell out to God, or you simply walk the other way.  Mom and dad could have done things so much differently.  They could have turned away from God in bitterness rather than turn toward Him.  I have often wondered what would have been the outcome of our family if they had made that decision to walk the other road. I dread the thought! I am so glad they turned to the Lord!

For someone, today, who is at a crossroads, I encourage you to turn to Him with all your heart.  Your family is depending on you to make the right choice!  Just do it and watch the miracles unfold in your life on the MIRACLE ROAD!  You will never regret it!!  SRR