Christmas Miracle

On Christmas Eve 2009, Mike Hermanstorfer’s wife Tracy went into labor with their third child. Everything was normal at first. And then it all went wrong. During labor, Tracey went into cardiac arrest and died. Her doctors tried for several minutes to revive her but did not succeed. She was limp and blue when the Doctors made the decision to finish delivering the baby. Mike held his wife’s lifeless hand and wondered what he would tell his other two children. The doctors cut open Tracey and found the baby to also be lifeless.

In such moments, where hope is destroyed, where God seems cruel, we may be tempted to curse him and die, as Job’s wife suggested he do after his tribulations. Mike started the day prepared to bring his wife and new baby home, and in a span of a few minutes he was now trying to figure out how he was supposed to live with such a loss. The doctors put the lifeless baby into Mike’s hands and worked to start the little heart.  Now, I’m just guessing here, but I don’t believe that Mike cursed God. I believe he said a desperate prayer. And he felt life spring into his child’s tiny body. As soon as the baby started to come around, Tracey’s heart miraculously started beating again after several minutes of having been still. Doctors rushed her into surgery to repair the emergency C-section. There is no medical explanation for what happened. But Mike knows what happened. “There’s only one explanation… Its just an absolute miracle.”