The atmosphere inside St. William’s Cathedral, Lafia, was charged with reverence and gratitude during the feast of St. Anthony of Padua. Standing before the congregation, Sister Perpetua Ifeoma Igwe cleared her throat, her voice trembling not with fear, but with the weight of a miraculous testimony.
What she shared with her fellow parishioners was emotional yet a triumphant journey of how God intervened and saved her at her darkest hour.
For Sister Igwe, a devoted member of the association,(?) _the hospital delivery ward which usually carries the sense of anticipation and new beginning, suddenly became a battlefield between life and death. Expecting a routine delivery for her last child, she was abruptly hit with a reality that sends chills down the spine of any mother. For the first time in her life, she needed an emergency Cesarean Section (CS).
What followed was not just a medical procedure, but a profound spiritual journey through the valleys of paralysis, fear and agonising pain. Her testimony serves as a raw, emotional reminder of why Christians must give their trust in God, even when everything seems to be slipping the wrong way.
Naturally, the human mind is fragile when confronted with a sudden crisis. For Sister Igwe, the announcement of an emergency surgery shattered her composure. Fear did not just knock at her door; it invaded her spirit.
”When they wrapped the clothes to take me to the theater for the CS, oh God, fear entered. They called the doctors. I laid down, I was so scared. I was looking at my husband, wondering if I would ever see him again”, Igwe recalled.
Even as a seasoned gynaecologist tried to soothe her with medical statistics and reassuring words, the voices of panic drowned out his expertise. In her mind, a claustrophobic darkness had settled. She was convinced she was staring at the end of her life.
”All those stories that he was telling, I heard him, but I was not even listening. I was just thinking: So, I will not see my children again? That was the thought, the dark fear that entered into my heart”, she said.
Driven by this overwhelming certainty of death, Sister Igwe did what she believed was her final duty. With trembling faith and a heavy heart, she began to dictate her final will and testament to her husband right there in the ward. She prayed a final, frail prayer not a prayer of roaring faith, but the desperate whisper of a woman slipping away.
Yet, the moment her stretcher crossed the threshold of the operating room, a strange phenomenon occurred. God’s sovereignty stepped into the room before the scalpel ever touched her skin.
”As I was passing through that theater floor, immediately I stepped in, it was as if one big stone was used to block my heart. I could not feel the panic anymore. All that fear left me. My spirit became lighter”, She said.
The surgery itself was a clinical success. Surrounded by doctors who casually talked about the current economy under President Bola Tinubu, a stark contrast to the life-altering gravity of her internal world. Sister Igwe soon heard the sweetest sound known to a mother: the sharp, piercing cry of her newborn child. The procedure was so painless and swift that she marveled at its safety. But as many believers know, the victory in the operating room is often followed by a trial in the recovery ward.
”You know that when the Lord is doing His thing, the devil will always say ‘I’m watching.’ When He is planting His good seeds, the devil is waiting to plant his weeds,” she said.
The enemy of the soul rarely concedes defeat without a fight. Following the surgery, an involuntary reaction caused Sister Igwe to repeatedly lift her head to vomit, inadvertently triggering a severe, debilitating spinal headache.
What began as a post-op complication quickly mutated into a relentless, blinding torture. For three agonising days, a brutal migraine battered her skull from morning to night. The hope she held onto that the pain would vanish after the fourth day shattered when the nurses themselves began to show signs of worry. Exhausted, unable to retain food, and completely drained of physical strength, Sister Igwe reached the most dangerous place a christian can find herself: she was gradually giving up hope.
”The worst thing that can happen to you when you are going through trials and tribulations is to give up. Don’t ever give up. Because when you give up, that’s when the devil comes in to do his thing. I gave up that night,” she admitted.
At exactly 2:00am on that third night, feeling her spirit drifting away from her body, she began to distribute her family. She told her husband to give the newborn to her younger sister and to send the older children to her mother, crying out of fear that a future stepmother might mistreat them. The ward became a scene of absolute chaos. Her husband, gripped by panic and desperation, began to cry and scream aloud, “Jesus, don’t let me see shame! Don’t put your church to shame!”
God is never early, but He is never late. In the middle of that midnight despair, God used an instrument dressed in a nurse’s uniform. This nurse did not offer empty platitudes; she brought the authoritative atmosphere of violent faith. Seeing the frantic husband and Sister Igwe fading away, the nurse stepped into the breach. She grabbed both of their hands, commanding the atmosphere to shift.
”A nurse of strong faith stepped into the situation. She held my husband’s hand, held my hand too, and said, ‘Oga, stop shouting! Close your mouth! Oya, Madam, repeat after me. Use your last strength and repeat after me: I am not going to die. My story will not end like this!”, Sister Igwe testified.
With the last residual drop of her strength, Sister Igwe echoed those words. It wasn’t a theological discourse; it was a desperate, stubborn alignment with the word of life.
Instantly, a supernatural calmness washed over her spirit. Though the physical headache remained for another week, the spiritual assignment of death was permanently broken. She held onto those words until the morning light broke, and eventually, the “evil headache” left her entirely.
It was only after the storm had completely cleared that Sister Igwe realised the true depth of God’s protective hand. The doctors later revealed a frightening truth: had Sister Igwe stubbornly insisted on her initial desire for a natural “Hebrew woman” delivery, or had the medical team attempted to force a vaginal birth, the consequences would have been catastrophic. The placenta could have detached, the baby could have suffocated, and she could have bled to death.The emergency CS, the very thing that had brought her such paralysing fear was actually God’s chosen vehicle of salvation.
Sister Igwe’s testimony leaves the Body of Christ with timeless truths that Christians must trust God completely because He sees the hidden traps ahead. Sister Igwe prayed for a natural birth, but God knew it wasn’t safe for her or her baby. Even though fear told Sister Igwe that she would never see her children again, and the enemy told her she was dying, God’s truth said otherwise. Christians must live by faith, not by emotional fluctuations.When hope is lost, words possess the power of life and death. When you cannot pray long prayers, declare your destiny in Christ: “My story will not end like this!”.
