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Four gunshots rang out. The report never got there.
April 14, 1993; 2:15 a.m.
In 1 minute, 26 seconds, Glover's life changed forever.
She along with several other squad cars had responded for a traffic stop in the southwest quadrant of Rockford, Ill., a poorer section of the city. As Glover observed the other officers pulling away from the scene with their suspects, she felt, an urgency in her spirit: "Go to the basement of the police station and write your report where you'll be safe."
Instead she decided to sit in her car and complete her report.
"I was arguing with my conscience," Glover, an officer for four years, says. Then the gunfire. "I looked out of my left window and I saw that the glass was shattered. Then I felt a stinging sensation in my left elbow. As I was checking my body for injuries, I felt a blow to the left side of my face and the force of the blow was so strong it threw me sideways."
Then she heard a "tremendous noise," and blood began pouring from her nose, mouth and ears. She was choking on her own blood.
As her natural body fought for life, Glover says her spirit seemed to be staring back at her. "I felt as if I was suspended in darkness and thousands of people were around me weeping and mourning. I had the feeling that it was now too late for me to repent of my sins."
But soon Glover realized her body was still inside her squad car. "I suddenly felt total energy," she says, "and then I heard, 'There is someone out there who is evil and mighty, but I am mightier.'"
Immediately Glover began praying the Lord's Prayer. When she got to "Hallowed be thy name," she felt her lips moving and heard her own voice.
"Air was literally being forced into my lungs so I could breathe again," Glover says.
Another officer heard the shots and rushed to Glover's car. As he tried to reassure her everything was OK, she responded, "Everything is going to be OK because the Lord is with me."
In that minute and 26 seconds, she had reconnected with the One she had walked away from 17 years earlier.
But Glover's physical battle was just beginning.
Within five minutes, an ambulance arrived. Because of the bullet to the head, her brain began to swell and form blood clots. An IV going into a vein that was collapsed caused the fluid to go directly into her, so her body swelled. For the second time, Glover was fighting for air. It took more than seven minutes to revive her.
After surgery and two days in intensive care, Glover woke up talking about the love of Christ Jesus. "All I could remember was what the Lord had done for me that morning [when I was shot]," she says. "When I woke up, I was saved. I asked the Holy Spirit, 'When did I become saved?' He said, 'At the time you were praying the Lord's Prayer.'"
In the quadrant, the gang had issued a challenge to shoot a police officer in an effort to stop law enforcement from interfering with their drug activities. Because of extensive media coverage of the shooting, most in the area soon learned of Glover's miracle. As a result, four weeks after the shooting, she shared her testimony in two churches.
"I was a brand-new, born-again Christian - a baby in Christ - so I had to do many things beyond what I was capable of doing," Glover says. "God's response was, 'Well, learn.'"
Glover began attending First Assembly of God in Rockford (Sam Mayo, pastor). "God put me there so I could understand the gifts of the Spirit and speaking in tongues. When I said, 'I'm ready [to receive the Holy Spirit],' He was there; I mean, He was just there."
The medical miracles are "profound," Glover says, as she points to a light scar on her head. "When I was shot, the bullet went in through my skull and did not break or bruise the bone. But once the bullet got in, it did a tremendous amount of damage to my left ear. When I woke up, I couldn't smell or taste or sit up. My vision was blurred. There was loud ringing in my ears. I suffered from dizziness."
Glover was shot four times in her left arm. "The bullets in my forearm and in my shoulder - they simply traveled around and came out," she says. One ended up underneath my arm and had to be removed surgically. But the bullet that went through her left elbow shattered it. Her forearm now serves as her elbow. After therapy Glover's arm is normal. Her dizziness is gone; her vision, only slightly blurred.
As profound as the medical miracles are, Glover says. "There's something even greater - it's my salvation and God's grace in my life. Satan meant to rob my unsaved soul from God, but God turned it around for His honor and glory."
Reprinted with permission by, Pentecostal Evangel, May 20, 2001.
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