Another Miracle house saved from fire

In San Bernardino, Calif., the fires had reached the mountains surrounding the city. Eddie Leyvas believed they wouldn’t come down the hill and reach his beautiful new home, so he left for Los Angeles—leaving wife and children behind. An hour later, Eddie got the call from his wife—she had been ordered to evacuate.

"I was in shock that we had just moved down and now we were going to lose our home," Irma recalls. "We started packing my son’s things first."

That was not an easy task because Andrew is a special needs child, which means he has special equipment. And it all had to be moved.

"I got sweaty. My heart started beating faster and faster. I just wanted to act right then and there, but my feet wouldn’t move right away," says Irma. "We probably had about 8 or 10 minutes around there to get what we needed, to get in the car and get out."

As Irma left for her brother-in-law’s house, Eddie began the grueling trip home—45 minutes became 4 hours. Eddie began to see the devastating signs of the fire as he approached his San Bernardino neighborhood.

"The air was pretty hard to breathe, and it looked like something out of a movie," he says. "I mean, there was fire on wooden posts. I couldn’t believe it. We finally got inside about a half-mile away from the house, and a police officer stopped me and said, ‘Man, you have got to get out of here.’ I go, ‘I got to get in my house and get some equipment for my son.’ He said, ‘You know what? I’ll go up there, and if it’s safe to go, I’ll come back and get you.' He came back about 15 minutes later after we were waiting, and he told me, 'There’s no way you can come up.' He said he couldn’t even drive to the house. He drove maybe a quarter of a mile away and had to walk the rest. He said that there were power lines and sparks all over the place. He said the home on the front and on the side toward the East end of the home there’s a bunch of flames, but my house was still OK."

But with the fires raging within 10 feet of his home—on three sides—Eddie wondered how long his home would last. Later that night, in what some would call an act of foolishness, Eddie went to look for himself.

"It was devastating," he says. "I remember opening the window and I couldn’t breathe. It looked like a war just happened, like a bomb just dropped. My eyes started getting watery, and I just started thinking of Andrew, Sarah, and Jacquelyn and my wife. What are we going to do? People’s homes destroyed, innocent people, people just like me."

But in his mind and on his lips kept coming a simple prayer.

"As I came up to the hill, I saw all the flames of the fire and the house on the side, and I was just asking God, 'Please, Lord, have mercy,'" Eddie remembers. "I came up on the side, and it was thick in smoke. I just kept thinking, God, He’s been good to our family. We’re trying to make a home out here. I came up on top of the hill, and I saw our house, and all I could say was 'Jesus,' nothing else but 'Jesus.' I got into the yard and I just kept saying 'Jesus.' I instantly felt it was God’s power. It was unbelievable. I mean, God hears our prayer, even regular people like us."

Their house had been spared! A trip to his neighborhood the next day showed just how amazing this story is. The fire had raced down the mountain, consuming nearly every home in its path. It totally destroyed the home in front of Eddie's house, and as Eddie showed us, the home next to him was totally destroyed.

Homes to the east and south also sustained damage. And then by some miracle, the fire seemed to jump over Eddie's house and then burned nearly every home down the line from him!

So what kept the flames from even scorching the paint on the walls around Eddie’s home? Irma will tell you she believes it is the power of prayer, prayers prayed days earlier while smoke was still on the mountain.

"We got together, and I said, 'We need to pray.' We got in a circle and we prayed and we asked God to have mercy on us," says Irma.

That is exactly what God did. He extended His hand of mercy.

"God is watching us. He’s keeping us in His hand. He’s protecting us. This is prayer. This is what prayer does," says Eddie. "We read about it in the Bible, but now we’re living it, this miracle that happened. Prayer does exist and prayer does work."

Says Irma, "The first word I thought of was God is awesome. It’s a miracle! I just say God’s angels came and encamped around our home and protected it."