SAN FRANCISCO–For as long as he can remember, 7-year-old Timmy Yu has had one precious dream: From the bottom of his heart, he has hoped against hope that God would someday hear his prayer to walk again. Though many thought Timmy's heavenly plea would never be answered, his dream finally came true Monday, when the Lord personally responded to the wheelchair-bound boy's prayer with a resounding no.

"I knew that if I just prayed hard enough, God would hear me," said the joyful Timmy, surrounded by stuffed animals sent by well-wishing Christians from around the globe, as he sat in the wheelchair to which he will be confined for the rest of his life. "And now my prayer has been answered. I haven't been this happy since before the accident, when I could walk and play with the other children like a normal boy."

God's response came at approximately 10 a.m. Monday, following a particularly fervent Sunday prayer session by little Timmy. Witnesses said God issued His miraculous answer in the form of a towering column of clouds, from which poured forth great beams of Divine light and the music of the Heavenly Hosts. The miraculous event took place in the Children's Special Care Ward of St. Luke's Hospital, where Timmy goes three times a week for an excruciating two-hour procedure to drain excess fluid from his damaged spinal column.

Said Angela Schlosser, a day nurse who witnessed the Divine Manifestation: "An incredible, booming voice said to Timmy, 'I am the Lord thy God, who created the rivers and the mountains, the heavens and the earth, the sun and the moon and the stars. Before Me sits My beloved child, whose faith is that of the mustard seed from which grows mighty and powerful things. My child, Timmy Yu, I say unto you thus: I have heard your prayers, and now I shall answer them. No, you cannot get out of your wheelchair. Not ever."

Paralyzed in a 1996 auto accident that also claimed the lives of both his parents, Timmy has served as a shining example to his fellow churchgoers at Lord In Heaven On High Church, inspiring others with his simple, heartfelt devotion. Now that Timmy has received an answer, Christians the world over are celebrating his story as a stirring testament to the power of faith.

"The Lord has answered a little boy's plea to know if he would ever walk again, and that answer was no," Rev. H. Newman Gunther of the San Francisco School Of Divinity said. "For years, this boy had been plagued by the question of whether or not he would ever walk, and now Our Lord, in his wisdom and mercy, has forever laid to rest any lingering doubt. Young Timmy can rest assured in the immutable truth that the Lord has bestowed upon him. Now and for all time, he finally knows that he will never escape the cruel prison of his chair of iron, for God hath willed it so. Praise be to God!"

Asked for comment, God said: "This kind-hearted child's simple prayer hath moved Me. Never before have I seen such faith. His trusting soul, so full of innocent devotion to Me, hath offered seventy times seven prayers asking, 'God? Can I please walk again?' It was indeed right and fitting that I, in My infinite wisdom, should share with him the One True Answer to this long-repeated question he put before Me."

"My will be done," God added.

Witnesses to the miracle said Timmy begged God for several minutes to change His mind and heal his shattered vertebrae, but the Lord stood firm.

"God strongly suggested that Timmy consider praying to one of the other intercessionary agents of Divine power, like Jesus, Mary or maybe even a top saint," Timmy's personal physician, Dr. William Luttrell, said. "The Lord stressed to Timmy that it was a long shot, but He said he might have better luck with one of them."

Despite all the attention he has received, Timmy remains humble in the face of his newfound notoriety as the only human ever to have a prayer directly answered by God Himself.