HUMBLED REFLECTION

So, for some reason, today i found myself getting very emotional thinking about how amazing God's glory is being revealed to us and to everyone around us as our life story continues to unfold. 


This story starts 3 years ago at a woman's bible conference put on by our church out on the coast. This was my first time attending the conference and it was called "Rejuvenate" and the whole weekend was about slowing down, even stopping, and finding rest in the Lord. We as women and organizers of our families sometimes find it difficult to be still and just rest in His presence. It was an incredible weekend and I made friendships with some that are now some of my best. It is tradition that at the VERY end of the conference, when you arrive at your table, you have a bible verse that was randomly set at each seat, written on a piece of paper, and concealed. Before opening the verse, we pray over the verse that lies before us for the following year, asking the Lord to speak through His word to us and that we may hold onto that verse in the following year.


After praying we were told to open up and read our verses.  I frantically opened up my verse wondering what magnificent verse the Lord had for me! As soon as I read it, i looked around and wondered if it would be totally inappropriate to ask if anyone wanted to trade...


We go around the table and share our verses with our friends. One by one the other women read their verses, all seemed so upbeat and beautiful about loving the Lord, and how he so richly provides for us, and how we are His beautiful creations. Then it was my turn...slowly I read out loud....sigh...


"Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed." 1 Peter 4:12-13


Seriously...anyone want to trade?? It didn't help that someone sitting next to me said, "ugh, I got a verse like that last year and man, its been an awful year...i had a miscarriage, i lost my job, a family member passed away..."  My mind started to drift away as she was talking, thinking "LORD, WHAT IN THE WORLD IS GOING TO HAPPEN THIS YEAR..."PAINFUL TRIAL"?? I DON"T WANT A PAILFUL TRIAL! I'M COMFORTABLE"


For a couple weeks after the conference this verse loomed over my head...thinking about the year ahead of me, and wondering around what corner of my life was the "painful trial" going to rear its ugly head. Well, two weeks later, at a routine doctors appointment they found a tennis ball sized uterine fibroid. They said it shouldn't cause any problems getting pregnant, but they would keep a close eye on it, as a pregnancy WITH such a large fibroid that will only continue to increase in size wasn't an ideal "typical" pregnancy. Okay, so this must be it. Lance and I were hoping to get pregnant any time...now we knew to expect a pregnancy that would be a little more difficult than most. 


Six weeks later we found out I was pregnant!  We were excited of course, but there was a part of me that still worried about my "painful trial." Our first doctor's appt only confirmed my fears. Having a uterine fibroid, COULD pose minor problems, to catastrophic problems with a pregnancy. Only time would tell as to where on the spectrum this particular fibroid and pregnancy would place me. Again, thinking about my verse, I was worried, would this pregnancy last? Would i be in severe pain the whole time? When would something wrong happen? 


I felt blessed that at every appointment after appointment, the fibroid was growing larger, but seemed to not be causing the problems typically associated with having one. PRAISE GOD!  We had decided to find our what we were having...but we made a conscious choice that every time someone asked us what (gender) we wanted to have (here other would reply with a boy/girl answer or just a healthy baby)...we ALWAYS replied..."We want the baby the Lord has for us." Plain and simple. We walked into that 20 week ultrasound so excited to watch our little one on the monitor for over an hour. That appointment was amazing...found nothing out of the ordinary...HE (yes we saw what we needed to see, RIGHT away!) was a perfectly healthy growing boy.


Four months later, Rowdy came screaming into the world via c-section 16 days early, which we would come to learn was much more complicated than the typical and would leave our family with a lasting decision about future pregnancies. He was perfect!! He scored 8/9 on his apgar, had all fingers and toes, and looked just like me as a baby (i think it was that he had a perfectly LARGE ROUND head). I remember the first two days in the hospital being so overjoyed at having this little miracle! He had my lips & definitely Lance's nose. He never made a peep, never cried, just content. We were seen every couple hours by nurses, doctors, and even our pediatrician who did the first official evaluation. All, just praised at how beautiful and great he was doing! He was also a nursing champ, like he had been doing it forever, he fit right in the boys in our family can really pack it down!


Over the course of our second night in the hospital, I started to notice that Rowdy seemed to be dry heaving. Mommy's internal bell was going off, "this isn't normal." But i asked the nurses over and over and they assured me that sometimes c-section babies can have a little fluid still going on because they weren't squeezed out of the birth canal, and that he was just gagging a little on the fluid. Firth time mom...uh...okay. The gagging was getting worse and he was refusing the nurse, I even stayed up all night holding him, fearing if I laid him in the bassinet, he might gag and choke. In the very early morning, during one of the "every three hour" checks, the nurse said she didn't like how he was responding and wanted to take him down to the nursery for a little bit to look him over...she wheeled him down and said she would be right back.


An hour passed, I woke up Lance and made him crawl in bed with me. I was exhausted but i couldn't sleep, now I'm worried...they had been gone too long. An hour and a half later, our nurse came back and told us sternly that we needed to get up, put our slippers on now, that Rowdy had vomited up a dark green substance and was bring transferred immediately down to the NICU. Over the next couple hours, we would find out that they suspected Rowdy had a blockage in his small intestine call Duodenal Atresia...this caused them to bring up a series of questions about our his physical attributes and  "soft markers" that lead them to suggest to test our son for possibly having Down syndrome. We would be rushed up to the large metropolitan city an hour up the freeway, to a NICU with amazing doctors that would need to perform surgery on our baby at 5 days old. We were on auto pilot. So concerned with his physical health that we had a hard time even grasping the idea that he might have Down syndrome.


After Rowdy's surgery one evening, Lance and I were in the rocking chairs by his little warmed bed, akwardly snuggling our newborn who is connected to leads and wires all over his body. Neither of us spoke about it often, but I think we would both just study him, looking for a confirmation of his Down syndrome. Sitting here, I had a  flash to a conversation I had with God...9 months previously.


I had just found out I was pregnant and had been reading an article about abortion and how over 90% of children with Down syndrome are never born. I remembered crying wondering how this was possible and the complete injustice of it all. GOD created these little humans, and our society was deciding they weren't good enough...I remember my internal monologue with the Lord. "LORD, please if you have a little baby up there, that won't be loved and appreciated, and CELEBRATED, by someone and tossed away, PLEASE send me that little one. Our family is not only god-fearing wonderful examples of your love, but four of our immediately family members are well equipped with special education degrees. We can do it!"


Rocking in our chairs, not looking at Lance, i said, "I have to tell you, I'm sorry to drag you into this without telling you, but I asked for this...I prayed exactly for this moment." I went on to tell him about my conversation with the Lord. I don't feel like I have personally ever had the "grieving moment" over Rowdy because I feel like my heart was prepared from the beginning and the Lord heard me, and gifted me exactly what I asked for. Later that week, my best friend reminded me of a certain verse that I was consumed with worry over. 1 Peter 4:12-13....ah-ha, here is my trial. Watching my baby lay in the NICU for three weeks and go into two surgeries, and at three weeks be confirmed that he had Down syndrome. In the midst of all of that, it was now easier to focus on the second part of that verse. That God's glory was going to be revealed through this little boy. He was going to be a beautiful light and God had a very special plan for him.


God blessed us with Rowdy's presence in our lives, and through parenting him we have been led to our beautiful daughter, Rush, who shares the same bright light and purpose to reveal God's glory to the world.  We pray everyday that the Lord would be glorified in all of our words and actions, he called us, we answered.  He is working in our hearts and also in the hearts of many others because of this obedience. Our life, our beautifully colorful adventure is meant to bring Him GLORY. Don't be confused by hard or painful circumstances you may face... but may we be OVERJOYED when we see the purpose behind it and see His GLORY revealed to the world!!!

"In the same way, let you light shine before men that they may see your good deeds, and praise your Father in heaven." Matthew 5:16