One year ago… we woke up never realizing that were were going to witness a
real miracle that day.  It was a busy day, schooling and preparing for a youth
night at our house. I had a pretty bad headache that day, so when our friend Bertha offered to help in the afternoon, I didn’t think she needed to at first, but then changed my mind and said yes. It still overwhelms my heart how God knew when we needed an RN in our house.

We had a great time chatting and finishing up chores as the older children were happily occupied in their room with coloring books and stories.  Our little sunshine baby, Kyla, was toddling around nearby.  She started walking just days before, at 13 months.  Already, she was the joy of our home, so loved by everyone.  I put her in her booster for a little snack, and decided to give her an early bath as soon as she was done.  Normally, this occurs in our main bathroom, where everyone can watch her easily and most importantly, she cannot turn on faucets.  She was very comfortable and had good balance, so it was not unusual for me to let her play for a bit.  But this time I decided to put her in our jacuzzi because I was planning to head for the shower in minutes, where I could watch over her.  I put an inch or two of water in and let her play  there while I finished up a few things in the kitchen right on the other side of the wall.

I could drive myself crazy trying to understand how enough time elapsed for the accident to even happen, but Berti and I got into a discussion about something, which explains that time got away from me.  I also don’t understand why I didn’t hear the water when Kyla turned it on, but it was something about the doors being partially shut or our voices, or… who knows what.  Being a mom, my ears are tuned to my baby’s voice at a time like this, and I do remember hearing her happy sounds, or at least what I thought were happy sounds, at one point.  But when I opened our bedroom door wide to set a basket of laundry there, I was horrified to hear water running.  Instantly I knew Kyla must have stood up and turned on the water, and I rushed into the bathroom, to find what no mother EVER wants to find.

The tub was almost full, the water running full force, and my baby was floating face down.  There are no words to describe the utter horror or the desperation of the cry that came from the bottom of my heart… “NO!!! My BAAABY! Jesus, help my baby!!!”  Instinctively, I shut off the water and angrily flicked the drain knob as I grabbed my baby out of that horrid tub.  I instantly felt the responsibility that was mine, but I also did not think our little girl was alive anymore. Her blue body felt cool and so lifeless.  Her eyes were closed, and the only evidence that she might not be completely gone was a rattle coming from her throat.  I ran screaming for help and Bertha took her from me as I raced to PD’s office.  I should have thought to call 911 but all I could think was to find PD, and the only thing that came out of my heart over and over was a desperate cry to Jesus to help us.  My heart told me He was our only hope. PD was not in his office, but by this time, Bertha had Kyla on the back porch and was performing CPR.  She was able to get PD’s attention. He was outside with a customer who had just stopped to look at a trailer that was for sale,  but I didn’t comprehend that at the time.  He came running and immediately called 911.  A gentle, soft spoken stranger walked up on the porch just then and began to do chest compressions as Berti directed him.  I thought he was an angel.  Later we found out he was that customer, and that God had sent HIM, too.  He was a former shepherd from Ireland whose lamb reviving skills came rushing back to help him in assisting our little girl back to life.  An RN and a shepherd….who but God could think to drop them off on our property at just the right time?  *tears*  But our little girl’s medical condition was very, very grave.  My heart told me so, but I didn’t know all the things Bertha did, or how very desperate her heart was feeling as the CPR produced absolutely no results minute after minute.  She was unable to even find a heartbeat, although we did see a lot of water release from her mouth.

Just when Bertha was thinking there would be no response, PD knelt down and laid his hands on Kyla’s head, uttering the most heartfelt, petitioning prayer a Daddy could ever pray. We needed a miracle.  And that was the moment when our little angel gasped, and her little hands and feet went from blue to pink.  Every one of us who was there knew without argument that Jesus stepped in and gave our baby back to us.  There are no words to describe the shock of experiencing the two most opposite emotions you can in half an hour’s time, but I tried in vain to process it as I rode in the ambulance with my little girl who was uttering cries through her clenched teeth.   She was alive!  Many, many people began praying for us right then.  The next hours were anxious for us, yet nothing could override the deep sense of this, along with gratitude that she was at least breathing and moving, and even fighting the nurses and doctors, although she did not open her eyes.  Her body felt rigid and she began to have seizures shortly after arriving in the ER. These were difficult moments, but once again, God sent us an angel, in the form of Dr Chamberlain, our ER doctor.  He came and put his arms around both PD and I and prayed for us with all his heart.  The memories of moments like this throughout our harrowing experience are simply warm, golden reminders of a very loving heavenly Father surrounding us with His Presence and care.  We were touched again and again with this reality.

The doctor soon told us they would be transporting Kyla to a bigger hospital, as they were not well equipped to deal with trauma situations for babies.  It seemed far too long to us until the ambulance arrived, but the doctors and nurses did their best to stabilize our baby as we waited.  It is a very strange experience to hold your child who is breathing, but whose body feels more stiff and dead than alive.  I could hardly stand it, neither could I stop kissing and touching that little body.  By the time the ambulance arrived, Kyla was resting better and stable.   We followed in our truck for the 45 minute drive to Brenner’s Children’s hospital.   I kept a close eye on the transport nurse, but she didn’t seem too anxious or active. We found out later she was very concerned, with how little response was coming from Kyla, but there was little she could do until we reached the hospital.

Upon arrival, they explained to us that the trauma team was ready and what all they would be doing.  Every inch of our baby’s body was examined very carefully before they took her away for scans and xrays. Every scan and bone x-ray came back clear and so did the chest x-ray, praise God!  But there was still concern about the lack of response, and we understood this better later when we read about drowning victims who are rescuscitated, and the affects that can take over hours or even days after the accident.  We were told Kyla would be kept in a special room upstairs for observation.  All the events so far had taken place from around 5:30pm until 9pm or later.  We were grateful beyond words for the support of friends and family as we waited there in the ER until 2am the next morning, very thankful our daughter was alive, but not knowing what to expect as her eyes were still closed.

Around 2, the transport nurse came to take us up to our room.  This was the moment we will never forget!  Our precious baby rolled over and opened the most beautiful blue eyes we ever saw.  She looked bewildered, but only for a moment until she caught sight of her Daddy and Mama’s faces.  Then she smiled and sat up, exclaiming over her wires and tubes, and promptly tugging at them.  We were so incredibly overjoyed and could only thank Jesus over and over again…!  Our baby was alive and very normal!!  She made a full and speedy recovery, to the amazement of doctors and nurses and also everyone who loved her!!  Everything, from the crime investigation to social services checking us out, to the relieved sighs of nurses and doctors who were involved every time they walked in and saw her brightly grinning and toddling about… all of it was guided and cared for by the most merciful and redemptive Father there ever was.

We praise God over and over and over again for Kyla’s miraculous little self.  Everyone loves their children, and we love all our children.  There’s just something about standing on the brink of loss, only to be given so much mercy… and life anew, that makes us hold her extra close.  Every night after this for a long, long time I rocked her and just felt her little arms and legs and the incredible warmth of her little body, and marveled over God’s kindness.  I never dreamed that we or our children would feel such a kinship with the lady to whom Jesus gave back her son who had died.  We wonder, too, about the purpose God has for our little girl. Though we don’t understand it all, it truly seems God gave her back with a little touch of Heaven all over her personality.  Did she sit in Jesus’ lap and hear the angels sing?  Is that why she LOVES to dance to music and sing her little heart out?  Did He put His hands on her head and bless her?  Is that why she loves to pray and loves to love people SO much?  Did Jesus put that gleam of  life and startling intensity in her blue eyes?  Did He let her experience the atmosphere of Heaven for just a little and stamp a signature of joy in her spirit to share with us and make her a minister of His love?   We don’t know.  But we do know she is a miracle.  I hope we never get over it.  :)

One of the things that has been very hard for me to comprehend in our story is why God chooses to give some back and take others home.  We have dear friends who went through similar experiences but deal with the deep sorrow of having to let go of their loved ones.  It makes no sense why our little girl is still in our arms while others stayed in Jesus’ arms and left aching, longing hearts behind.  Yet there is peace in knowing God understands all the things we don’t, and we accept His sovereignty.  Did He want us to have a deeper sense of what so many dear ones have gone through?  I don’t know… but I do know, we love you, dear ones.  And this morning, I am praying, for each one of you, in a new way again.  May Jesus be glorified!

Jesus, thank you for the fire. Thank you for Who You are, and that is Life. Thank you that You have humbled Yourself, to become a man, for me. Thank you for walking this earth, among people who did not understand Who You are, so that You could understand who we are. Thank you for immersing Your life and Your heart into the lives and hearts of people… for being an example of what Your children should be. In the face of critics and gainsayers, thank you for walking quietly in the security of Who You belonged to, for showing us where real life is, in Your connection with the Father every day, even in places void of love.   Among religious people who inwardly felt so empty, You stepped with the fullness of God, not expecting to be understood… only expecting to understand. Thank you for the tears that You carried in Your heart for them, and for us. Thank you for the tears You wept for them, and for us. Thank you for the healing touch You placed upon many a weary brow, and spoke sweet life into dead bodies and dead hearts. Thank you for walking those 40 days in utter loneliness and temptation, as the devil tormented and tortured you with his lies and wiles, for us… to remind us we are more than conquerors through You. Jesus, thank you for facing rejection and scorn from many hearts, and then total abandonment from those who walked by your side and listened to your words and learned from Your life… and for walking from that place directly into the hands of punishment and death, for a crime You did not commit, for me. The love that You have shown, the pain You have carried, the life You have lived, and died, and then lived anew… has given me life eternal. My heart is so full that I can only worship You through my tears today. I love You because You first loved me. You have proven Your faithfulness to this child through years and years. You have won my heart so completely, so irreversibly. In my heart, when I see You, it is standing in a place of intercession beside the Father, ever watchful of every heart that belongs to You.  Embracing Your Presence means entering the place where Love is so pure and so right, where my heart is known through and through, and the security of that place is completely unsurpassable. Knowing You are perfect, and You are God is overwhelming, and knowing You have walked the steps of a man even in Your perfection, and there is nothing, nothing we can face that You do not understand…. *tears*…. thank you, Jesus.  YOU. are my Treasure. I love You.

Hey, dear friends,
We are indeed still here, and we never even got to share with you the joy of our newest little bundle, Kyla Faith. She was born Feb. 2, 2010, a PRECIOUS expression to us of our Father’s love. She has brought us pure joy. She is total sweetness and contentment, and we all five have more fun kissing her fat cheeks than you can imagine!! She is now 6 months old and learning to sit, while those first little teeth are taking their good old time pushing through little weary gums. She’s very brave about it.

Kyla’s name was a hard one for us to settle on. PD chose her middle name, Faith, a few months before she was born. It was a perfect expression of what God had been especially teaching us more about. We finally settled on Kyla for the first name, and we now love the combination meanings. ‘Kyla’ means ‘a narrow strait of water, lovely (or beautiful)’. Combined with faith, we love to think of ‘rivers of living water’ that will flow out of us when the Holy Spirit is abundantly within. Our desire is for this little lady to grow up and be a vessel of the power and love of Jesus to everyone around her. Her little life has already been a huge inspiration to us to allow Him to do that work in US first of all. O that her life may be surrounded by the life He puts inside of us, from little up.

We are SO thankful for this new little lady, who puts our number of girls to four!! We are enjoying them all so much. Sometimes I just wish I could stop time a little… so we for sure don’t miss these precious moments with our children.

We spent a few days at the beach in Tela, Honduras.

…and there is an old one of their Mom and Dad… mmm, I love that guy!

I know it’s been way too long since we have updated anything on here, but life has been moving right along for us. We are grateful to God for His unchanging and steadfast love through anything life brings us. Last Friday Leeny was diagnosed with viral meningitis, and she has been pretty much flat on her back since then. We ended up in the ER yesterday for a while and did some more extensive testing, and thankfully nothing else showed up. The extreme pain in her head is lessening, thank God, and she is backing off her pain pills slowly. Today it feels like she is finally over the hump, and headed back to normal. Thanks to all who were praying for us, that was a great encouragement to me. It was definitely a strange way to celebrate our ninth anniversary.

God is good.

All the time.

We are a little behind the times here, but just had to put in a little post about the week when our dear friend Beth came down.  We met Beth and her parents during our trip to Honduras last March.  Between my fresh grief over Isaac’s death and the grief in Beth’s heart over leaving her little sisters and her brothers behind as she and her parents headed for the states,  we connected.  We have since developed a very precious friendship.  Thanks, lil sis. :)  Beth’s life inspires me continually, because I see her drawing comfort and grace from a Strength much greater than her own. I am so blessed by her ability to thank God for her pain because she knows He loves her and will somehow make beauty from the ashes in her life.  Her presence in our home brought much cheer and delight.  The week went way too fast, but we enjoyed it immensely, and Beth left us with lots of sweet memories… and PHOTOS!  We haven’t had a camera, so I’m posting some of Beth’s pictures for your enjoyment.  All credits to her!  I love you, Beth.

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Tonight I was lying in bed after PD and I prayed and he had fallen asleep.  I desperately needed to talk to God.  I haven’t been spending the time talking to Him that is so vital to maintain the life inside.  As I lay there talking to Him, and felt His love and His grace and His life welling up like a fountain inside, I was overwhelmed by Him.  It still baffles me how He can live inside of us so intensely… so incredibly real.  How can He be there, where all my humanity and sinful tendencies lie?? But He is.  His forgiveness is so secure.  His grace is like an ocean.  His love is unfathomable and unquenchable.  His conviction is sweet.  His LIFE is unending.  He is real.  He is there.  He is not some distant figure who frowns upon us as He waits for us to attain a great measure of holiness before we can feel His Presence.  His Presence reaches us when we admit our sinfulness and are honest about how much we need Him.  His forgiveness removes our sin far from us and His love overwhelms our weak and faltering hearts.  His grace pours over our insecurities and drowns them in the security of Himself.  His LIFE resurrects through the death of ourselves… oh, ouch.  Perhaps so many of us stop at the forgiveness and receive only little bits of His grace into our hearts at times because we are afraid to feel the pain of death.  How often have I done it myself?? How often have I turned my face away from the Spirit of God because my heart was overwhelmed by fears.  Oh, Lord, please forgive me for grieving your Spirit at times… for exchanging your LIFE for my fears.  I would rather hang on to them because they are so familiar and limiting?  But oh, to discover the fountain of joy that erupts when the pain and the death is accomplished within me!  Like the little seed who at last lay cracked and splintered to reveal his worthlessness inside, still contracting from the last throes of pain as he surrendered to his fate… Suddenly, from above, the LIGHT shown through into his very heart and with that light came LIFE, beautiful, vibrant life erupting forth, engulfed by the warmth of the Son and straining toward Him with everything he has been given.  Thank-you, Jesus!!!
 
Last night, we visited PD’s parents,  and I was searching through the bookshelves for a good book for my daughter to read.  I stood there gazing at the wealth of good reading material… so many good books.  ‘Faith’. ‘The Gift of Intercession’. ‘Complete in Christ’. ‘A Set Apart Life’.  ‘The Purpose Driven Life’.  ‘The Grace of God’.  ‘The Bondage Breaker’. 
 
Those are not all actual titles, but I am quite certain there was a book for each of those subjects, besides many more.  I thought about our little joke about writing books, and how I actually would love to write one sometime if God gives the inspiration and the time.  But I realized… another book to stash on our bookshelves would be nice… but even if people read it, and perhaps are even blessed and touched by God because of it, will it really make a difference??  That got me thinking further.  What will make the MOST difference?  God will.  So God can and does use books.  But what is the most powerful tool in the hands of God and His people?  Perhaps prayer?  But even that, will it make a difference unless HE is in it and it is full of HIM and HIS life moving in our hearts towards Himself?  So it must absolutely be the work of God for any of these good things to be genuine fruit of His Spirit and Presence in our lives.  And what will move Him toward us but prayer… groanings of honesty from our own hearts reaching towards Him in faith?  What will move His heart towards His faltering children to strengthen their faith but the prayers of their brothers and sisters??  Is there really time to pour my life into anything else, or to have anything else poured into my life, but prayer??
 
Tonight… as I lay upon my bed and I thought of all the questions that I have heard coming out of the honest hearts of myself, my husband, my children, and my friends, those questions and groanings gave way to a picture in my mind of a group of hungry children, our arms outstretched and grasping heavenward, our eyes gleaming with tears and incredible hunger… we are reaching for life.  We are reaching for Him.  Some of us lose our way in the search.  We become discouraged by our circumstances, not realizing that the things that make us feel our inadequacies so keenly have been allowed by God in His mercy because He knows they provide the best opportunities for us to find Him.  Sometimes we are discouraged by others who have quit their search, or become satisfied in the good things they have found.  Some of us turn away from the light to find the answers within ourselves.  We raid the resources and intellect God has given us, finding plenty of good theories and raising good questions, trying to analyze them and reach a logical conclusion.  Yet we remain unsatisfied, for our conclusions are human, though the very best of humanity there is to be found. It is not enough.  Others of us look within ourselves for the beauty we yearn for and we find some… but it doesn’t satisfy and we end up enjoying ourselves and disliking Christianity, but we are still hungry.
 
While my mind ponders these pictures, my heart is pulsing with Love, Life, and a Joy that cannot be explained.  And I wonder… how can what we are searching so earnestly for be so simple, so available to us, yet be so hard to find?  I think of how Jesus came, swaddled in humility from the day of His birth.  I think of how He walked among men and women, quietly, no big ado, just love… forgiveness… healing… a tenderness beyond what any of us realize.  I think of how He was so often silent, but He was God. I think of how He faced the eager religious leaders with sobriety, how He understood their human tendency to see only what was on the outside, and not the heart.   Yet He could not condone this, for He looked on the hearts of men.  I think of how Jesus received the blessings and worship from sinners, and forgave them.  I think of how He ate with the publicans and the harlots, loving them, but never touched by their sin.  I think of how He healed the sick, cast out demons… how He expounded the kingdom of God to His disciples in parables, so they could understand.  And then, what suffering He endured, cruel accusations, and revilings He was unworthy of.  He took it silently, for us, because He loved us.  He died. He resurrected!!
 
That Jesus Christ has made it possible for Himself to dwell within us, to change us into His image, by the Spirit of God.  It is Him that we are reaching for!  We are yearning for Him.  We are seeking Him.  He is the LIFE, the LOVE, the FORGIVENESS we all long for.  But our hunger for Him will only be satisfied when we choose the path that leads to Him…  We need willingness to be buried with baptism in His death and resurrected through His Spirit to LIFE in Christ Jesus.  We need willingness to walk in that life, which invariably means death to ourselves.  We must accept His will… to be vulnerable and honest before God and man, to not shun the rejection nor fear the misunderstandings of those around us, yes, sometimes those we love the most. We simply must be willing to be like Him, to live like He did.
 
It sounds so hard. It sounds so… painful to my heart.  But as I feel that deep joy welling up and spilling over the agony of death, my heart says AMEN.
 
“Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”