I heard this song for the first time a few days ago. I've been listening to it a lot since then. Thought I'd share it with all of you. Make sure you listen to/read the lyrics.
God’s fingerprints – in no particular order:
-Leading us to Calvary Baptist Church (CBC). Last summer, after finding out Hannah was pregnant, we began discussing how we wanted to raise our child. I hadn't gone to church in years, and Hannah had recently stopped going to church. Even so, we both knew we wanted to raise our child in church and teach him about God. We decided to start looking for a church. We found one about ten minutes away that we liked. It was very small – around twenty members - but the members were all very friendly and Hannah had known some of them for years. Even better was the fact that they only had one service a week - Sunday morning. Having been out of church for awhile, and being back in church only because of our unborn child, we didn’t exactly want to attend more than once a week.
We attended this church for a few weeks and really liked it, but quickly realized that our two children didn't seem to be enjoying it. The only other kids in the church were the pastor's kids, and they didn't have any Sunday School classes or anything centered around children. We were getting some pre-marital counseling from the pastor of another nearby church (CBC) and he recommended that we visit his church, partly because there was more for our kids there. We attended CBC on Sunday evenings for a few weeks. We sort of liked it, but the music was more contemporary than we were use to and they didn't exclusively use the King James Version of the Bible. *gasp!!* (We were both raised in churches where the music was strictly hymns and the Bible was strictly KJV - and these churches taught that anything different in those two categories was just plain sinful.) For these reasons we actually stopped attending CBC after a few weeks.
A few weeks later we met with the pastor for another counseling session, and I told him we had stopped attending his church and explained why. He patiently and lovingly gave us some wise counsel on those topics, as well as some advice in general about what to look for in a church. We left his office that day feeling very torn and confused about what we should do. We loved the church we were currently attending. We loved the members, and we especially loved the messages that the pastor had been preaching. We considered and discussed the CBC pastor’s advice some more, prayed about it, and eventually decided to give CBC another try. We felt like God was telling us to look past the external factors - the music and the Bible version - and look at the heart and soul of the church, as that's what really matters. We did that and quickly fell in love with the church and, after even more prayer about the matter, decided to make it our home.
"But what about the music and the Bible version?" you may ask. I will discuss Bible versions in a later post, but I will touch briefly on the music question now. Yes, the music is more lively than good old-fashioned hymns. Yes, many of the songs even have a beat to them. And you know what? It's great! For the first time in my life I actually feel like I'm praising and glorifying God when I sing in church now. The words that we sing and the music that the musicians play join together in a joyful noise of worship, praise, and adoration of our God.
Okay, now that you know the very unlikely story of how God led us to CBC, let me explain why the church has been such a godsend in our time of loss. The outpouring of love from our church when they found out about Uriah's death was so amazing and such a blessing in our lives. From the countless prayers on our behalf and words of encouragement to us, to the meals that our Sunday School class brought in during that first week, to opening the church to us for Uriah's funeral, to each of the pastors helping out with the funeral service (including a very important message that we needed to hear from one of the pastors), to the many members who brought in food for the luncheon following the funeral, and everything else I'm not thinking of right now, God's love and grace and compassion were demonstrated in our lives through the members of this church. We weren't official members of the church - still aren't. We had only been attending for a couple of months. But they cared about us, and so they made themselves available and willing to be used by God and He did that in a very special way.
I've told my wife on several occasions that I shudder to think of where we would be had we not found CBC. I think we would've both turned our backs on God again, and that's really all that needs to be said about that.
-Loni. This dear friend of Hannah's has been such a blessing during our dark time. When Hannah found out what was suspected to be wrong with Uriah she texted Loni and she immediately came down to the hospital. You see, she has experienced the pain of losing two children and she knew Hannah needed her. Late in the afternoon of Uriah's first day as Hannah and I sat in her room on the 5th floor of the hospital, she tearfully told me that she didn't think she could stand to see Uriah any more. Knowing that he likely wouldn't survive, she couldn't bear the thought of getting more attached to him, only to have to say good-bye. With a now even-heavier heart, I went back down to see Uriah alone. Some time later I was so relieved to see Loni approaching Uriah's bedside with Hannah next to her. Loni had encouraged her to come back down to see Uriah, to appreciate and enjoy whatever time he had on this earth, to make memories with Uriah while it was still possible, and her words thankfully had the desired effect on Hannah. She was a huge blessing during those two days in the hospital, and she has continued to be a blessing in the weeks since, encouraging Hannah - and even myself on a few occasions - during the dark times that still appear.
-Pastor Mead. Last summer we decided to get some pre-marital counseling from Pastor Mead. That decision is probably the wisest decision we've ever made. He has helped us - both individually and in our relationship - so much with his wise, godly advice. He steered us in the right direction in our individual relationships with God, and in our relationship with each other. He counseled us about Uriah, and we came to realize that Uriah was not a mistake but was a blessing from God. He encouraged us to come to CBC. He came down to the hospital on Tuesday, Uriah’s last day, stood by his bedside with us and prayed for us and encouraged us in our sorrow. He has continued to pray for us in the weeks since Uriah’s death. He spoke to us during Uriah’s funeral, and ministered to us with a message that we so desperately needed to hear on that day. His presence in our life has been invaluable. We are where we are today because of how God used him in our lives.
-Insurance and doctors. The only insurance that Hannah had when she became pregnant was Medicaid. When it was time to find an obgyn doctor we quickly realized that precious few obgyns were accepting new patients with Medicaid. We made quite a few calls before finally finding one - and his office was an hour away from our home. We were less than thrilled about the distance, but he seemed to be the only option so Hannah chose to continue seeing him. That doctor, and the female doctor who Hannah actually saw for the majority of her appointments, were very good. The male doctor is the one who delivered Uriah; he sensed something was wrong as Uriah was coming out so he called for the NICU doctor right away, before Uriah was even all the way out. The NICU doctor arrived moments later and he’s the one who was finally able to intubate Uriah. It was a blessing in disguise to get stuck with the obgyn that was an hour away.
-Hospitals. The obgyn's office partnered with Spectrum Health hospitals in Grand Rapids, so that is where Hannah delivered the baby. This ended up being a huge blessing because Devos Children’s Hospital was just one floor away and they were able to take him to the NICU unit immediately. Since it was in the same hospital building it allowed us to see and touch Uriah during his two days on this earth, and then to hold him in our arms during his final hour. Had she delivered Uriah at one of our local hospitals, they would have immediately taken Uriah down to Devos Children's Hospital in G.R. and Hannah would have been at the local hospital and never would have seen her son while he was alive.
We praise God for touching our lives with Uriah and for the ways he prepared us to walk through the dark valley of losing our son. His love and mercy towards us are unfathomable.
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I have been working on this blog post here-and-there for the past couple of days. I asked my lovely wife, Hannah, to proof-read it last night. She did and made a few suggestions of things to change. Today I made some of those changes, and then the Lord brought to mind some more things to add to the post. Now I sit here waiting for my wife to return home so I can ask her to proof-read the revised post. While waiting I decided to read a little from a couple of devotional books as well as the Bible. I have really been struggling lately with spending time in God’s word. Earlier in the year I was reading from a daily read-through-the-Bible-in-a-year plan. This worked pretty well until I got partway into Exodus, at which point I allowed myself to get stuck and just stopped reading the Bible. I was right in the middle of the section where God is giving Moses directions for the ark of the covenant, and it’s all about measurements and materials and, well, I got bored with it. I’m ashamed to say that it’s probably been a couple of weeks since I last picked up my Bible to read anything for the day.
I decided I should just make myself pick up where I had left off and continue reading in Exodus tonight. Before I opened my Bible I prayed and asked God to speak to me through His word, to please show me something…anything…in what I was about to read.
I read one chapter that consisted of instructions for consecrating the priests and for offering certain burnt sacrifices.
God, please – show me something.
The next chapter was more of the same. Downhearted, I began to close my Bible.
God, how did this help me?
A thought sprung into my head – You didn’t give Him much of a chance, did you. Read one more chapter.
I fought this idea for a second – I didn’t like the thought of reading more instructions about burnt sacrifices. But then I opened my Bible back up and started reading. Initially it was more instructions that don’t seem to mean a thing to me today – great. Then instruction about the Sabbath day – okay this is a little more interesting, but still not very helpful to me right now.
Then I read the final verse and it hit me.
Thank you, God.
"And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God."
It was as if God had said to me:
My finger was writing in your lives before I allowed your son to be born. I was molding you, positioning you, preparing you for the trials of losing your son. I don’t write on earthly tables of stone any more. I write in people’s lives. Your lives are now a testimony of my ever-present love and compassion.
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Posted by
Jesse
Tags: Bible, church, counseling, friends, God, loss, love, music, prayer
Tags: Bible, church, counseling, friends, God, loss, love, music, prayer
I enjoyed reading "Isaac Newton
", one of the Christian Encounters books published by Thomas Nelson Publishers. This was the first biography I’ve read in many years, and it has piqued my interest in reading other biographies. Mitch Stokes does a good job of describing Mr. Newton’s life, including his triumphs, trials, and disagreements with other scholars of his day. Isaac Newton was very intelligent, but yet also very humble. He made a lot of discoveries in the scientific and mathematic worlds, but he was not prone to boasting about his achievements. He pursued knowledge because he believed that in doing so he was worshiping God – his love for God was the driving force behind most of his work. “The ultimate goal of Newton’s studies was to know God and ‘give him honour & glory.’ … Newton believed that all knowledge – including knowledge of nature – was, in the end, knowledge of God. Knowing was worship.”The book mentions on multiple occasions that Isaac Newton spent a great deal of time on theological research and writings, but doesn’t really go into much detail about his theological writings. This was rather surprising to me, considering that the book is part of the Christian Encounters series and the book cover says that Isaac Newton wrote far more about theological topics than anything else. I would have appreciated a little more focus on his theological writings. Overall it is a great book and I recommend it.
I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
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I have a very small selection of Bible verses in random rotation now displaying at the top of my blog. I'll be expanding the selection eventually. Feel free to offer suggestions if you have a favorite verse(s) that you'd like to see up there.
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Two books that I highly, highly recommend - Safely Home
and Heaven
, both written by Randy Alcorn. I'm about halfway through with Heaven. I may write more about the book later, but for now let's just say I've never looked forward to Heaven as much as I am now after reading part of this book. Safely Home is a novel. After the first couple of chapters I was so engrossed in the book that I didn't want to put it down. It is a good read with a powerful message.---
Spring seems to have almost arrived here in Michigan. Sunny and mid-to-upper 50's all week here; they're forecasting snow over the weekend though. Hopefully it will just be a very short-lived interruption of this beautiful weather we're having!
And with the new blog title comes a new blog design. Let me know what you think. It's not complete just yet, I have some more tweaking to do, but this is pretty close to what the final design will look like. If you don't like it please tell me! If it loads too slow, please tell me.
re·vise
–verb (used with object)
1.
to amend or alter: to revise one's opinion.
(from Dictionary.com)
My head has been spinning lately with thoughts of all the various areas of my life that I want to alter and improve. I feel compelled to work on these things, to better myself, but I know I cannot undertake too much at one time. Change and me aren't the greatest of friends. I don't exactly abhor change, but I certainly don't embrace it either. If I attempt to change too much in a short amount of time I'll end up failing miserably on all counts. So I've decided to focus on just a few of those areas for the immediate future.
In no particular order, they are:
-Physical health
This involves both my weight and my fitness level. As I've written about previously on this blog, I struggle to gain weight. A year ago I was borderline underweight. I weighed 120 lbs. Thanks to some wonderful cooking and great encouragement from my lovely and wonderful wife, I am now up to 141 142 lbs. This is definitely a more healthy weight than where I started, but I desire to add on another 20 lbs or so. The higher my weight gets, the harder it is to add more on, so it's definitely an uphill struggle. Coupled with adding more weight is improving my physical fitness. For many years now I've not exercised at all. I'm going to work on changing that. I'm horribly out of shape. My physical endurance is pitiful. Make me run for four minutes and I'll be just about keeled over and gasping for breath. I won't be hitting up the gym anytime soon (can't afford it!), but I can at least do some basic exercises at home, such as pushups, situps, lunges, running on the treadmill, and so on.
-Mental health
No, I'm not mentally ill! Not that kind of mental health. Three men in the last two generations of my family tree (my dad, my dad's dad, and my dad's uncle) have suffered from early onset dementia and passed away from complications of the same. It is not known for sure what causes this disease, but if memory serves me correctly I have a better chance of not getting the disease myself if I take care of my physical and mental health, exercising both my body and my mind. So I need to work on that. I'm not exactly sure what approach I'll take for the mental health one, except that initially I'm going to work on educating my mind more than I have been by reading more books. As a child/teen I used to read a lot. I remember bringing home a stack of books from the library on a fairly regular basis. When I started working and going to school I found I didn't have much time left over for reading. On top of that with my narcolepsy I simply couldn't stay awake long enough to read more than a couple of pages of just about any book. My Xyrem medication helps me so well that I can actually stay awake while reading a book now! I've done a little reading here and there, but nowhere near what I used to. I have a couple books I've just started with a couple more on the way from the library so I'll definitely have to spend more time reading if I'm going to get through all of the books in a timely manner.
-Spiritual health
In recent weeks I have been challenged on several occassions to connect with God on a deeper level, to spend more time with Him, to learn more about Him, and to grow closer to Him. I am going to work on doing just that.
I'll try to write about my efforts from time to time. Hmm, maybe I could even use that as my new blog title: Revising My Life. What do you think?
Life should be, I suppose, a life-long journey of altering/improving/revising who I am and how I live, continually striving to become the person God wants me to be. That is why I think it might fit to use "Revising My Life" as my blog title. It also sounds better than my current blog title. :-) I suppose just about anything would sound better than "Anemic Slime Stew" though!
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My wife and I have had some discussions recently about wanting to have another baby. We both have an intense desire to have another child together. We are also afraid. Afraid that if we do get pregnant something will go horribly wrong again. A miscarriage. A birth defect. An unexpected and unexplained event like what happened with Uriah. We don't want to repeat the pain of losing a child. We need to trust the Lord though; He does know what is best. He can give us a healthy child if He so chooses.
One of the things that we've talked about is wondering what other people think about us. Occassionally we catch ourselves talking about other couples/families, questioning something that they are or aren't doing, wondering why they're doing something that doesn't make sense to us, judging them for doing something we don't agree with, etc. It's not our place to judge others though, so we need to be very careful in that area. Anyway, the reason I mention that is because we then wonder if people talk about us, and if so, what do they talk about? We figure if we get pregnant again now some people will question that and think we're doing the wrong thing. We realize it doesn't matter what others think about us. No matter what we do, somebody will disagree. If we get pregnant now, somebody will think we should've waited longer to give my wife's body more time to recover from the previous pregnancy. Somebody else will think we should've never got pregnant again, that we shouldn't take that chance on losing another child. If we wait a year to get pregnant again, someone will think we shouldn't have waited that long, that it was too risky because of my wife's age. If we never get pregnant again someone will think that we're just too scared to try again, and that we don't trust God enough that He could give us a healthy baby. Regardless of what we do people will talk and wonder and question. We need to not worry about it. All we should concern ourselves with is what our hearts' desires are coupled with what we feel God wants us to do.
It wouldn't surprise me if people have already talked about us in regards to Uriah. "It's no wonder God took Uriah from them - he was conceived in sin and God wanted to punish them for it." Yes, Uriah was conceived in sin - adultery. We are ashamed of that, but we confessed our sin to God and He forgave us. Uriah was not a mistake. God knew what He was doing when He conceived Uriah for us. He knew that Uriah would be the push that we both needed to turn our hearts back towards God. I do not believe that He took Uriah from us to punish us.
Regardless of what people may think or say, we are trying to get pregnant again now. We are praying that God will bless us with another child. This child would not be a replacement for Uriah, because Uriah can never be replaced in our hearts. But we do desire another child, another blessing, from the Lord. Would you pray for that with us please?
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Since I first wrote this post late last night (I dragged my feet in posting it!) I have tentatively decided on a new name for my blog. Nevertheless, if you have any suggestions please offer them as I'm not yet fully settled on using the new name. What is the possible new name? You'll find out in my next post. :-)
