Take Time

I will praise the Lord.

Lord my God, you are very great.

You are dressed in glory and majesty.

You wrap yourself in light as if it were a robe.

You spread the heavens out like a tent.

Psalm 104:1-2

It is mid-September and after a brutal, drought-stricken summer with strings of days of temperatures over 100 degrees, the weather is cooling off and recent rains have restored color to our lawn and gardens. With pleasant temperatures throughout the day, we have more hours to spend enjoying the outdoors. Let's not forget to take the time to do so. Let's have picnic lunches on the now-green lawn and do read-alouds outside. Let's feel the warm - not hot - sun on our skin and feel the cool breeze whisper of God's love and freshness.

This morning Will woke me up at 6:30, telling me it was morning. I looked out the window with him, and although it was still dark, the sky was no longer night-black but pre-dawn deep blue. The sliver of moon hung just above the trees and a bright, bright star shone higher in the sky. A few minutes later I looked out and saw the golden-pink of the sunrise just starting to take over the horizon, so I called Will back into my room and showed it to him. At first we thought the moon had disappeared but then we saw it higher and fainter in the sky. The same star shone above it, its brightness being dulled by the rising sun.

Still later, around 7:30, Will said, "Mom, come look at this." Rushed though I was, I took the time to go see what he was looking at. He pointed at the stairs With the front door open, the sun was streaming through the storm door and casting its bright glow on the right side of the staircase. The orange-pink on the oak treads was just beautiful.

I thought to myself that if I had not taken time to show nature to Will earlier, he may have rushed past the golden sunshine and missed the fleeting beauty of the play of light on the staircase.

Let's not be too busy to miss these oppotunities. Moments like these, days like these, and years like these will be gone before we know it if we don't take the time to enjoy them.

I will sing to the Lord all my life.

I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.

May these thoughts of mine please him.

I find my joy in the Lord.

Psalm 104:33-34

I Want to Feel the Rain

Rain, depending on the intensity of it, can either represent God's showers of immediate blessings or the storms of life God sends our way to refine us and bless us in the future in ways we could not have imagined.

On a rainy morning in May of 2003, Chuck and I headed to the hospital to receive God's fourth little blessing into our lives. Never did we imagine the storm that had been brewing undetected for nine months. Our son Will was discovered just after birth to have a myleomeningocele, a hole in his spine, a condition more commonly known as Spina Bifida. With our baby life-flighted to another state for intensive neonatal care, Chuck and I plunged ourselves into this new world of being special needs parents. We learned a whole new language and a whole new way of caring for an infant. We also had a healthy dose of denial; when we took him home from the hospital 2 surgeries and 7 days later, we thought we'd get on with our normal lives.

That was not be.

Less than two weeks later, our baby was life-flighted back to the hospital in Birmingham for failure to thrive. As Chuck was walking to the car after Will was taken the second time, the rain fell lightly and the tears flowed freely. He did not know if Will would live or die. He was reminded of how Jacob spent a night wrestling for his blessing and he realized that Will would always have to wrestle for his blessing.

After the second hospitalization, we settled into a "new normal". No, things would not be the same, and they would not be as we had dreamed and planned, but we would survive. In fact we thrived, we flourished, but it took a tremendous amount of effort. Our new normal included docotr appointments, specialist appointments, therapy appointments, and 7-8 hours of time spent feeding our failure-to-thrive son each day.

Will got older, but his motor skills development was so far delayed. He smiled at 10 weeks. He laughed at 6 months. He crawled at 1 year. He did not talk, he could not stand, much less walk, and he could barely hold himself up. He made progress, but it was slow, slow, slow. He had 7 surgeries by the time he was 3 years old. His list of diagnoses kept growing longer.

At age 6, Will is walking with forearm crutches, talking so much - although he's difficult to understand - and starting to explore a world that has been largely inaccessible to him until now. For the first time ever, Will had grass stains on his socks from playing in the yard at the farm. Although he'd rahter be watching videos, he is beginning to interact with nature and take initiative with exploring. Last Saturday, a rain shower came up while we were at the farm house. Will said, "I want to feel the rain," and then he walked to the edge of the porch, held onto the rough cedar post, and extended his hand as far as he could to feel the rain. Then he moved to the porch steps so he could feel it with his whole body. He remarked with delight at the sensation of the rain coming down.

I took a mental picture of the moment - the outstretched arm, reaching out to embrace something new. I can still hear the sweet, sweet sound of his voice as he said, "I want to feel the rain."

Dear Lord, I want to feel the rain, too. I want not just your showers of blessings, but also the storms of life that shape me and refine and bring me blessings I never could have imagined. Blessings like Will. Give me the courage to stand in the rain and feel Your love pouring down, even through the pain.