Say That Again?

My daughter woke up the other night because "I hear music in my ear and it scares me". So she fell asleep next to me on the couch while I wrote.

When I was ready for bed, I went to pick her up and carry her to bed. She is much like her dad and talks in her sleep. When I scooped her up, she moaned, stretched, and said, "Don't do that. I might come back to life!"

Huh? Deep sleeper, I guess.

Then there is #3. He is a funny little kid. He's funny just existing. Today, on the way home from school, he was excited over a penny he had.

"Mommy, it says 1981 on it. Does that mean it was made in 1981?"

Yes.

"Wow! So how much do you think it is worth?"

A penny.

"But mommy, it should be worth more since it is so old!"

1981? Old? I must be archaic by now.

Her Story - A Gift

There is more to tell of this story, of God's ways of caring and comforting me, of unlikely people who did the right thing and brought me comfort, of facing fears during another pregnancy, and of God's goodness. But the reason I began this story is that I wanted to tell what gift God had given me with the death and birth of my first daughter.

We named her Lydia. It was not the name we had originally chosen if she was to be girl, but we named her Lydia. Lydia was the seller of purple, a valuable cloth fit for royalty. With Lydia's small life, I began to see God's hand in my life in a real way... like a purple thread woven throughout my daily journey. Lydia was the first believer in Asia. Our Lydia was our first baby in heaven, and it seemed like a good name.

Our children all had middle names which their dad chose. Ones which worked for his country. He never could find a name for her, and for ten years, she had only the one name. Last year, I told God that I wish she would have had a middle name, too. Then I was reading somewhere, and I found the name. Amana. It means permanent, secure. It was a good name. Lydia Amana. Now, I feel peace - she needed her whole name, even if she was so tiny.

Back to the gift:

I had watched my friend tell me about the death of her daughter, Sarah, who died of SIDS. I thought then, "the one thing I could never live through is the death of my child. I would not survive." I had longed for children all my life, and knew I just couldn't survive that.

A few weeks after Lydia's birth, I was again sitting in the car driving somewhere. Honestly, God and I have our best conversations in the car! I was thinking ahead to the next steps in our life which would lead us eventually towards going to country that really wasn't that "safe" to be in. Just having lost one baby, I wasn't thrilled about taking my only child (at the time) into a dangerous place. Hey, I was scared at times about taking myself there!

I had grown up in the 70's and 80's in churches that put a lot of emphasis on being right, being prepared to defend your faith, being strong enough to face persecution. Ok. But... how do I know if I am really strong enough. What if....? What if....? What if I am weak? The thought always frightened me. What if I am in a situation where I am not strong enough? I had grown up on the mission field. A few of our community were actually killed for their faith. It was not unheard of. What if I was not strong enough?

And then God began to talk to me. Very, very gently. He showed me again that last night, driving home from pizza and the quiet word and picture He had given to me, the very picture that hung on the wall of the room where I delivered my little girl's dead body.

He could have given me that comfort earlier - somewhere in the two weeks that I carried her body. It would have comforted me then. He didn't. He gave it to me the very night I was going to go through a labor without hope. He gave it to me exactly when I needed to think about my daughter alive with Him and not be focussed on the twisted, dead body which I labored with. He knew exactly when I would need the help and met me exactly then with exactly what I needed to get through that night.

That was the gift God gave me. He showed me that it would have nothing to do with how much I had worked out my "spiritual muscles", but with Him. It wouldn't be a strength He would give me beforehand to store for when needed, but it would be given to me in the time I needed it. He, Himself, would give me what I needed to endure whatever came in the time I needed it. Even if I needed it in my weakest moment.

He gave me confidence in Himself. I know that God will enable me to face whatever comes because He has the strength, not because I do.

Do I still pray that nothing bad ever happens in my life? YES! But, I am not fearful anymore. (well, not so much!) I know my God.

That was the gift of my daughter's short life, that and the joy we and her brothers and sisters will have when we finally get to meet her.

A Rough Night

What else would follow a rough day, but a rough night?

My friend who just miscarried called at midnight that night being rushed to the hospital with severe pain. She had an ectopic pregnancy that they didn't catch earlier, and needed surgery. I did not go in that first night as another team member was with her, but I did last night's shift. She is home now, with her husband who arrived while she was in surgery, and resting comfortably.

A Rough Day

I think I will never join another committee! I hate having to make rough decisions.

The last decision which meant a good-bye was done well. Sad, that is did end not the way I wanted, but it went well.

Then, last week we made another decision. One person was not acting as they should, so we drafted a letter meant to help them see where change was needed and assist them in changing with support. It was a very gentle letter. Too gentle for the situation, I thought.

It was not received well. The person objected to all the changes asked and stated that she was fine the way she was and we were oppressing her. Then she quit - in two weeks. But today, before she quit, she went around gossiping angrily about the leadership. She was so angry that we did not feel she could do her job alone. She would continue to spread lies and rumors. So I was assigned to sit in on her classes. She had already packed all her stuff, so questions were coming, and my job was to ensure that they were handled in the way we had agreed on handling them.

I sat there and smiled, and she was there and smiled. She knew I was watching her. I knew she knew. I managed to keep the day pleasant and cheerful in all my conversation with her. It went well for the situation, but it was stressful.

I don't know what tomorrow holds and what steps we will have to take next. We did not see this coming. I'm exhausted today. I got home to help another family talk through a major decision. We sat for three hours discussing back and forth, listening, waiting. It's been a rough day. Pray for peace. I'm sad when I see what sin does.

Her Story - a dark night before morning dawned

When I last left this story, I was riding home in the car with a tummy ache after eating pizza. God had just spoken to me clearly that night, giving me comfort. He had said, "Your daughter went straight from the safety of your womb into My arms. She never knew pain and never knew sin." Then, in the quiet darkness, He showed me that beautiful picture of her toddling out of a walled garden through an open gate into the light of the new day. I clung to that half second glimpse of her turned head and little baby giggle. I held in deep in my heart, and hung on to it.

When we got home, I was exhausted. I went to bed, and my husband put my son in his crib, and went to play computer games. I tossed and turned, but could not get comfortable. The pizza had really disagreed with my tummy and I could not sleep. It took about an hour for me to realize that the indigestion was beginning to come in waves, and likely had nothing to do with pizza.

It took my mind a long time to wrap around the thought that I was in labor and needing to deliver. I should have known, but I didn't. Grief does not leave a clear mind. I called upstairs to my husband, but he was playing. He called down that he would come when he finished his game. I just sat, curled up on the bottom of the stairs waiting. Trying to think this through. How could I be in labor? The baby was dead. Labor is exciting. It is the beginning of hope realized. It signals that it is time to meet your baby. Mine was gone, no longer there to meet.

Yet, as I sat alone on the stairs that evening's words came back into my head. She never knew pain. She never knew sin. She is safe with Me. I repeated them over and over to myself. I opened my hurting heart up and looked toward God and sat with Him. And I hung onto the glimpse of the laughing girl with black hair toddling towards the morning. I sat there and said to myself, "someone left the gate open, and she has walked to God, straight to Him, that is all. This is not death; it is life. Maybe even more alive life."

After some time, my husband came down, took one look at me, and scolded me for not telling him it was urgent. But I was glad to have that time sitting alone. I needed it. God Himself was preparing me for a birth which was not a life. As we gathered up our son again and drove through the dark to the hospital to deliver the dead body of our first daughter, my thoughts were not on the twisted, cold, lifeless body inside me, but on the glimpse He had given me of my child alive.

It was a rough night at the hospital. A foreign country where things are not done like we would at home. No emergency care. By that time, I was bleeding heavily, and for some reason, they stuck me on a surgical ward with two other patients in a room. They told my husband he could wait in the waiting room, but not with me. By this time, I was in active labor, and crying. The nurses kept coming in the room and scolding me for crying, telling me to shut up and let the others sleep. Finally, they called my husband to tell me to be quiet, and he was able to better explain the situation. Then they transferred me to the maternity ward.

I expected to go into labor area and wondered how I would handle that, but instead they put me in private room near the door. Unfortunately, it was directly across from the nursery. All night, I heard newborns crying. The nurses had graciously taken my seven month old son into the nursery, too. They looked down their noses at me when I said that he won't take a bottle and I should feed him first. They knew how to get babies to take bottles, I was told.

The new room was nicer, but I lay in bed in pain for an hour listening to my son scream bloodly murder. He didn't take bottles. I knew that. Somehow, being a patient in this country meant you had no brains. The nurses knew best. After an hour of loud wailing, a shamefaced nurse brought my son in to me. "He won't take a bottle."

Um. yeah. I told you that over an hour ago!

By then, the contractions were nearing the end, and I was struggling. But I was a mother, and I rolled on my side, quieted my cries, and nursed my son to sleep. I gritted my teeth and sang to him, and he was quiet.

It was after he was returned to the nursery that my daughter was born. While the labor was rougher than any of my other labors, the birth was quick. I have often thought back as to why the pain was worse, and this is the only explanation I can give - it was pain without hope. It was without the hope that gives us energy to go through it. It was simply pain on top of pain.

And then she was born. No bigger than what I could have held in one hand. The nurses scooped her up, all wrapped up in her membranes and all, and plopped her into a plastic tub much like a margarine container. I still can hear the snap of the lid. Then they walked out of the room.

I never saw her. I had rested my head back, and I never saw her. They snapped that lid on and walked out with my daughter inside.

Later on, somewhere in the dark of that night, someone asked if we wanted an autopsy, and I think we said yes. A week or two later, we were told that she was perfectly formed.

But I never saw her. They simply threw her away in the medical waste in the incinerator. That thought took me years to cope with. We don't do that, but it was standard practice, I guess. She was, after all, a week short of 20 weeks, so not legally a child.

It was a dark night. I was left entirely alone after they walked out. Somewhere in that night, I struggled to wake as I had dreamed I was watching from above as my body floated down a dark river. I struggled and struggled to wake, fighting to wake for my son. My husband leaned forward when he heard me mumbling, and he called for help. I was bleeding badly. Then the nurses came back, took one look at me, and went running for help. I slipped back into a semi-conscious state again, and woke later with IVs running and the nurse calling my name. She was wheeling a bassinet into my room, and for a brief second, my heart lept, but no, it was not her.

One look in the bassinet had me at least smiling. A seven month baby looks like a giant in a bassinet. My husband said later when he checked on him in the nursery, he laughed. It was little bump, little bump, little bump, huge baby! I nursed one more in the half darkness of the morning, and thanked God that He still left me this one baby to fill my empty arms.

My husband was the buyer for a company and that next day was a day where he was supposed to order the whole winter stock at a trade fair. He had to go, and told me that while I nursed. I knew he had to, but oh how much I wanted him then. He said he would go get my friend to stay with me. It would take him two hours to get her and he'd be back.

As I sat alone in my bed with my empty belly nursing my son, the sun rose. Light streamed into my hospital room and lit up the wall opposite my bed. I raised my tired eyes to the light and saw something which made me cry. There on the wall was a painting. It was a painting of a walled garden full of creeping vines and flowering bushes. An archway stood over a small gate which had been left open, and outside of the gate was a gently sloping hill with the daylight beginning to dawn over it. It was the picture that I had seen the night before as we drove home after pizza. The same picture, except that now the little laughing girl in the white dress was gone.

I sat in stunned shock crying, yet they were tears of comfort as well as pain. Even on this horrible first morning that I had to wake up alone in a maternity ward surrounded by the sounds of other mothers caring for their babies, God had met me. He had come to answer my pain, to surround me with detailed comfort in the very minute I needed it. He had walked that dark night of pain through with me and was there with the morning's light.

Later on, when I was able to think back to it all, I had learned a lesson about God that I never forgot, but just then, I sat together with Him nursing one baby, mourning another, and being comforted by a very present God.

Only During Service - Never Ask #3

I could have warned him. I could have, but I didn't get the chance.

Our pastor occasionally likes to involve the children in the service by asking some questions. Sometimes he just has them raise their hands, and other times he might ask them a short question like "What was your favorite birthday gift?" or "Do you remember who Abraham's son was?"

I could have warned him to ignore number 3 son's frantically waving hand. The deep breath he took before he began to answer should have clued him in.

The pastor simply asked, "Do you remember a really wise man who had to make a difficult judgment? Does anyone know what happened?"

Well, #3 sure did! He took a deep breath and began at high speed to tell the whole story.... the whole thing..... and just when we thought he would end, he took another deep breath and kept going.... all the way through the famine, and no one had food, and two women had two babies and one died and one said it was the others and no one knew whose it was, and they went to the King, ..... and..... the King got the sword.... and one woman said, "yes, yes, cut him in two.".... and the other said, "no, no! I want him to live - give him to the other woman".... and Solomon knew that the real mother would want him alive.... and all the people were amazed....."

He didn't leave one detail out, and he put in all the right emotions, and explanations, and he just kept going! It took him over two minutes to answer all this. I tried to get him to hush halfway through, but he just turned to me, shrugged, and said, "Mom! He asked about it! He wanted to know!"

The pastor laughed with me afterwards and said the amazing thing is that the kid has a loud clear voice that could be heard all over the church without a microphone.

(I knew that... I wake up to it every morning!)

But, #3 loves to teach. When it is his turn to do devotions in his class, instead of just bringing in a devotional book to read like most do, he spends a week researching his topic and looking up verses, coming up with a point, and putting it into a speech with questions and audience participation. And he is only 8.

A Dream

My friend here, the one who just had a miscarriage, is a special person. We have become close, much like sisters. She is without family nearby, and I have family, but am also seldom near them.

For the last six years, we have been sisters.

I met her one day when they lost a place to live, and they moved in with us. For about three months, we lived together, and even after they moved out, they were daily in our house from early morning until late night. My daughter loved her more than me as a small baby and would scream when she left. I was there for the birth of her last child. I love my new sister dearly.

We both moved across the world together and navigated our way around a new place together. We're friends.

The country which we work in had no songs. I guess there were a few, translated years ago with western tunes, but no real songs. Singing was not really done. We needed music. A church needs music. Believers need music. Music lifts, teaches worship, and is so dramatically different from the darkness around them.

My friend can sing. She is not the best, no. Would likely never be accepted for American Idol. But she can sing. More importantly, she knows how to worship God, and that worship has in the last few years begun to be expressed in song writing. She writes, and then with others, she teaches how to sing.

Before she began to write songs, she had a dream. She told me this dream hesitantly one day as we did housework together. She said:

I dreamed I was in a stadium sort of building, an arena with seats all around it. I knew I was standing where people were brought to be killed. I could see people coming to kill me, but I was not afraid. I stood there with my children with me, and I began to sing. When I opened my voice to sing, the singing filled the arena. It was almost like a powerful force, and it stopped the people coming, but then they became very angry and they began to run toward me to kill me. I sang louder, and we began to run. We ran and ran up the arena seats towards the door, and I saw my children go out the door to safety, but I was still singing as I ran. The men came chasing me, and I turned around and the words that I sang were so powerful. I can't tell you what they were, but the song was filling the arena. And then I woke.

I asked her if she got out alive, and she said she didn't know. She woke up. I asked if it was a frightening dream, and she said it really wasn't. It was more amazing when she saw the power of the singing, and the song itself filled her with courage and hope. That was four years ago, and she and I filed it away to think about. Yet, from that day, I knew God would use her in her country in a great way. The church needed songs. This last week, when she came back from traveling, exhausted, and she miscarried her baby; she had just come back from teaching a whole new set of songs - the second set now. People who had never heard singing now sing together to worship.

I know for me, worship in song has amazing power. It lifts me when I am down. It comforts me when I hurt. It allows me to express joy in God's presence. I could never do what my sister does, but I watch her work and am thrilled. I've prayed for God's hand on her in this area for four years - ever since her dream.

The devil is Mean

He is. He doesn't care one bit about us.

Why that is a surprise to me, I don't know. Somehow, I expect him to have some common decency. He doesn't.

I need you to pray for one of my coworkers. Her husband has been struggling with sicknesses for months and there are worrying symptoms. Then her husband is gone to a location that is not too safe to do work that is even less safe. She was just on a long trip with her two kids, and is tired from that.

Then a few days ago, there was a huge conflict in the believing community that we work in. One person phoned her and many cruel accusations were dumped on her head. I won't mention details. It is looking like it will be solved at some point, so I am thankful for that, but it was a huge emotional blow to her.

Then yesterday, she phoned me in tears. She just had a miscarriage. She didn't really know she was pregnant. It was a surprise. But she just miscarried, and she is in pain and very sad.

The devil is just mean. That is all I can say. All these things on this woman at one time... it is too much! And she had just returned from doing something that will help a new church learn to worship. She writes songs for believers who haven't had song in their language, and she sings them. What she does lifts people's spirits and teaches them how to worship.

And now this. Pray for her. For comfort, for healing, for settling of the conflict in a Godly way. For strength. We have contacted her husband, and he is coming home. She needs him now.

I have to go to set up for a wedding tonight, but I will write tomorrow about a dream this woman had. I think God has set her in place for a key purpose. He has given her a gift that this dark country needs. I am not surprised that she is attacked right now. We should have been praying for her more specifically in this regard. But pray for her now.

A Straight Part

I woke up to the sound of bath water running. That got me moving fast! I popped my head in the bathroom to find #2 son and my daughter in the tub.

"Mommy, you just said we couldn't take a bath alone in the mornings! There is two of us here!"

Ok. I guess. It sure got me out of bed fast!

Later on, Daddy combed out my daughter's waist length hair. It was an early morning out the door, so having to do hair was not an expected job. Later on, I checked his work, and took her back up to braid her hair. In a loose pony tail, it will be a mess by evening, and we need to go out this evening.

While I took her hair down and began to quickly do it, I told her, "You need to tell Daddy next time he does your hair that he needs to get a straight part first. Then it looks better."

She wrinkled her face at me in the mirror and said, "But I have a straight part. My finger is straight, and my legs, too. My arms are straight, too, unless I bend them."

#2 has his birthday today! He turns 11. They are getting way too big.

What To Say?

I need you all praying.

I have a woman here at my house to ask me what I think about her marrying a man from another culture. I am not too excited about the idea, and the more I listen to details, the less I think it is a good idea. But how to say that?

Pray for me. I'm going to take her out for breakfast tomorrow and be as honest as I know how to be gently. It will be her choice and her responsibility, but I need to be able to honestly share with her what I see.

Pray. I don't like to hurt people. I'd like to say only good things, positive things that make people happy. I like making people happy. Tomorrow's talk likely won't make her happy. But I need to be able to do it.

Thanks.