Sometimes Surgery is Necessary

I get up early most every morning. That’s my best writing time, but yesterday was different. My daughter Erika was having extensive surgery on her foot and I would be with her until surgery and take her home afterwards. The surgeon said it would take a year to completely recover, but that she would not experience the pain she was having with each step she took. But there is the year and the surgery to recover from. Waiting for the two hour surgery to be complete, reminded me of another time where I waited for my girl to recover…

Her birth was swift and hard but at last, she was born. Yet the delivery room was quiet. There were no cries of protest from my baby. Something was wrong. They whisked her upstairs to NICU to better care for her. Finally, after twenty-four hours, they knew what was wrong. She needed blood. Lots of it. Three quarters of her blood had transfused back into my bloodstream moments before she was born. They gave her what they called a super cell transfusion and soon, she was fine. But it took twenty four hours to figure it out.

I was and am so grateful for those doctors who labored to find out what was wrong with that six pound eight ounce baby, and saved her life.

It saved my life too. Before that time, I was a nominal Christian. I went to church. Prayed at meals. But those twenty four hours while we waited to see what was wrong with our baby, God got my attention. I realized I’d readily accepted Jesus into my heart, but not my life. I lived the way I wanted to live.

After that incident, I joined a neighborhood Bible study and it opened my eyes. I drank in the words like I’d been in a desert. The words quenched my thirst and refreshed my soul. It helped me know how to live and raise my children, be a good mate to my husband. Since that time, I’ve never looked back. It’s been a wild ride since then. With lots of twists and turns, but always, I kept my eyes on Jesus and drank in His word. And it has been good. Not without problems and loss, but without, it would have been much more difficult.

Dear reader, if you’re going through something difficult–and all of us do. Go. Dust off that Bible that has been sitting on your shelf and read it. The first passage I read that morning when I didn’t know if my baby girl would survive and while waiting for the doctors to tell me she would be OK, was this:

And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them (Romans 8:28 NLT).

Reading that passage gave me hope that it would work out for the good. I didn’t know how, but I knew it would be for the good.

Just as now, for the good, my girl, Erika, had to go through lots of cutting and rearranging of the bones and tendons in her foot so she could walk more comfortably, I had to walk through the pain of waiting when she was a tiny baby, to find out if she would be better.

What are you waiting for? A diagnosis that might be scary? Someone in your family is sick, and you don’t know if they will get well? Are you waiting for a job interview that might bring in more money or benefits that you need? Are you ill and they can’t help you? Or you feel or are isolated from your child? Whatever it might be, get that Bible out. I remember one friend telling me someone gave her a Bible. She knew nothing about it and didn’t know where to read, but noticed there were lots of red letters in the New Testament.

She just read the passages in red, and found out later they were the words of Jesus. She said it was like God–who is Jesus–was speaking directly to her. Try reading the red letters. Or go the to the middle of the Bible in the Book of Psalms.

You will learn more about God there and his character. I pray it will open up to you as it did for me so long ago.

I’ve written a little on the “birth” of my newest book. Very soon, it will be released. Here’s what the cover looks like.

Below is a song I loved when that baby girl of mine was little. Contemporary Christian music had just began to invade the music world. I loved this beautiful song and many others from this artist, Evie Tornquist. I hope you enjoy it too.