Happy Anniversary!

One year ago today, Jaden and & I were just leaving the pediatrician's office after being told that he has type 1 diabetes. After 2 hrs at the pediatrician's office we were sent home to pack our bags and then head back to Ft. Worth to be admitted into the hospital for the next 48 hrs. Jeremy was in Cuba and received his email around 8pm that night with the not so good news. We were only able to "google chat" for a little while so I could fill him in on everything. He got on the 1st flight home the next morning and was at the hospital with us by 3pm that day. I will never forget how God orchestrated everything that day and all of our friends and family who stepped in to help.

It was only by an act of God that we even went to the Dr. that morning. Jaden hadn't been himself for a couple weeks and so I emailed a friend, Becky, at 5am that morning asking some "nurse" questions about his "symptoms." She said she never checks her email in the morning before work, but for some reason (God) that morning she did. She quickly wrote me back and said that his "symptoms" were classic signs for diabetes. Had she not told me, I probably wouldn't have taken him in that morning. You see, I had no idea what diabetes was or what all it entailed so it was all very new to me. I thought the Dr. would just give him some medicine and it would be better. Oh, silly me.

All the phone calls and emails that I made that day. Robyn stepping in to hold down the fort and take care of Jenna in order to keep her little life calm. Kim, for also stepping in to help with Jenna and just stuff with home. Robyn, Matt and Heidi for coming to the hospital late that night for moral support. Melissa for being my 2nd ear in training/education classes while at the hospital until Jer got home and could join me. My in-laws for getting on the next plane out to come be here for the weekend in case Jer couldn't come home. My sisters who were so supportive and willing to come if/when I needed them to. And then most important of all......All the people across the globe who were so faithful in prayer for our family!! I say most important of all, because well....Prayer is our most valuable tool from God! He is the Great Physician and I know He has Jaden in His arms 24/7!

Praise the Lord for Dr's who are gifted with the knowledge needed to help take care of my little man! It's just a year later and we are no longer doing "shots" of insulin, but now on a pump that does it all for us. God is so good to take care of HIS children!

Honestly, I don't know how anyone could live without knowing the Lord and having the hope that He gives through the salvation of His son Jesus! I thank God everyday for my many, many blessings. I pray that I never take Him or those blessings for granted. I know He will use diabetes for good in Jaden's life. Yes, it sucks to have a disease, but oh how wonderful it is to know that that disease may be used to lead someone to Jesus some day!

My little man is strong and knows the Lord who takes care of him. Thank you, Lord, for taking care of us each day!

Breathe

A friend of mine, Melissa, shared with me not too long ago a word that God had given her: Breathe. It keeps coming up all around me; in scripture I'm reading, sermons, and the fact that I have to breathe in order to be alive. We watched a Rob Bell Nooma video about it last night even. Let me share some thoughts with you:
In Hebrew, God's name is Y,H,V,H (in English we'd pronounce this as "Yod, Heh, Vav, Heh."
Rob Bell - "Some pronounce the name 'Yahweh' or 'Yahveh', although in many traditions the name isn't even pronounced, because it's considered so sacred, so mysterious, so holy. In fact, the ancient rabbis believed that these letters actually functioned kind of as vowels in the Hebrew language. They believed that they were kind of breathing sounds and that ultimately the name is simply unpronounceable because the letters together are essentially the sound of breathing. Yod, Heh, Vav, Heh. Is the name of God the sound of breathing?"
He then talks about how the first and last things you do in life are to take a breath.
The very first and last thing we do in life is speak our creator's name. Isn't He amazing?

A New Start

Well, we've only just begun. What a great day we had with the start of our new Compass Christian Church site in Roanoke. We had 247 on our first day open to the public! I'm amazed by that. I'm not much for numbers in church, but it's exciting to see how many people knew that our doors were "open for business." Our church put a huge ad (including the front cover with a picture of Jeremy & Trevor) in a local magazine ("Living" Keller/metroport edition) that went out to like 28K houses in the area. We had about 20 people say that they came because of that ad in the magazine. The article is really good and represents the heart of our group really well. We had several people make a decision for their lives yesterday including some who want to be baptized next week. How exciting is that? The angels are having a HUGE party right now! I can't wait to see all that God has planned for this community!

I have to admit I was very scared to move away from our home for the last 9 1/2 yrs, but God has continued to bless us for our obedience to His call. For those of you reading this who know us well, you know that we lived way out in the country for the last 2 yrs in Katy and had to drive A LOT! It made life difficult at times to be able to be in community with people and we really missed that. We now live about 5 minutes from Jenna's school and our church. We have Wal-Mart & Home Depot around the corner from us and are loving the small town feel of Roanoke, yet being about 15 minutes from the city life. God continues to bring new people along our path that we just get to love on and share life with.

In my last blog, I wrote about "friends for life" and am still seeing how God is using people in our lives. We have a dear friend who was in our youth ministry for 4-5 yrs who decided that when she graduated college that she wanted to come work with us. She is now Trevor & Jeremy's admin, Jeremy's asst soccer coach for Jenna's soccer team, and my dear friend. The team that we have to work with in starting this church is awesome. Each of them brings such a unique heart and desire to serve the Lord that encourages me even more with each day.

I thank God for this new start in ministry. I thank Him for not allowing us to get burned out, but keeping life fresh and new each day.