Today is the two month anniversary of Sarah’s surgery. I imagine most people are thinking about and talking about the election today and while I’ll go and vote, today is a day of celebration for me. My daughter is alive and doing incredibly well.
After not eating for her first two and a half months, she has plumped up like a little piglet! She was a little over twelve pounds when we weighed her a week and a half ago. She’ll be weighed again on Friday, and I won’t be surprised at all if she’s up to thirteen already. Her scar is still prominent, but it is starting to fade a little at the bottom. I wonder what it will look like in a year or two years. I can’t find any photos of other kids scars and I’ve spent way too much time looking. She’s doing all the things that a normal four month old would be doing. She’s starting to roll over. She can go from her stomach to her back, but gets stuck going the other way. She reaches for toys and plays with her toes. She laughs out loud and blows raspberries back to you when you do it to her. It’s so much fun.
I wrote an entry shortly after returning about how I was feeling. It was strange not being able to talk about it right away, but I think that was normal. We were all still in shock. Today I am so happy to tell her story and share about how God divinely intervened when we needed him.
James 5:14-16 (NIV) says “Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.” On the night before we took Sarah to the hospital for the feeding tube, I was at church for a meeting with the elders to confirm my membership. Our pastor brought oil with him knowing that I would be there with Sarah, and as this passage describes, he annointed Sarah with oil and had the elders lay hands on her and pray over her. I know that God heard this prayer and the many others that followed.
Did we share that she was born without any clue that she had a heart defect. There was no murmur that would have caused them to look at her heart. But when the doctors were at their wits end, a murmur suddenly appeared and helped them look in the right direction. That murmur was unrelated to her condition and is not present today. Thank you God for guiding the doctors in such a perfect way. Thank you also God for sparing my daughter and allowing us to spend more time with her in this life.
Today I celebrate Sarah’s life and my Savior’s goodness and grace. I hope that as you pray today for our country, you’ll join me in this prayer of thanksgiving as well.
