Friday, July 20, 2007

God is so specific


This picture shows EXACTLY how I recently came to see God. We are in the middle of this little safe tunnel and outside of us is the world- stormy, crashing, could wipe us out, except that God has put us the in little tunnel of quiet in the middle. He tells us- Just stay on the board, I'll do the rest. How do I make a long story short? Well, here it is. Went to get diagnosed for bipolar two, and my roomate at the women's center looked familiar. Real familiar. Her husband had left her for a younger woman and she was truly suicidal. That night as we lay in the darkness on our beds, I asked her if she was a Christian. She said that she was and asked where I went to church. I told her Christian Family Chapel. She gasped and said, " So do I." But I didn't know her from church. On we talked and she asked what I did before kids and I asked her, and she said, " I worked labor and delivery at Baptist Hospital." I gasped and said, " Do you spell your name in this certain way ( I am protecting her identity) because your name is short for so and so? She GASPED, and I started to cry. I said, " You were my labor and deliver nurse for 12 hours when I gave birth to my oldest daughter Emily." Her picture is in Emmy's baby book, literally. I never forgot her name, the spellling of her name or why it was spelled that way because she was SUCH AN AMAZING NURSE. I told her, " You may think that being here is awful (and it was, for most of us) but here is the reason I am here." The next day I coaxed her to eat and drink and take her meds and she got out of bed. I stroked her arms and hugged her and told her that I cared and that 10 years ago she told me I would make it while I was in such pain giving birth to Emily and now it was my turn to tell her the same thing- she would live and that God was showing her that he had NOT forgotten her, at all, but rather he was very specific and wanted to help her and encourage her by sending me. (I felt some urgent need to get diagnosed THAT NIGHT) and would not wait. Call me impulsive or call it the Holy Spirit.) I am so amazed still. We are both out now and are keeping in touch and both of us are doing much better, but we will never forget that night. In the meantime, I sent her the picture of her, Jon and me in the labor and delivery room to remind her of God's faithfulness. I am humbled that God would choose me, a broken and mixed up gal to bring this friend a message of hope, but I have also learned that because of all of my trials, I am always willling to do anything, and to never stop asking for help. So my crying out for help turned out to be not so much to help ME, but to help someone else- what an amazing God we have.