Stellan

I've always been a sucker for other peoples' stories. Call me a people person or call me crazy, but I love to know about the lives of people who are removed from my particular situation. Of course I love my peers and I enjoy being 19 year old me, but being surrounded by college life does little to provide perspective. It's like "I have a paper due, I'm so stressed out" and another person is all like "omg, I have ________ to do, I feel you on that!" It's an empathy that, at times, is very comforting. It does help to know I'm not alone. But it also legitimizes my busyness and anxiety and I go on thinking "okay, it's normal to stress about this."

And maybe it is. But there is something insightful about reading the thoughts and struggles of people long since graduated from college. Proof that life goes on, and in many cases gets harder, after school. Conviction to enjoy this stage of my life now because I wont get it back. Evidence that while life may get perpetually busier and more complicated, there is hope and happiness enough to go along with it. Knowing the joy and the fear of women years ahead of me is sobering. It takes the focus off of myself, if only for the 15 minutes I spend catching up on their lives, and makes me consider their situation. If I was experiencing the things they face, how would I respond? Would I still trust God? Could I keep up hope? It's not that I try to escape reality and wish my 30's would come tomorrow, but it is a recognition that when I am 30, I will be serving the same God. What happens in between is contingent on what I do to grow and how I work to be closer with Him. God purposefully uses different people differently and I can't expect to have these women's stories. I can, however, learn from them a little bit about what I could never know by myself. 

One of these women delivered a baby boy back in October, the fourth of her "Many Small Children." In the womb, he was diagnosed with heart failure and the doctors told Jennifer at 24 weeks that her very ill baby would surely die. It was a miracle of God when Stellan was born a well and whole full-term baby after thousands of prayers. Thousands. That is how many read Mck Mama's blog, and it is how many are concerned and offering up her son now. 

Today I was walking back from the gym all up in my bubble. I was thinking about how manageable my week is looking and what I need to do to get to the weekend. Thanking God for the beautiful day and feeling altogether confident (which is probably a mistake because I felt confident this morning when I tripped over a chain fence on the way to Literature and fell, with all of my weight, down on the ground-- coffee, backpack, hip and all. Matter of a fact, if there was anything going wrong in my life an hour ago, it was the massive bruise that now covers said hip). I got back, went to the computer to turn on music for the adventure of taking a shower and getting ready and inevitably got distracted by checking in on my favorite blogs. 

That's when I found out that Stellan is in the hospital for the major condition every doctor who has examined him since birth were convinced he was healed of. This happy, seemingly healthy 4 month old is now struggling for life. *Pop* goes the bubble. Even when my life seems fine and I don't really feel majorly dependent on God, stuff like this reminds me that I absolutely am. And stuff like this drives me to my knees. 

Angie brought up these scriptures on her site to pray specifically for Stellan today and said, "The God of the universe is neither surprised nor threatened by this turn of events. He is the Great Physician, and I am asking you to beseech Him this morning on behalf of this baby boy we have all come to love."

1 Praise the Lord, O my soul;

   all my inmost being, praise his holy name.

2 Praise the Lord, O my soul,

   and forget not all his benefits-

3 who forgives all your sins

   and heals all your diseases,

4 who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion,

5 who satisfies your desires with good things 

   so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's

(from Psalm 103)

1 Blessed is he who has regard for the weak;

   the Lord delivers him in times of trouble.

2 The Lord will protect him and preserve his life;

   he will bless him in the land

   and not surrender him to the desire of his foes.

3 The Lord will sustain him on his sickbed

    and restore him from the bed of illness...

(from Psalm 41)

I believe it. And I'm so glad these ladies who are in the middle of it believe these words, too. It is one of the best examples I have of trust even in the middle of heartbreak-- heartbreak I can't even imagine now.