On a warm August day over thirty years ago I lay in a hospital bed in Detroit after giving birth to my firstborn, Amanda.  Amanda had been transferred to the Children’s Hospital down the street within hours of her birth.  Marilyn, a very sweet social worker from Children’s was at my bedside and had gifted me with a booklet that was all about spina bifida.

Spina bifida.

Spina bifida is the birth defect that Amanda was born with.

Thirty years ago, I had never heard of it.

From having absolutely zero knowledge of what spina bifida was, how it would affect my daughter, how it would impact our lives over the years, what things I needed to do for my daughter, and what I could expect or anticipate was all wrapped up in the booklet from Marilyn.

Here are pictures of the booklet (which I happened to come across recently).  The first is the cover, the second is showing how ‘thick’ it is while lying on the counter:

Not more than 8 by 6 inches in size, with a whopping 34 pages – A complete comprehensive view!

So WHY am I writing my blog and WHO is the YOU I am writing for?

My  belongs to all you spina bifida families out there.  Thirty years ago I hungered for more information and more families like ours who we could relate to and become friends with.  Because of medical advances in the treatment of spina bifida as well as the marvelous ability to network with others through computers – knowledge and camaraderie is so readily available today.

Whether you are touched in your lives by someone with spina bifida or not, this blog serves to inform you more about it.  And for all my SB peeps – thank you for being such a great community of computer connections – and friends.  I hope I can serve you all well as my new blog site will include resources for all of us.  (Pass it on.)

Just Laurel

(For those of you a few days behind on my blog updates – a new and improved web site is coming!  I plan to keep my focus on my faith ‘cuz I am nothing without Him – but my second focus group is the spina bifida community.  Stay tuned for the third and last group that will make up my triad!)

On a warm August day over thirty years ago I lay in a hospital bed in Detroit after giving birth to my firstborn, Amanda.  Amanda had been transferred to the Children’s Hospital down the street within hours of her birth.  Marilyn, a very sweet social worker from Children’s was at my bedside and had gifted me with a booklet that was all about spina bifida.

Spina bifida.

Spina bifida is the birth defect that Amanda was born with.

Thirty years ago, I had never heard of it.

From having absolutely zero knowledge of what spina bifida was, how it would affect my daughter, how it would impact our lives over the years, what things I needed to do for my daughter, and what I could expect or anticipate was all wrapped up in the booklet from Marilyn.

Here are pictures of the booklet (which I happened to come across recently).  The first is the cover, the second is showing how ‘thick’ it is while lying on the counter:

Not more than 8 by 6 inches in size, with a whopping 34 pages – A complete comprehensive view!

So WHY am I writing my blog and WHO is the YOU I am writing for?

My  belongs to all you spina bifida families out there.  Thirty years ago I hungered for more information and more families like ours who we could relate to and become friends with.  Because of medical advances in the treatment of spina bifida as well as the marvelous ability to network with others through computers – knowledge and camaraderie is so readily available today.

Whether you are touched in your lives by someone with spina bifida or not, this blog serves to inform you more about it.  And for all my SB peeps – thank you for being such a great community of computer connections – and friends.  I hope I can serve you all well as my new blog site will include resources for all of us.  (Pass it on.)

Just Laurel

(For those of you a few days behind on my blog updates – a new and improved web site is coming!  I plan to keep my focus on my faith ‘cuz I am nothing without Him – but my second focus group is the spina bifida community.  Stay tuned for the third and last group that will make up my triad!)

If you read my last blog, then you are aware that I am in the process of having a new blog site created.  I mentioned that, in the design process, I have been forced to define my goal, or my mission.  That’s a good thing!  I needed to clarify what my site was to accomplish and who the YOU are that I hope to reach.

There are three groups of people I am seeking to reach.

Today I will tell you who that first group is.

I blog for other Christians.  Period.  If you are a person who is a Christian and try daily to live a faithful life with Christ, well  I am right there with ya!  We all know that we should attend worship regularly, study God’s word, live a righteous life, and seek Him first in all things and we are ALL daily challenged by that!  My desire is to share with you what I learn and see.  Heaven knows we all need to pull together and pull each other up!

I honestly don’t know how women today can survive without faith.  If you are a mother and/or you work and/or you participate in multiple activities, then you know how busy life can be.  But when the good life becomes tainted by someone in the family with poor health, declining finances, struggling relationships, or other challenges – what or who holds you up and gives you the strength to go on?  If you try to carry that load on your own, you know that the fatigue will grow and you will weaken and probably crumble over time.  However – the women I’ve seen lately that do not crumble but rather show great strength are all women of faith.

There’s my friend whose aging mother is in the hospital trying to adjust to a new pacemaker, another friend whose young daughter with spina bifida is in the hospital with shunt problems, I have a family member who has been deployed overseas and leaves behind a family with a baby on the way, friends whose hearts ache for children who have turned away from the church, and yet others who have faced the loss of a loved one or face their own personal struggles.  The one common thing that all these women do?

When faced with trials – they do not run away from God, they run towards Him!  And they ask their sisters and brothers in faith for prayers to strengthen and uphold them.

To all my brothers and sisters in Christ out there – I write for you!

I pray that what I write will inspire you, make you sometimes laugh, give you encouragement, make you more knowledgeable, and help us all along our paths of faithfulness to God and the ability to trust Him.

There are two other groups of readers I am targeting.  More on that in my next blog!

Just Laurel

Proverbs 18:10 The name of the Lord is a fortified tower; the righteous RUN to it and are safe.

It’s time to move.

As I search the scriptures in my attempt at being a better student of the bible, I am amazed at how I can be directed to certain verses at the exact time I need to read them or at how something I’ve read in the bible suddenly takes on new meaning or becomes so clear.  The latest ‘ah-ha’ moment I had was when reading John 5:1-9.  This is the story of how Jesus comes across a lame man who was lying near a pool.  It was believed that when the waters of this pool suddenly churned and stirred, that the first one to go into the water after such a disturbance would be healed of whatever sickness they had.  The short story that most of us read in verses 1 through 9 is that Jesus heals this particular man.

But this time when I read verses 1 through 9, I saw the long story.

The lame man had been lying there for thirty-eight years.  Thirty- eight years!  THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS!

Jesus happened to notice the lame man lying there and asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

Well, the lame man replied that he, of course, wanted to be healed but that everyone else beat him to the waters when they churned and he was just waiting around for his chance.  Waiting for 38 years!

Jesus simply said to him, “Get up!  Pick up your mat and walk!”

And the man was cured and he picked up his mat and walked.

How often do we all sit and wait for things to happen??  Especially when we are praying for something – God certainly loves to hear us talk to him and to seek Him in all things.  But do we just sit back and wait for it to happen?  I truly believe that God wants us to trust Him and pray about things and then we are to get moving!  How long do we sit and wait when we could be moving forward under God’s prayerful guidance?

So, yeah, I wrote a book … and I blog … and I want to share my faith with other moms … and I wrote a bible study … and I want to write more … but what to do next and how should I do it?

It was time for me to get moving.  Especially when God has put so many opportunities in front of me:  I have an invitation to speak at a school, I’ve been requested to write a review on a women’s devotional, I am recording an audio version of my book, Amanda, Perfectly Made, and I think God is laying out a roadmap in front of me – I just need to take the first steps and start moving down that road.

So …

I am in the process of having a new blog/website designed that will provide so much more info for all you readers out there – and I am redefining who “you” are … I feel God’s nudge to encourage other women of faith … and of course I have a special bond to all you caregivers out there … and I especially have a tie to all you wonderful spina bifida moms.  I hope to provide resources and inspiration.  It’s taken a couple of big commitment and financial steps to get moving … but I couldn’t lie back and just pray about it … it was like God answered my prayers with the question, “Do you want to get moving with this ministry?”  He kept laying all these road signs in front of me … so … of course I wanted to get moving.

<gulp>  (a “ministry” ??)

So things are moving …. Look for a new website and other new things.

Please pass this on and be patient while the new website is under construction.  I shall try to keep you all updated … and will share more of what’s coming in the next several weeks.

John 5:1-9

Just Laurel

I was thinking …

What if women were present in the place of men during some of the interactions between Jesus and the people of His time?

Imagine Jesus explaining to a woman about how man needed to come to God by being born again?  “Oh, I’m not going to go through THAT again!” she might blurt out before Jesus would have time to explain.

Or, when those five thousand people showed up to hear Jesus speak, and Jesus asked his followers if they could buy enough bread to feed everyone?  If the disciples were women, they probably would have disappeared to run home and cook up a lunch.

At the last supper, as Jesus was breaking and passing bread around the table, it would be just like a woman to say something like, “Oh, my Lord, this is lovely pita bread.  Can I have the recipe?”

Last week at our first LOL Bible Study, we learned how God made us purposefully and individually.  We are all unique!  He also made us specifically male and female.  We are all different!  We can laugh at our differences, but we should also celebrate them.  If there is someone you idolize and would love to be ‘just like them’ – well you can use them as an example of some ways that you would like to be like – but why would God want to make you exactly the same as someone else when He’s already made one of those already?

Women do things differently than men.  And that’s okay.  Women are nurturers and more creative.  We can be useful servants of Christ – just in different ways than men.

This week the LOL Bible Study is going to look at how women were treated in the time of Jesus.  We are also going to take a look at how women may have been portrayed through the ages, and today as well.  You may be surprised to know that Jesus actually treated men and women equally and gave a voice and respect to women!

Stay tuned to my blog if you want to hear more of what we are learning through bible study.  Join us if you can – Wednesday evenings from 7:30 to 9pm.

Just Laurel

Psalm 139:14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

I find it curious how the stores all have ‘organizing containers’ and bins as the featured special each January.  I guess as part of our New Year resolutions to slim down, unclutter, make better, and re-do areas of our lives, it means we are cleaning out and organizing our closets and basements as well.  Maybe we clean out in January because we have old toys to throw out and new toys to put away along with all the other Christmas stuff.  It may also be because it is too stinking cold outside to do anything but find something to do INSIDE.  (Well, at least in the northern states.) The “cleaning out bug” bit me yesterday – my dresser top looks polished and cleaned off now!  As I was sorting through some stacks of papers, I came across this Q&A that I cut out ten years ago from the magazine, “Focus on the Family.”  God bless you Dr. James Dobson.  Posted in the February/March 2003 issue was the following question with Dr. Dobson presenting the answer:

Q  You have said on several occasions that a society can be no more stable than the strength of individual families.  Specifically, you said sexual behavior is directly linked to survival of nations.  Explain how that principle works.

A  A book could be written on that topic, but let me give you a short answer.  This link you referred to was first illuminated by J.D. Unwin, a British social anthropologist who spent seven years studying the births and death of 80 civilizations.  He reported from his exhaustive research that every known culture in the world’s history has followed the same sexual pattern:  During its early days of existence, premarital and extramarital sexual relationships were strictly prohibited.   Great creative energy was associated with this inhibition of sexual expression, causing the culture to prosper.  Later in the life of the society, its people began to rebel against the prohibitions, demanding the freedom to express their internal passions.  As the mores weakened, the social energy abated, eventually resulting in the decay or destruction of the civilization.
Unwin concluded that the energy that holds a society together is sexual in nature.  When a man is devoted to one woman and one family, he is motivated to build, save, protect, plan, and prosper on their behalf.  However, when male and female sexual interests are dispersed and generalized, their effort is invested in the gratification of sensual desires.  Unwin wrote:  “Any human society is free either to display great energy, or to enjoy sexual freedom; the evidence is that they cannot do both for more than one generation.”
It is my belief that the burgeoning social ills seen in Western nations, including rising crime rates, drug abuse, sexual exploitation of children and the disintegration of families, can be traced to the disintegration of traditional values and biblical standards of morality.

Oh my!

The United States used to be a country with strong traditional values and passionate patriotism. This country is going quickly to hell in a hand basket!   Where have the standards of right and wrong, good and bad gone?  It’s more of a “if it feels good, do it” kind of society.  <sigh>  What happened to respect, responsibility, and religion?

Today I saw a news story of how members of a Satanic Temple insist that a 7-foot tall statue of the devil be located at the Capitol building in Oklahoma.  Seriously?  Here’s the story if you want to look it up:  http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2014/01/08/satanists-seek-spot-on-statehouse-steps/
Looks like Satan is getting a strong hold.

PewResearch just released statistics on religions in America.  Included in their results was this finding:  “Among Americans ages 18-29, one-in-four say they are not currently affiliated with any particular religion.”  That is very sad.  Here is the link if you were interested in the complete report:  http://religions.pewforum.org/reports

Folks, it is a new year and you probably have aspirations to ‘make better’ and re-do areas of your life.  Why not ‘make better’ your relationship and commitment to God?  The results can be far-reaching.  As you walk closer to Him, perhaps you will influence friends and family and they will influence more people along the way.  It’s time to clean up our act and stand strong.  Show a little backbone and recognize a right from a wrong.  We need to save the next generation.

Stand strong.

Just Laurel

We are less than a week into the New Year.  Have you already made and broken any resolutions?  Haha!  I start my diet over again every day.  How about you?

Resolutions are challenging because they pretty much require a change of behavior, thinking, or habit.  Change.  <shudder>   Some people just can’t handle any change.  Take, for instance, my dear daughter Amanda.

For those of you who aren’t aware, we are currently in the midst of a Michigan snowstorm.  Yesterday, the grocery store was full of frantic people who were loading up on groceries and toilet paper so they could go home and hibernate while the snowstorm dropped six to ten inches today.  Ted and I walked into the grocery store yesterday to get our weekly groceries, and then walked out empty handed.  We weren’t going to be part of that chaos.  Today, we went back to do our shopping and the crowds had died down and the shelves had been restocked.  However, there were many items that were sold out after yesterday’s frenzy.  Part of my shopping list was Amanda’s list of groceries of which I shop for each week for her.  Four of her items were not available and I had to substitute other brands.  <horrors!>  Substitutions I made included a different flavor of Capri Sun that she drinks every day, a different brand of potato chips from her usual preferred, and a different brand of bread from what I got her last time.  Now most of you might think, “So what?”  Oh, no no no.  Not Amanda.  When we got home from shopping, I immediately explained to Amanda the shortages at the store and prepared her for the changes in her food supply that she will have to adjust to this week.  I could read distress on her face as her whole body tensed up a bit and she kept sighing heavily.

The sermon at church touched on this subject somewhat today.  Pastor Blythe preached about how the Christian life is an adventure.  Even Jesus, as a young boy, took risks by following His Father’s will.  For three days Jesus’ parents lost track of their son because he had gone back to Jerusalem, where they had departed from, to teach in the temple.  Jesus took a risk, changed it up, and did something different.

I don’t know about you and if you have any resolutions to keep.  But why not try to step out a little more boldly in your faith this year?  Make a change!  Try a new Bible study class.  Stand up for your Christian beliefs.  Talk to your neighbor about Jesus.  Help with a Sunday school class.

We have a mission and a ministry to share the Good News!

And Amanda:  Splurge and take a new adventure by drinking a new flavor of Capri Sun!  Try a different kind of potato chip!  Go all out and eat some chip dip even!

Be bold – change it up – make it a new year of risks and challenges!

And for those of you who were in church and saw it this morning – here’s the video that Pastor included that had us all laughing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dTyWQ6gHtQ

You can even take the lid off your coffee 😀

Just Laurel

Please forgive me for not writing in such a long time.  I am sure we can all give the excuse of being busy with the holidays.  But before the year ends, I thought I should at least speak about Christmas while at the same time, catch your attention with the hope that my blogs shall come more frequently in the New Year.  🙂

Christmas.  It’s the most wonderful time of the year!  And even with all the decorations, shopping, baking, school programs, and even Santa Claus, we all know that it began with the birth of the Christ Child.  CHRISTmas. 

At church this past Sunday, Don had the children gathered around him for the weekly Sunday Children’s message at the front of the church.  (His messages are heard by the rest of the congregation at the same time – little do they know they are getting a lesson, too!)  Don talked about Christmas and presents.  He was asking the children if they were familiar with the classic, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” as he helped them remember the story.  For those of you who don’t know, the Grinch steals all the presents and decorations from the residents of Whoville on Christmas Eve, assuming they will wake up and find Christmas gone thereby sparing the Grinch from hearing their happy Christmas celebrations.  As the children listened intently to Don, he was at the part of the story where the people of Whoville wake up on Christmas morning without any signs of Christmas and, “What?” he asked them, “Do they do?”

There was a young girl with curly brown hair and a cute little dress who knew the answer and with all the confidence and enthusiasm of a young child, she popped up and shouted with glee, “THEY SANG WITHOUT ANY PRESENTS!” 

Bravo, dear child! 

And that, folks, can stand alone as the simple explanation of the joy of Christmas.  We give gifts because the Magi gave gifts to the baby Jesus.  But it’s not the presents or the decorations or the fancy holiday food.  It is the joy of God’s son coming to earth to live among men … to become our Savior.  Joy to the world, the Lord has come!  O holy night!  The first Noel!  Go tell it on the mountain!

That girl’s shout of “THEY SANG WITHOUT ANY PRESENTS!” gave me a smile that wouldn’t quit.  It was said so simply, so joyfully, so purely.  The people of Whoville, in the story of the Grinch, came together, hand in hand, and sang for joy that is was Christmas morning.  That’s all they needed.  You can take away the presents and all the frilly fancy stuff of Christmas, and we can still rejoice about that little baby boy. 

I pray you all had a joyful Christmas full of love and family and friends. 

And may you keep singing for joy, even when there aren’t any presents.  God’s gift to us, His Son, is all we need.

Just Laurel

Are you all as busy as I am with the holiday season?  It’s all so fun:  shopping and decorating and baking and all of that good stuff!  But I had a little ‘moment’ today that I thought I’d share.

I had gotten off of work relatively early for a change today and was running errands – a quick stop at a few stores as well as the post office.  At one of my stops, I swiftly parked and then grabbed up my car keys, cell phone, and purse.  With a free hand I pulled on the lever to open my car door and as I turned to stick my legs out the door and make a quick dash through the cold air to the store … ugh! … oomph … I was stuck!

Folks, it is hard to get out of your vehicle with your seatbelt securely fastened!

I quickly sat back, restrained in my seat as I already was, and just giggled.

It made me think 🙂

So many times we are anxious to make a change, to get somewhere, to start anew, to change things up a bit, to give up an old bad habit, or to simply start over.  For any of those things to take place, you have to give up the old ways … let go of the past!  Ha ha.  It’s the first big step – letting go and unfastening yourself from the person, place, or thing that you want to change but are so scared to give up.

You’ll never win the race if you keep your shoes stuck in the running block.

Just something to think about … especially with the New Year fast approaching and everyone already thinking of turning over new leafs or making new positive changes.

Don’t forget to let go of the old stuff.

And don’t forget to unbuckle your seatbelt!

I hope you are all having a holly jolly Christmas Season … think of it as a big birthday celebration 🙂

Just Laurel

2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!