Miracles

London is 2 weeks old today! I have been reflecting on what a miracle he is...the transformations he has made in just two weeks. The nurse called the other day after running his tests and said there was no need for anymore home health care because he is so healthy and normal! He had his first check up at the Dr. yesterday and there is nothing to be concerned about! What a miracle! It comes as no surprise to me...my family has seen its fair share of miracles. My life is certainly one of them.

See, I wasn't "supposed" to be born. My mom had a miscarriage just months before getting pregnant with me. It's no accident that things happened the way they did...I have known my whole life that I had purpose on this earth. I am thankful for my brother or sister who didn't make it so that I could. I have always felt like I couldn't waste my life knowing someone died for me to live. (Technically we should all be living this way since this has happened for us all...but that's a whole other thought train)

My dad always called me his "miracle baby" for this reason, and also because my dad nearly died before I was born. He had a triple bypass surgery and developed a staff infection that put him very close to dying.

My sister Megan wasn't "supposed" to live. She was born with a rare condition that didn't allow her to digest food. She would projectile vomit everything that went down. Basically she would have starved to death without surgery. The surgery to correct her condition had just been developed in January of that year. She was born in June.

My dad was a Pastor at an inner city church when I was young. We saw so many miracles during that time you would not even believe some of them unless you had been there to see it yourself.

The year my parents divorced my dad had a massive stroke. I will never forget waking up that morning to a message on the answering machine from a police officer telling my sister and I what had happened. His entire left side was paralyzed, his speech was slurred, and they were telling us his brain was very damaged. We got to the hospital about an hour after it had happened and he was already wiggling his toes and speaking some. The doctors didn't understand how it was possible. They moved him to a hospital in downtown Philadelphia, and when my sister and I got there to see him in his room he wasn't there. We started to panic because we thought he had died...until we saw him up walking the halls. The dr's didn't understand how it was possible. But we did.

3 years ago this June I saw another miracle in the form most people wouldn't call a "miracle". My brother Ross passed away from kidney and liver failure due to a life of drugs and alcohol. I know how that sounds...some miracle, right? Here's the thing...sometimes our miracle doesn't come the way we think it should. Death doesn't seem like a miracle to us...but my brother's death certainly was. Here was a man who had spent his life on wasting things, things that destroyed him both physically, emotionally and spiritually. In his last few weeks of life my dad didn't leave his side. He had so many spiritual awakenings during that time, and gave what was left of his life over to Christ. He didn't want to sit in the hospital and just die. He wanted to make a difference while he still could. He told my dad how he felt he had wasted everything and didn't know how he could do anything for God now. My dad challenged him "before you leave this hospital tonight, go tell everyone on this floor about Jesus". So my brother, frail and dying, went to every room that night and witnessed to everyone he met. He reached more people for Christ in that night than most of us do in our lifetime. My brother was a miracle.

My London is a miracle. It's amazing to see already the joy and strength he brings to people. It seems he was a little pillar of strength in that NICU. Both to the nurses and the other babies. The baby next to him had made some major improvements since he has been there. I love my little miracle. And even if things went totally in reverse tonight... if all his levels dropped...he would still be my miracle.

Living when you aren't supposed to isn't the only thing that makes a life a miracle. It's not about the number of years we "outlive" our projected number. It's the things we do for God and others that make miracles happen. I just want to encourage anyone who is reading this - in case no one has ever told you before...YOU ARE A MIRACLE! Your life is not by chance! Someone died so you could live - don't waste your miracle life!