What If

This Summer I am participating in Beth Moore’s study of Deuteronomy and I know that it was God’s perfect timing for me to be in this study.  Yesterday we had baby dedication at our church (our last baby dedication by the way)!  The writings of Moses found in Deuteronomy 6:5–9 describe God's plan for how a parent should raise up a child:

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates."

One key step in marking your desire to nurture your child in the ways of God is to dedicate him or her to God publically, through a child dedication ceremony.  We are so thankful that we’ve been surrounded by many great churches over the past twenty-two years that participate in baby dedications and have supported us in raising our children spiritually. 

Following the dedication we took some time with friends to pray over Esther for her surgery today.  We were joined, at church, by new friends, old friends and people who are yet to be friends! There were people praying all over the nation for her yesterday and continuing to pray for her today.   We know that God already knows the outcome of this surgery but we also know that where two are more pray in one accord God listens and gives us the desires of our heart so we are praying for her to have hearing over these next few weeks. 

“Take this most seriously: A yes on earth is yes in heaven; a no on earth is no in heaven. What you say to one another is eternal. I mean this. When two of you get together on anything at all on earth and make a prayer of it, my Father in heaven goes into action. And when two or three of you are together because of me, you can be sure that I’ll be there.” Matt. 18:20 (The Message)

We know that God placed Esther in our family and we feel like He has BIG things in store in and through her little life.  We are just blessed to be along for the ride!

Today will be the beginning of a long journey for Esther (and our family) we covet your continued prayers.  If this surgery is a success then we will follow up with another implant in her right ear in about four months.  This will require several days a week of therapy as well as classes to learn sign and practice speaking.

July 22^nd will be the “turn-on” date for Esther’s implant.  This is the day that many of you have probably seen in all the videos that have been posted lately where a child hears his/her mothers voice for the first time and smiles with excitement.  You notice that there are only a handful of these videos on the Internet.  That is because this experience isn’t always delightful.  Imagine being deaf and never hearing and then being startled all of sudden by overwhelming sound.  That might not be so exciting – it might be more scary and intimidating that fun and exciting.  We will post our video of Esther either way because we want to document the real, honest journey but just want to educate people through the process in case it isn’t so fun for her.  Our prayer is that it will be an awesome time for Esther since she was hearing for over a year of her life – the restoration of hearing and sound may be such a relief.  On the flip side, the only sounds she has ever heard were so drastically different than the ones she will hear now because we aren’t in Haiti and don’t speak Kreyol and things will be different than she remembered them to be.  There are a lot of "what ifs" in all of these steps so we just ask you to join us in prayer for the next three weeks for healing and for the turn on date and just asking God to be in the details!

Blessings,

Tiffany