friends

To all of you who have walked alongside us as we've journeyed to Emma Kate and back again, we are so grateful.

Friends make the load lighter, and the burden less.
Friends share joy and it magnifies.  Goodness lasts longer and is the sweeter.

The prayers that have upheld and sustained us, the ones we know of and the many more unseen or heard this side of heaven, are precious to us.  We cherish deeply the prayers you have prayed on our behalf.  And we know without a shadow of a doubt that the Lord has moved mountains and calmed storms and made a way because you faithfully called on Him.  How He delights in caring for His children.

Many of you have ministered your friendship and love to us also in such tangible, seen ways.  Jesus with skin on, so to speak.  Thank you for being His hands and feet to our family.  I can't even begin to list the meals and hugs, help with the kids, flowers to cheer and hearten, kindnesses large and small.  We have been so humbled to be loved in this fashion.

One of my friends, Brenda, finally met Emma Kate in the days before Emma's latest surgery.  It is a meeting long awaited.  Brenda has cheered us along all the way to Emma, and has been such a thoughtful friend.  She was a firm support in the harrying day of Luke's seizure onset, and I treasure the conversation we had on a walk around Bredesen Park.

There are a few things she has said, and others she didn't but spoke with her presence, that stay with me.  Things that remain and last, bolstering me on certain days.

"Gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body." Prov. 16:24


Brenda is also my friend who, upon hearing of the need in Emma's orphanage, promptly sent in a donation through Love Without Boundaries to help the babies needing special feeding bottles, formula and diapers.  


She's just like that.  It made me cry, and just recalling that kindness and heartfelt generosity still tears me up. 


Brenda, I didn't ask your permission to write about any of this, so I hope you aren't mad I'm extoling you here.  :)  




Brenda and I have walked, in some fashion, some tough roads with one another.  And you learn things in desert places that allow you to rejoice in the "meadowlands" in a way that wouldn't be without the hardness.  Things like the 2005 summer {with baseball}.  Never again.  I'm so glad a season is just that; a season.


It is good to be able to ruefully laugh about that time now.  From the other side of it all.  I know we wondered if such a day would come.  Six years, Brenda!  s.i.x.


When we finally met up this past week for coffee, introducing her to our Emma Kate was such a delight.  Even though Brenda and I talked to each other a mile a minute for a few hours while Emma engaged in some serious Little Bear watching.  :)  


I wanted to record here that meeting.  And remind Emma for always about the cheering section she had from so far away, from before she even knew any of us existed and such a thing as a home and family were also hers.  

Emma Kate couldn't keep a straight face!  She was so silly, and the very large bag of lovelies that you brought, Brenda, surely contributed to her nonsense at picture time!


Emma has loved playing with it all these past few days.  We all say thank you for keeping her so happily occupied while in recuperation mode!


And more that, thank you for being a friend.


We are so blessed by friends and the friendships God has knit into the life of our family.


Richly blessed.  And profoundly grateful.