Christian inspiration for the season...

One year and two weeks ago I was a parent such as that ... except that thanks be to God as well as the absolutely incredible nurses and doctors at a Children's Hospital NICU, we were able to celebrate my baby's first birthday.

Owen was in respiratory distress caused by RSV.  He was two weeks old and had been misdiagnosed as having a mere cold by his pediatrician earlier in the day.  I arrived home from being out of town that night to find my wife in bed with the baby in her lap, watching him take a breathing treatment as the doctor's soothing words echoed in her ears.

I wasn't there to hear the doctor's dismissive comments and called the doctor through the after-hours number ... baby with labored breathing was all that I needed in order to get a second opinion.  We described his symptoms and he told us to hang up + call 911.

We did and it was Katy-bar-the-door as no more than 2 minutes from when the call went out did a police officer trained in CPR show up, followed by two fire trucks with an ambulance on their heels one minute after that.

A friend watched our two other children as we took Owen to the Children's Hospital ER and there was no time for paperwork, prescreening or whatever. We went straight into an examination room.  Bottom line: his blood Ox was low, really low.

They hooked the poor little guy up to more machines + tubes than I thought possible. Our NICU doctor + nurse teams were incredible.  Steph and I have never prayed so much before in our lives ... and later found out how many people were doing the same for baby Owen as word spread.  We were able to leave a week later - the night before Thanksgiving.

So as a parent who has gone through a similar circumstance and as a Christian, I am proud of the courage it took to have everyone stop and say a prayer for that child. Prayer works and I have every confidence that your prayer was answered.

Thanks for sharing your story.  I wouldn’t be truthful if I didn’t tell you that it brought tears to my eyes … and make me want to go hug my children.

Thank you for sharing the story.

Ditto- that's like people having to say "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas". Or writing Chrsitmas as X-Mas. 

Traget isn't Christmas, but people go there to Christmas shop- duh.  If it didn't represent Christmas, then Target would have those sales year round.

True- the whole Christmas thing is confsuing to people.  I mean, how does Santa Clause compare with Jesus?  I hate how parents teach their children that Santa has all these special powers to deliver presents to EVERYONE on Christmas Eve and all that garbage, and then the kids don't even know about Jesus- sorry if I offend anyone.  And if Christmas is all about giving, it doesn't mean about jsut giving presents.  It's about giving people your time, talents, and of course presents are a nice gesture.  I'm going to be alone for Christmas this year and will probably spend Christmas Day serving food in a homeless shelter.  I don't care if I get presents or not.

run4yrlif - 2005-11-29 9:51 AM

runnergirl29 - 2005-11-29 8:49 AM

 I'm going to be alone for Christmas this year and will probably spend Christmas Day serving food in a homeless shelter. I don't care if I get presents or not.

What a great way to spend Christmas... .

I'll have nothing else better to do so it makes sense.

Writing it as X-mas is actually legitimate. In the Greek alphabet, X is the letter chi which is the first letter of the Greek word for Christ -"Christos". Use of the letter chi to represent the title "Christ" is an accepted historical abbreviation. It's been around for hundreds of years.

And Colomingle and Huengsolo, thank you.

That might be true, but where do you ever see Christ represented with an X, unless your Greek?  I  mean, if the Bible uses the workd Christ should we instead of an X?  Don't mean to ruffle any feathers, just thinking out loud.

Well, there's merry X-mas for one. It's no different than referring to "JC", or the acronym "WWJD".  It's an initial. It's not intended to be blasphemous, it's actually reverential by conferring only one possible meaning to the letter.

There are bibles in Greek, you know. 

Ok- so if X in Greek means Christ, then why don't people write the rest of Merry Christmas in Greek as well?  I'm just saying.  It doesn't make sense to substitute one part of a word into Greek and  the rest.  Hmmm...I think i have a good question here. And, I'm sure that Greek Bibles are all in Greek, not just a word or 2. 

Melanie ... you have got to love the Cup of Joe.  Where else can a thread about witnessing, feeling His presence and the power of prayer lead to a discussion of religious tolerance for Buddist Monks while shopping at Target?

Seriously, thanks for bringing your awesome story about witnessing in such difficult circumstances.  Hopefully it will inspire others to share their stories about feeling His presence and serve as the reminder of Jim, Janelle and Smokeater are discussing - Christ in Christmas.

Thanks for posting this Melanie.

Melanie, your story is awesome. Thank you so much for sharing it. Many people would only pray that this baby be healed and give up if that didn't happen. You gave such a gift to your co-workers. Talking to God is not just about the good times and the things he gives us. He's not Santa Claus (pun intended). He's so much bigger than that.

And on the Christmas topic - while Target and others like it aren't Christmas stores, I'd rather hear "Merry Christmas," "Merry Kwanzaa," "Happy Hanukkah" than the usual grunts I get at Target. I'm so sick of all the political correctness. Why have holidays at all? Why not just have a dump-your-money-at-retail-stores day? Anyway, just the rantings of a crazy woman .