Highs and Lows

It has been an interesting week with some big emotional and physical hits. But then those have been countered with some wonderful blessings bestowed upon us from above.

On Tuesday mommy and daddy went to the als clinic. We met lots of of new therapists and doc came and did an exam to find the current state of mommy's disease. The result of the day was that doc has prescribed a controlled pain medicine for her. It is a highly addictive medicine although he basically said "at this point we don't worry about that." Doc also wants her in leg braces when she is up and walking and in an electric wheel chair most of the time to conserve energy. One of the hardest emotional hits was his closing comment that she needs to spend the energy she has left only doing the things that she likes to do.

As we are dealing with the emotional issues we also have to deal with the financial. The leg braces run close to $1,000. The cost of an electric wheel chair is in the 25-30 thousand dollar range. Our insurance only covers $5,000 a year on these types of devices. Obviously we don't have any funds to cover the difference let alone a difference so great. Here is where God comes in. After sharing with daddy's sister the situation she shared with her pastor. The email exchange from her looked something like this:

"You two know that God works in amazing ways! I was talking to my pastor about your appointment on the 29th & how you will need a motorized wheelchair. He listened quietly & then asked if you have ordered one. I said no not yet. He smiled & began to tell me that his close friend just passed & that his wife still has all of his medical equipment- a fancy motorized wheelchair with a fancy lift seat as well as comm. Devices & other medical equipment. He is sure that the owner will help you with these needs and is going to speak to her!
Praise God!"

And a later email:

"I just heard from my pastor- all is a go- "she" [we want so much to give you her name but she has not authorized that and until we have permission we want to respect her privacy] has the wheelchair another possible skooter, the hospital type bed & some type of augment comm device! We are to let them know when you'd like them! Praise God!
He does provide for ALL of our needs!"

If the significance of this has not hit you hard as to how GREAT God is, please go back and read the paragraph above about how much these things cost and how insurance was basically not going to cover it! Only a true and caring God can answer prayers in this way.

This presented another problem as there is no access to our house for a wheelchair. There are steps leading up to the front door (which can and will be dealt with by building a ramp) but the existing sidewalk was too narrow, uneven and craked. Here is where yet again God shines. Daddy called Mike, a friend who does concrete work to ask for some advice on what to do and more importantly how to do it. After giving a little bit of direction on the phone daddy fearfully asked "how much will this cost?" The answer came "Do you trust me? Then I will have my guys come out next week some time and prep in the morning and have the concrete ordered for the afternoon. It will be taken care of." Oh my what another wonderful blessing. If you ever need a great concrete and general contractor in the Portland, Oregon area please let us know - We'll tell you all about this wonderful man!

Today daddy and friend Steve are going to spend the day tearing out what is there and leveling the ground to make it ready for the new sidewalk next week. We are going to be doing that with a new to us tractor that Grandpa made possible just this week and with the use of a Bobcat and other equipment donated by another good friend - thank you Grandpa and Doug! To top that off just yesterday another contract friend that helped us out splitting wood last weekend stopped by and just happened to mention that they have a jackhammer they bought for another job and have only used once and is sitting in their shop just up the road available for use - thank you to the Herbs! And to show how God works way ahead of time on things, another friend called us out of the blue this last summer and asked if we needed gravel. He delivered more gravel than we need and we have had extra sitting in a pile since then. That "extra" is going to be right about the amount we need to lay down under the new sidewalk - thank you Johnny! Yes, God does work through other people.

Again, if you have any question as to the ability of God to meet the needs of his people, please go back and read this post again. Our God IS An Awesome God!