Sudden Bursts of Life

Sudden bursts of life are unpredictable and almost always result in dramatic change!  You know, there you are rocking along in life everything neatly in its assigned bucket, filled just to a level where it won’t spill if there is a slight jiggle or jaggle along the way. 

And then it happens – KAPOW – “A Sudden and Brilliant Burst of Life” fills your space and stops all movement and even your breathing in an instant!  Certainly more than a jiggle or a jaggle!  WHOA!!!!

So, what is a “Sudden Burst of Life”, (SBOL)?  Well, for me and my family it happened on the morning of the 15th of December 2010 when my daughter called her Mom and said, “I think Lillie Reese is coming, my contractions are 5 minutes apart”.  Her Mom, my wife, who is very wise, said to my daughter, “it is ok, let’s wait until 10:00am and your doctor’s appointment and then make a decision about going to labor and delivery”.  And so they waited, leaving me at work with, oh well little information, so there I sat.

Well about 1:30pm, my daughter called her Mom again and reported her contractions as 3 minutes apart. So they each departed for Lexington Medical Center.  I arrive at the Maternity Triage at about 3:00pm and all is seemingly on track.

At about 9:30pm, the Labor and Delivery nurse  comes and says let’s try a practice push to see how you are doing.  Well she pushed, the Nursed YELLED STOP!  Team to Room 11 NOW; TEAM TO ROOM 11 RIGHT NOW, TEAM TO ROOM 11 NOW - - well they rushed in, the doctor 30 seconds behind the nurse and he yelled sweetheart, your are going to have to hold up a second.  Well Lillie Reese had other ideas and at 9:40pm, less than about 10 minutes from the practice push she burst into our lives with a powerfully healthy set of lungs proclaiming to all the world her presence!

My life changed forever, at that moment I went from Husband, and Father to Grand Father!  All I could do was wander around the labor and delivery room filled with all of the activities in and around my daughter and this new life – all I could see was my bride, my daughter, my grand daughter and Justin.  At that moment the only lives that mattered to me and entrusted to me by God to love and to cherish as long as God gives me breath!

Sudden Bursts of Life are unexpected and certainly undeserved!  Yet God sends them reeling into our lives because she believes in us and has faith in us to love and to live with and for each other as Children of  God, as part of an eternal family joined together through the waters of baptism and sustained by Bread and Wine and God’s Holy and Eternal Word!

Thanks Be To God for Lillie Reese’s Bursting Into Our Lives and Changing Us Forever For God!

AMEN!