August 3 Update

The last update I posted has been a few weeks back now. My failure to do an official post wasn't so much for lack of desire as for lack of information.

Micah has been sick. He's been up and down, but more down than up. Unfortunately, there's been too little information about why and even more troubling no way of determining what to do about it.

On Friday Micah had a liver biopsy. It was almost the liver biopsy that didn't happen. The results came back showing inflammation in the liver consistent with rejection. In the grand scheme of things, it is mild. Micah has been receiving powerful doses of steroids the last two days to knock his immune system down to curb the rejection.

Micah's bilirubin level was down by 2 points at last check. We celebrate that and hope this indicates the steroids are addressing the rejection and helping his liver function better.

He has been receiving nutrition in his feeding tube that was inserted Friday as well. Micah's calorie and protein intake have been below what is needed to maintain and certainly far lower than what is needed to replenish what he's lost. The tube is necessary evil for him. It isn't comfortable and he wrestles with the discomfort of it. However, it appears to be giving him the much needed nutrition.

Today has been a better day than the past few. Perhaps it is the nutrition, perhaps the treatment of the rejection, perhaps the blood transfusion from yesterday, or maybe the mix of all the above. He even enjoyed a few moments when his two younger brothers showed up to visit. But then again, who couldn't Titus and Malachi make smile.

We are grateful for your prayers. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to be back at Refuge Church and preaching this morning for the first time in 5 weeks. It was also a joy to have the people gather around to pray for me, our family, and, more importantly and specifically, Micah.

Micah Update: We Wait

Three months ago Micah was listed on the liver transplant list to receive his second liver transplant of his short 7 year life. We continue to wait. There's no way to know when the surgery will take place. And certainly the events that precipitate the availability of a liver are difficult to think upon.

Micah continues to do well most days. He continues to face more regular fatigue. But he completed baseball season alongside of his brothers, Isaac and Ethan. They are all three great at helping care for and play with the two little brothers, Malachi and Titus.

He continues to have surgery on his mind everyday. There's rarely a day that goes by that something doesn't trigger a conversation or some statement related to the wait or the surgery to come. With visiting grandparents this week, it simply came up when he told me they would stay longer if he had his transplant.

Please continue to pray for patience in the waiting, strength and comfort for Micah's body and heart, and trust in the perfect will and timing of God.

I would additionally ask specific prayer for Isaac and Ethan. They have lived these circumstances related to Micah's health for the majority of their life. They don't really know a time when it wasn't part of our journey, our story, and God's work in and through us. However, this time they face the future and the events to come with greater understanding. They know the risk for Micah and the cost to another child and family. Isaac shed great tears the other night as he verbalized his fear, sadness, and struggle with both all of this.

We are grateful for your continued prayers for us, our family, Micah specifically, and for God to accomplish, as we have always hoped, what will ultimately bring him the greatest glory by displaying and declaring the good news through this.

The Air We Breathe

We owe an incredible debt of gratitude to Martin Luther whom God used in what we call the Reformation. Luther became convinced that Christ is the ultimate mediator between God and humanity rather than an earthly priest, pope, or king. 

He challenged people to see Christ's work as the only means of salvation, which could not be bought or sold. Luther desired to lead individuals into the intimate love-relationship with Jesus Christ for which we were made.

Every follower of Jesus, whether man or woman, should live in constant dependence on God through prayer. Not doing so is to in essence cut off one's oxygen supply. God wants relationship with us and communication (prayer) is essential to any relationship, even ours with God. Whether with my wife, kids, coworkers, neighbors, or friends, good and regular communication is essential to a good and regular relationship.

Once Luther wrote, "To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing." He believed this and lived this often spending hours in prayer. The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, urging him to lead the church in prayer. In 1 Timothy 2, Paul wrote that God's people should be lift up in prayer all people, including those in authority of them, whether believer or not. But I love even more that Paul wrote in verse 8 of that chapter to men specifically. He wrote, "I desire then that in every place the men should pray, liftingholy hands without anger or quarreling…"

The truth of the matter is that there are far more things for which I can pray in a day than I have the time.  Yet this should only drive me to pray more passionately and regularly.

And there is far more things for which I have to do in a day that I often see prayer as the impediment to accomplish those things. Yet again, praying focuses my priorities and connects me with the divine power from above for these things. Or as Thomas Brooks says, "You can do more than pray after you've prayed, but you cannot do more than pray until you have prayed."

What stands before you today for which you need to first stand before God in prayer?