Our spring break getaway spoiled us tremendously and getting back into the real world has been difficult for all of us.

Overall we are all healthy and well. So here are some rambling updates…

Malachi has been so funny lately. We plan on taking him to a small private school for a few hours each day starting in the fall- he is entering the 6th grade, which blows my mind! He is a sponge these days and is finishing at least one novel a week on his audiobook reader. He is such a fun kid and craving some peer interaction. With him starting school with new-to-him kids I was telling him we were going to start working on his response time when asked a question. I explained that I can be patient with him and wait for him to respond but that the kids his age just aren’t that patient. He took our conversation to heart and when we sat down to dinner 15 minutes later he continually punched Jake to get his attention and ask for things….a sip of his drink, a taste of blackberry jam, etc. And did it all with a big smile on his face.

Malachi is so used to not being “heard” by strangers that it has slowly become his expectation. We simply have to teach others to listen to him and encourage him to keep trying.

Side note on that thought trail. When we are in public we are met with several different reactions, conversations, and experiences. The majority of the people we meet are very kind and mean well with their comments. But so many of them assume that Malachi cannot understand what they are saying which is just not true.

This week in the grocery store parking lot we were stopped by a woman who was expressing her condolences on how hard my life was and how she would be praying for me as well as my son’s healing. Her intentions were so pure, but as I got in the car I thought about those comments through Malachi’s eyes and they just made me feel so sad for him. I never want him to feel that he is a burden to me or that there is something wrong with him.

These opportunities allow me to practice showing the grace of Christ to others, and they also allow me to have affirming conversations with my Malachi about how he is God’s handiwork.

This week Levi asked me if Malachi had Jesus in his heart. I contemplated how to answer him, so instead of answering I told him to ask Malachi. And when Levi asked Malachi he immediately signed YES YES YES with so much enthusiasm he nearly threw himself off the changing table. What a precious reaction!

Levi has been growing and changing so much. These last few days he has been struggling a bit with his breathing. We were worried he was getting sick but are now pretty confident he is dealing with allergies. They have also been doing controlled burns in the national forest beside our house and the smoke has been significantly impacting his breathing.

Because of Levi’s tight airway, any swelling causes labored breathing for him. It also causes him to gag and then vomit often. So it brings about dehydration and weight loss as he isn’t retaining the same amount of calories his labored breathing is burning. Usually by April we are getting close to needing another Cincinnati surgery and this year is no exception. He can run around and be active for just a few minutes before he is gasping for air and pale.

The only issue is that we are running out of surgical options to help his breathing. We discussed removing his lingual tonsils when we spoke with his surgeons post op last summer when we removed his tonsils and adenoids. But really that was the only “small” repair option that we had on the radar. They did mention the possibility of doing another single stage laryngotracheal reconstruction (where they put the piece of rib in his vocal cords to prop them open) but we REALLY want to avoid that surgery if at all possible. We would limit his activity, particularly the ones that cause the struggled breathing, before we schedule something of that magnitude.

They open up the summer surgery schedule in April so we are working to get his dates established with his specialists and the operating room for this summer.

Here is a photo from career day at his school; he wants to be a match teacher like his daddy. He is very into matching daddy these days.

Next topic- and a difficult one. I owe you each an apology.

This blog started as a way for me to share my faith with others through the testimony of Malachi’s life. And while I have tried to stay true to that intention I have allowed insecurities to distract me from that purpose over the last six months.

I can’t count how many times I typed out a devotional thought only to delete the entire thing, worrying about my word choices or searching for hidden tones that people might find within what I wrote. I overthought each entry, feeling inadequate and not Christian enough to hear clearly from the Lord and be used as His mouthpiece.

I let the words of man replace the voice and promptings of the Lord, and the conviction I have felt over this is overwhelming. And embarrassing. In the Bible we see God speaking through a burning bush, a donkey, and lots of insignificant people. Time and time again in God’s Word we see Him choose wretched sinners like me to share His truths.

2 Corinthians 4:7 “But we have this treasure in earthen containers, so that the extraordinary greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves;”

We are simply earthen vessels. We don’t have to worry about the presentation or interpretation, but rather allow God to move through our obedience to Him. My accountability is to God and God alone. So I am going to do my very best to write what I feel like He is laying on my heart and trust that His Word will not return void (Isaiah 55:11).

I apologize for my disobedience, and I am repenting to the Lord for it. I didn’t share so many things I felt called to share, and I am so sorry that I allowed myself to be distracted.

Galatians 1:10 “For am I now seeking the favor of people, or of God? Or am I striving to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a bond-servant of Christ.”

So here we go…writing and walking in obedience.

Over the last month I have had the tiniest chunk of scripture playing in my head over and over again. In fact, last week it was mentioned in a Bible study, which is wild because it is such an obscure piece of scripture.

Context: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to bow down to the king’s graven image and were cast into a fiery furnace. The furnace had been turned up so much that the men who led them to the furnace entrance died from the heat. The three friends were tied up and thrown into the furnace but the Lord sustained their lives. Oh how I love this chapter SO MUCH!

Daniel 3:26-27 “Nebuchadnezzar then approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!” So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire, and the satraps, prefects, governors and royal advisers crowded around them they saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them.”

I grew up in southern Ohio in a very old farmhouse that didn’t have heat or A/C, our main source of heat coming from a fireplace in the living room on the first floor. Being the youngest and having two older brothers, I was rarely responsible for stoking the fire. But the smell of smoke often lingered on our clothing and in our hair and served as a reminder of that fire.

But these men were literally IN the fire and there was no smell of smoke on them. They were unaffected by the seemingly uncontrollable circumstances around them. We see miracle upon miracle in this story.

In many ways our medical world for the last decade has been a fiery furnace. It has been a place that we never expected to find ourselves in and something we were not fully prepared for. And from this fiery furnace we have been given the chance to watch miracle upon miracle.

But this month I have found myself wondering if I smell a little like smoke. Do I carry around the evidence of the fire that we are in? Or do I carry around the evidence of God’s protection within it?

This week I am challenging myself to look for God not just in the big, evident miraculous moments but even in the smallest details. Those precious moments where He is still very much working, even in the absence of visible evidence. The absence of that smell was as big of a miracle as was their preservation of life.

1 Peter 1:6-9 “In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ; and though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith the salvation of your souls.”

May our time in the furnace, whatever those may be for you, result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christs.

Much love,

Leah