Christmas isn't always easy or joyfilled... when your heart is hurting...

My heart has an ache in it and is heavy...

Heavy for all the new families that have joined our MEND group in the last 2 months...

Heavy for all of those that are struggling because the holidays and Christmas are hard when  piece of your heart is in Heaven...

Heavy for a precious 10 grader from our old church school who lost her mom in 3rd grade and whose dad is critically ill in the hospital and not expected to live... from what I have been told...
(Could you imagine being 15 and potentially with out parents???  My heart just absolutely breaks for her... she didn't have any siblings either... ) I see kids like this all the time in uganda... but not here... I am so very sad for her...

Would you please pray for Emily... that if God sees fit for her dad's life to be spared that it would be... for strength for her and comfort for her heart... for people to raise up and surround her fully in your love... That if he does pass that God has the perfect family for her to be a part of...  She really could use the prayers of God's people.

I remember that first Christmas after Samuel died, and the truth be told... I kind of was hoping Christmas could just slip right passed us... That of course didn't happen...

 It was hard as a different mom, dad and newborn baby played Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus in the church program... ( We were assigned those roles before Samuel was born)

It was hard trying to shop for the other kids, listen to Christmas music,  or cook a Christmas meal when really that all seemed so insignificant in the big picture of grief and sorrow.

If you have someone that you know that has had a loss recently or if you know anyone that is hurting this Christmas, please reach out lovingly  and tenderly to them ... please approach the throne of grace lifting them up to the Father...

PRAYERS NEEDED

Today our friend from Seminary who is a pastor in Illinois is going through a superbeam stem cell transplant in Arkansas. He is at the Multiple Myloma Institute. He has been fighting this cancer for the last 2 years and is tired.

Right now he isn't eligible for the clinical trial they were waiting on because of an increase in lesions in his back from 4 to 39 since last Friday.

Please pray for a miracle healing... pray for God's will to be done... Pray for strength for Matt's body as this will wear him out... Pray for Janet his wife who is at home with the 2 kids in IL. Pray for Matt's mom who is with him in Arkansas. Pray for the Lord to give clear guidance and direction for them. Pray for their 2 girls, 12 and 9 who are worried about their daddy.

Please pray with us for this sweet family... let's be the body!
Thanks friends!

Hello Everyone,

This is Greg... Sara's letting me post info on the terrible destruction in Joplin, MO. The tornado was categorized as an F5 and caused much destruction.

Louis and I had the opportunity to drive up to Joplin and help with Samaritan's Purse. They are so organized and they take care of you while you are helping care for so many hurting people. Our work days included: debris removal, packing items that made it (in some homes), hunting for items that were salvagable (because some don't have insurance!), and sorting (clothes, diapers, toys, food, etc.) from donors trying to help.

If you are able, I highly encourage you to get there and help... the people can obviously use physical help, but they also need a loving heart and a good set of ears to hear them tell you what they have been through. I know Sara has said this before, and I just want to reiterate... don't worry about what you will say, it's important just to have someone to be there with them and know they are not alone.

God bless you and keep you in the love of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior... and please keep praying for the people of Joplin, MO.

Greg :)

SOME PROJECTS, UPDATES AND A PRAYER REQUEST

Here are two of my crochet accomplishments since learning off of You Tube while I have been in the hospital. I made one like the green one for Levi and then Louis asked that I make a boy and girl one to put in the teen auction this Sunday at church... so that kept me busy for a bit:) Didn't my precious hubby do a good job picking out yarn for me:) I had some good laughs trying to guide him through the yarn aisle by phone... the process was pretty fun, but I think the end result turned out ok. This yarn was sort of hard to work with because you can't see your stitches real easily... but in the same breath... it also really hides your mistakes:)

Levi's BPP turned out just fine yesterday. Only 2 more BPP's before he is born...YAY! The ultrasound tech spent a lot of time just looking at his face for fun... OH my I know I am totally bias, but goodness does he look like a cutie pie. He actually looks sort of chubby in the face. I can't wait to get my hands and lips on those precious cheeks:) His non stress tests have been fine too. I have had to stay on longer at times because of contractions... but they have always fizzled out, which is great, and honestly I slept through some of them:)

I got the chance to talk with my sister just a couple of days ago. I wanted to ask you all to pray for her friend Susan. I have prayed for Susan and her family off and on for years. My heart continues to hurt for her as her family seems to continually be bombarded with challenges and trials. She has a 10 year old son Ben who is wheelchair bound and has Cerebral Palsy. This past year he has had trouble with repeated severe seizures that he has had to be hospitalized for. Please pray that they figure out how to get those seizures completely under control. Her husband lost his job and they have numerous other health issues within their immediate family. Just a few weeks ago they found a tumor on Susan's thyroid gland. She will be having surgery on the 14th, the same day we are set to have Levi.

Would you please pray for God's healing touch on her body, and the rest of her family. I am praying that the Lord would strengthen her each day and that He sustains her as she faces yet another trial. Please pray that if it is the Lord's will there wouldn't be any cancer there. Obviously, I hate that she is going through this all, but a part of my heart is glad to be able to pray for someone else. I am glad to be able to take my eyes off of myself and put them on the needs of others too, especially on the day that Levi will hopefully be born. Susan, please know this mama's heart will be praying in earnest for your mama's heart:)

If anyone else has any prayer needs, please leave them in the comments and I can focus on praying over them this week... if you rather leave it privately you can always email me at gshintz@yahoo.com

Thanks for lifting up Susan and her family before our Heavenly Father... much love all!
GOD IS STILL GOD... AND GOD IS STILL GOOD!

Time Will Tell

Hello Again,

So far... so good! Sara's BP was able to be regulated/brought down with the medications they gave her at the hospital. Levi is still doing wonderful and now we have to wait and see what the urine tests will come back with. We are praying that the condition is simply due to Sara's BP and can be somewhat handled easier than the alternative... which is related to pre eclampsia.

Please know also that my sweet love, Sara, is doing well also. When I spoke with her this morning by phone, she sounded great. She is definitely the best Mom out there and I am so thankful for her love and care for me and the children. It is very easy to see, when a situation like this comes along, how much she does for our family (I'm at home with the kids... working, trying to homeschool, breakfast, morning chores, etc.) The good news is that we haven't burned the house down and no one is crying at the moment! Praise the Lord!

Seriously though, Sara is completely awesome. I know I don't say it enough... and I am sorry for that... but it is nice to be able to write on her blog and share how fantastic it has been with her on this journey called life. God always knows what He is doing and He gave me a wonderful bride.

I can't thank you enough for your prayers (and continued ones at that!). We are constantly reminded that God is in control and He is with us always... He promised in His Word. :)

I'll do my best to update and hopefully soon the Rightful Blog Owner will assume her position at the keyboard.

Love y'all and God Bless,
Greg :)

Please Pray

Hello Everyone,

This is Greg. Please keep Sara in your prayers as the doctor had to admit her to the hospital for high blood pressure. We will keep you up to date. The doctor said that Levi is looking great, but Sara had to bring the BP down... minimum 2 to 3 days in the hospital.

We love you so much and thank you for praying for us. Our God reigns and we pray for His will to be done! Thank you.

A SMALL MIRACLE...

Yeah, this is one of the small silly miracles God has blessed us with, but I have yet to post about a different small miracle that God has brought our way... Really are any of God's miracles small?

Last Friday I had my small group bible study with 3 ladies from our church and one new friend that I invited. These ladies have really embraced me where I am at these last few months. That has been a HUGE blessing. I can tell that they are ok with my tears and my quirky ways. I have enjoyed our time together so much.

Well that night I took a run in the dark. I must say, it was a bit freaky. I am a complete chicken so I have to explain our neighborhood... very small, basically just one big horseshoe with a cul du sac on the each end. It is literally less than a 1/2 a mile to the other side. I love it because I can either take the kids with or leave them and if they had a problem they could yell off the back porch and I could cut through the yards and be home in less than a minute. The boring part is I just do the lap over and over again... I really don't mind though. So when I say I went for a run in the dark... now you get it, I am not going real far.

It was a gorgeous night. Living in the country we get to see some beautiful night skies, gorgeous stars... I love it. It felt wonderful. Afterwards I went to lie on the bench in Samuel's garden and stare up at the stars. I was just amazed by the vastness above me. I can't help but wonder where exactly my Samuel is. I know where he is, in the presence of our God, but where exactly is that? I feel close to him when I am sitting in the garden we planted in memory of him. When I take care of it, weeding it and watering the plants, in a strange way I feel like it is the only thing this side of heaven that I can do to take care of him. I love sitting out there. Then it dawned on me... God bringing this new friend into town that I could invite to the ladies study was like a small miracle. I just laid there crying... it felt like God had done something that finally felt good to me. I will explain more about this new friend in a bit.

Now I know that God is doing good things for me everyday. But honestly when you are living with a part of your heart missing, not everything feels good. We have had such a rough year, by far the hardest of our lives. It has felt like one tough thing after another for us and many close to us. Another example of enduring this hardship is our friends the Petersons from the seminary. We just visited with them at baby Nate's parent's house after Nate's memorial service about a month ago. We just found out that Matthew has stage 3 Multiple Myeloma. The prognosis isn't very good, but I personally am believing God for a miracle for this man. If you think of it, would you pray for Matt, his wife Janet and their 2 girls. His faith is amazing, but I know they will need to feel the warmth and strength of God's embrace and the warmth of His people over the next months.

I know I shouldn't be surprised by all of the hurt, disease, and war in this world. The Lord states all of these things will exist for believers and unbelievers alike. It still doesn't make it any easier to see those you love struggling.

Back to my small miracle... I can really go off on a tangent I know.... my mind is so not focused these days...

Well, I think it was probably this past May someone grabbed me after Bible study one morning saying there was someone who wanted to meet me. That Sunday I met a delightful couple, Tim and Nicole. Actually they were planning on moving here this summer from Sweden... from Sweden, yes all the way across that big ocean. The crazy thing is before living in Sweden, they had lived in Wisconsin and gone to the church where I grew up. They were dear friends with one of my college roommates. When they lived there they had become friends with all of my dear friends growing up. Really the conversation felt so good, like home. When I asked, "Do you know so and so." They replied with crazy things like, "Yeah, if anything ever happens to us, they will get custody of our kids." "They would say Tim was in a Bible study with so and so" I responded with, "That guy and his wife bought my parents house, the one I grew up in." It was like that over and over again. It was almost comical.

They came back for a visit one Sunday, just 2 days after our birth mom delivered Joel. This young lady was just fine with my tears, and gave me a big hug. I don't know what it is exactly... if it is all the friends that we have in common. Or could it be that there is just a familiarity about someone who comes from the same place you do, the frozen tundra:) They invited us over after church last Sunday, and we had such a nice time getting to know them better. What are the chances that they would move from Sweden to Tulsa and come to our church? It seems crazy to me, yet at the same time it doesn't surprise me that God would work all of that out. To me that feels like a small miracle... and I like the way that feels!

PRAYER NEEDED!

Friends, I am needing you to storm the gates of Heaven on behalf of our dear friends from St. Louis. Jerry and Greg were in the same program at the seminary. He is now a Pastor at a church in St. Louis. A year and a half ago I asked you to pray for them when they lost their 9 year old son in a tragic helicoptor accident while they were on vacation in Texas.



Seven months ago they made plans to adopt a baby that was to be born in March. He was born a couple of months early. Just an hour and a half ago my dear friend Becky called and said that this sweet precious baby boy, Nate, was found not breathing in his crib. They were on their way to the hospital with him. Immediately we were praying for a miracle for this family and for the Lord's sustaining power to rest on them. She called back a half hour later to tell me that he was gone.



Our hearts are absolutely broken for our friends. After everything that they have already been through... Really, I feel like I have very few words. I am completely in shock that this could even possibly happen... to them. I don't understand God's ways. I just don't get it... when is it just too much Lord? I know they will be proclaiming God's mighty ways through all of this. I also know the intense pain that they will be feeling over this new loss. I also know how this will make the loss of sweet Caleb fresh again.



Please, please pray for Jerry, Gretchen, and their 7 year old son Noah. They need a huge measure of the Lord's presence and peace right now. They need to feel the love of Christ from His people surrounding them. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

BUNNIES, BUBBLES and STRUGGLES

THE 7 BUNNIES ALL SNUGGLED UP... IT TURNS OUT RUNTSY DIDN'T MAKE IT AFTER ALL... THAT WAS SAD FOR THE KIDS WHEN WE BURIED THE LITTLE GUY OUT BACK:(



I JUST LOVE THESE KIDS. THIS WAS THE SCENE AFTER I SAID, "JUST PUT IN A LITTLE BIT OF BUBBLE BATH." IT WAS PRETTY MUCH OVERFLOWING... BUT THE KIDS WERE HAVING A BLAST.

I am giving you a fair warning this post is a little all over the place... kind of like my mind:)

We had a pretty uneventful week this week. The kids are finishing up their school work and we did some testing with them. They are really excited to be wrapping things up. We do plan on doing History and Science over the summer just to lighten up the load during the school year. I think it will be a good fit for us... we will need to get out of the heat... us northerners aren't quite used to the Oklahoma summer heat.

I just got a phone call today from a dear friend at the seminary whose college roommate just had a stillbirth at 38 weeks gestation. If you think of it would you please pray for Sherrie, her husband and their 2 little boys as they grieve the death of their sweet daughter Amelia. My heart just goes out to them knowing what they are experiencing right now... but even more so what they will experience over the next months. I have never in my life felt such isolation and despair. I know because we know what the Lord has in store for us for eternity we are not to grieve as ones without hope. I know I have the hope of my salvation... But in the day to day grind of moving forward without one of your children, that time of my salvation coming to fruition for eternity seems so far off. That awesome reunion with my son and of course my Savior seems so far off. Obviously I know it could come at any time... in fact we all know that all too well since losing Samuel... tragic deaths don't just happen to others... we have faced it head on. Louis has made it a part of his prayer each night to ask for the Lord to give us another day to live... if it is His will. I know many probably think 6 months is a long time... that I should be moving on... but really it is still so fresh for me and hearing of Sherrie's situation so similar to mine brings it all flooding back. I am hoping to be able to talk with her or at least email.

I don't know if I ever mentioned my sweet friend Corie from Colorado. She also lost her 5th child, a son, a year ago this past January. I am not even sure how we connected, somehow she came across my blog just weeks after Samuel died. Her son Larson had been with his Savior for about 10 months at that time. She was such a blessing to me. To have someone who REALLY understood what I was thinking, feeling, and dealing with was an incredible gift to me from God.

Well, I did FINALLY sit on my big blue couch. I know that may sound crazy, but I haven't been able to sit on it since October 29th when I was sitting there and the fear of what may have happened with the baby was becoming a reality. So I forced myself to sit there and do my devotions today. Of course I cried the whole time. I have been reading The One Year Book of Hope by Nancie Guthrie. She has lost 2 babies within their first 6 months of their lives. Tough! It is an amazing devotional. It really helps me refocus.

One of the things that I have struggled with has been those times of real despair when Greg and I are praying for relief, peace, comfort, and hope etc. At the same time we know that the devil is attacking at that same time filling my mind with bad thoughts and doubts. I know he is deceiving me during that time. So we also always pray for the Devil to have no power at all in my life, in our family and in our home. There have been times that I have felt NO relief... what is that all about? I know God is present with me in those times but why won't He just send some comfort. I asked my bible study ladies the other week what they thought regarding that. And one wonderful wise lady said that maybe during those times when I don't feel any relief from Him or His presence he is busy fighting off the devil and all his demons that are attacking me.

And let me tell you I KNOW clearly that I have been under attack. I have FELT under attack .

The crazy thing is today in Bible study at church we were studying Hebrews 4. A central focus to the early verses of the Chapter was rest. I have been a Christian my whole life and never before has anyone ever explained to me that there will be times that we may not feel that rest or peace WHEN we call out. God will give it, but in HIS time when He wants to or has planned to and that certainly can be at a different time than what we would prefer. Obviously there are times when His peace does wash over me when I pray for it, and I praise God for those times.

I am not saying this at all about my personal church, but I think churches in general. I think many people come to church and put their "church face" on. Sometimes it seems that there isn't always a real honesty about where people are truly at, what they are struggling with. Wouldn't it be a beautiful thing if we could admit our struggles and then pray and support one another in the struggle, trial, or trouble...not pretend that things are better than they truly are. I wish we could be completely real with one another.

So in Bible Study today, I hate to admit this but my blood was starting to boil. Greg was leading the Bible Study. I just wanted someone to put it out there... There was a lot of talk about if we go to Him we will have rest, the verse Come to me all you who are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Many people were saying when you go to him in the hard times He will give you peace, or make it easier. I have experienced the loss of my son, and I know my continual reliance on HIM, but yet I don't always feel peace or the burden being lifted, that is just the reality of it. I have a hard time that no one acknowledges that part of things. I know that God is there and sustaining me, but sometimes there is certainly not relief from the despair. I approached Greg about it, because this has been something we have talked about many times since Samuel died. He said that part of the Bible Study may be covered next week. I am interested to see what everyone has to say about that then.

So when this woman gave me that picture of God literally fighting off the evil one in those times. That made such an impact on me. I have been intrigued with the spiritual side of things and spiritual warfare since I read This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti in high school. It comforts me that during those times when I am under attack to literally visualize God fighting for me. It brought back to mind an awesome human video that I saw on the web a while back. Please take some time to watch it... you might need some kleenex. I love the way they show Jesus going to battle for the girl in the video. That is the same way He fights for us, you and me everyday when we feel under attack and even when we may be unaware of the attack. Praise God for that. That is just AWESOME!

So once again, I know I am not a theologian, just a woman who has lost her son and is traveling that road of grief and recovery with the Lord at my side one step at a time. I pray you are blessed by the video.

You will need to go to the bottom of my page and pause the music player so you can hear the music on the video:) Let me know what you think:)