Happy Tuesday from rainy Florida! Isaiah had another amazing night of sleep, so I thought I’d catch you up on his big day yesterday. First, let’s start with today’s bible verse and why it’s so significant to us today! Today we’re reading Mark 2:17
First let’s set the stage. We’re in Capernaum, and Jesus is being followed by large crowds who want to listen to Him speak. While he was there, he went to Levi’s house and had dinner with a bunch of sinners and tax collectors, who were widely regarded as the worst of the worst back in the day. That brings us to verse 16: When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” Without hesitation, Jesus responded in our verse of the day:
“On hearing this, Jesus said to them, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.’”
~ Mark 2:17
“On hearing this, Jesus said to them, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.’”
~ Mark 2:17
Isn’t that the truth? Jesus was here to save the sinners. Me. You. My husband. All of us, sinners. There isn’t a man on earth that was perfect besides the Almighty son of the God most high. So he was here to save the sinners. So why wouldn’t he eat with them? Isn’t it the sinners who need to hear the word of the Lord?
I’m really passionate about today’s verse, as I remember telling Isaiah as I was grasping at his tiny little hand through the incubator as the medical transport staff stood around with the doctors and nurses and my husband, our pediatrician, our pastor Jack, his wife Ann and Shelly and Liz, our nurse angels at Baptist before they wheeled him out to be rushed to Wolfson’s. I told Isaiah that God came to take away my sins, and his Daddy’s sins, and because God became man through Jesus, he could feel our pain and suffering, and when he died on the cross, it paved the way for ME and PAUL to have Isaiah be our gift from God. We don’t deserve him. He’s not ours. He belongs to Jesus. But because God forgives me, because God is willing to sit at the table with me, a mere sinner, ISAIAH IS OURS to borrow while he’s here on earth. Man, this pumps me up. While I was praying, Ann tells me two of the transport guys, one of whom Paul referred to as “7 feet 7 inches tall!” held hands. Two men. They grabbed hands as they heard the word of the Lord being shared with our hours-old son.
Ok, so quick update on why this touched me today. Isaiah had his first pediatrician’s appt yesterday. He sees Dr. Bonnie White in Ponte Vedra Beach, and talk about an angel? This woman is like no one you’ve ever met. She had only met us once, for a 30 minute consultation, and she was at the hospital at 9 pm, less than 3 hours after he was born, to walk us through what was happening with him after she consulted with the Neonatologist at Baptist South. She calmly explained some possibilities for his seizure, potential diagnoses, next steps and explained the Down Syndrome markers to us as we tried to process all the new information. She held our hands, hugged us tight, and cried and prayed with us over our son.
As Pastor Jack would say, don’t miss this! Dr. White is available to us ALL THE TIME. This makes her unique in her field, we know. The nurses couldn’t believe how accessible she was. She gives every patient her cell phone number. She prefers to come sit at our home with our sick child than she does to have us run him to the emergency room if he’s sick because “why would we take him to where other sick kids are if she can help us solve it at home?” She told us exactly this the first day we met her months ago when all indications were that we’d give birth to a perfectly healthy little boy. And then it happened. We needed her. We had questions. And Meg called Dr. White on her cell phone (she’s their pediatrician as well for their son Eli and we got the recommendation for Dr. White from Meg and Wes). And Dr. White got to work. At 7 pm on a Saturday. And she didn’t leave our side. Once Isaiah was at Wolfson’s, she personally called to check on him every day. She did. Not a nurse. Not an assistant.
We can call on Dr. White when he’s well. She saw him yesterday. He’s well. He’s better than well. He now weights 6 lbs 8 ounces after a birth weight of 6 lbs 4 ounces. He’s grown a half inch and is now 21″ long. He looks like a perfectly fabulous little boy. He has a little eye infection but he’s a trooper and he’s on eye drops. But what matters is that Dr. Bonnie is available to us when he’s sick. She’s immediately available for all of her patients. She didn’t become a doctor to heal the healthy. She became a doctor to heal the sick. MAN, I’m fired up!!!
Ok, new pictures below. And I’m off to some meetings. I’d encourage you to check out our new foundation program called Operation Feed Wolfson’s. It’s so easy. Anyone can help. It’s a great way for us to bless those who are blessing so many families by healing their sick babies.
Have an amazing day! Keep the prayer requests coming! We’ll do another 10 on Monday!
I’m really passionate about today’s verse, as I remember telling Isaiah as I was grasping at his tiny little hand through the incubator as the medical transport staff stood around with the doctors and nurses and my husband, our pediatrician, our pastor Jack, his wife Ann and Shelly and Liz, our nurse angels at Baptist before they wheeled him out to be rushed to Wolfson’s. I told Isaiah that God came to take away my sins, and his Daddy’s sins, and because God became man through Jesus, he could feel our pain and suffering, and when he died on the cross, it paved the way for ME and PAUL to have Isaiah be our gift from God. We don’t deserve him. He’s not ours. He belongs to Jesus. But because God forgives me, because God is willing to sit at the table with me, a mere sinner, ISAIAH IS OURS to borrow while he’s here on earth. Man, this pumps me up. While I was praying, Ann tells me two of the transport guys, one of whom Paul referred to as “7 feet 7 inches tall!” held hands. Two men. They grabbed hands as they heard the word of the Lord being shared with our hours-old son.
Ok, so quick update on why this touched me today. Isaiah had his first pediatrician’s appt yesterday. He sees Dr. Bonnie White in Ponte Vedra Beach, and talk about an angel? This woman is like no one you’ve ever met. She had only met us once, for a 30 minute consultation, and she was at the hospital at 9 pm, less than 3 hours after he was born, to walk us through what was happening with him after she consulted with the Neonatologist at Baptist South. She calmly explained some possibilities for his seizure, potential diagnoses, next steps and explained the Down Syndrome markers to us as we tried to process all the new information. She held our hands, hugged us tight, and cried and prayed with us over our son.
As Pastor Jack would say, don’t miss this! Dr. White is available to us ALL THE TIME. This makes her unique in her field, we know. The nurses couldn’t believe how accessible she was. She gives every patient her cell phone number. She prefers to come sit at our home with our sick child than she does to have us run him to the emergency room if he’s sick because “why would we take him to where other sick kids are if she can help us solve it at home?” She told us exactly this the first day we met her months ago when all indications were that we’d give birth to a perfectly healthy little boy. And then it happened. We needed her. We had questions. And Meg called Dr. White on her cell phone (she’s their pediatrician as well for their son Eli and we got the recommendation for Dr. White from Meg and Wes). And Dr. White got to work. At 7 pm on a Saturday. And she didn’t leave our side. Once Isaiah was at Wolfson’s, she personally called to check on him every day. She did. Not a nurse. Not an assistant.
We can call on Dr. White when he’s well. She saw him yesterday. He’s well. He’s better than well. He now weights 6 lbs 8 ounces after a birth weight of 6 lbs 4 ounces. He’s grown a half inch and is now 21″ long. He looks like a perfectly fabulous little boy. He has a little eye infection but he’s a trooper and he’s on eye drops. But what matters is that Dr. Bonnie is available to us when he’s sick. She’s immediately available for all of her patients. She didn’t become a doctor to heal the healthy. She became a doctor to heal the sick. MAN, I’m fired up!!!
Ok, new pictures below. And I’m off to some meetings. I’d encourage you to check out our new foundation program called Operation Feed Wolfson’s. It’s so easy. Anyone can help. It’s a great way for us to bless those who are blessing so many families by healing their sick babies.
Have an amazing day! Keep the prayer requests coming! We’ll do another 10 on Monday!
Quote of the day: “I can’t wait until I see a picture of Isaiah holding Paul upside down!”
~ Bryan Robie (Michelle’s Dad) in reference to the picture of Paul holding the “test baby” upside down with our Physical Therapist, Jen.