After a few requests, here is the first of my three part series on faith. This was more a testimony of what my wife and I had gone through in the past 8 or so months and how God changed us and grew us and got us through it all.First, thank you for allowing us to come and speak to you. I consider this a great honor. May God bless you by the telling of our testimony that He has given us.
Lets pray….
My name is Brian Spears; this is my lovely wife Trisha Spears. We were married last year on March 19. We were blessed with a pregnancy right away. Early in the pregnancy, our son was diagnosed with a diaphragmatic hernia. This means part of his stomach and intestines had formed up in his chest cavity and were impairing the growth of his lunges and possibly his heart. After he was born on December 9th, 2005 at Lutheran Hospital in Fort Wayne, he was rushed to Riley Hospital in Indianapolis; where he lived for 53 days. Nathaniel Gabriel Spears died February 1st, 2006. We would like to tell you some of this story, what it has meant to us, and how it has changed us.
Psalms 139:13-16 (NIV)For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.
God knew exactly what Nathaniel would go through, before he had even been born. God had a specific purpose for him. He had a job to do.
First, I need to tell you a little about me. You must see that God has saved me from my sin and myself. His mercy and grace are changing me every day. I was born in an unhealthy abusive home. My mother tried to push a legalistic view of Christianity down my throat, while my father verbally abused me, beat me, and ran away from God himself. When I turned 18, I swore I would never walk into a church again. This is where I ran away from God. I began smoking and drinking heavily. I started using people, both friends and family. I began a life of deceit and theft, first from those close to me, then from strangers and work. I was miserable and constantly looking over my shoulder for trouble coming my way. The patient love and unconditional acceptance from my sister and brother in law brought me to Indiana. Here I found salvation. Here I found my wife and my church. Here I have started my relationship with God.
Romans 8:31 (NIV)What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?
We all have jobs to do. And God stands with us, guaranteeing that we can get them done.
Within weeks of being married, Trisha and I found out she was pregnant. We could not have been happier! A short time into the pregnancy, we were told our baby had a birth defect. His internal organs were not growing where they were supposed to grow. He would need surgery very soon after birth. From my childhood, I had memorized one verse:
Proverbs 3:5-6. (NKJV) Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths. This became my lifeline to God. I knew that if I trusted God and did my best, then He had promised to take care of everything else. The tests had just begun. When Nathaniel was one day old, I followed an ambulance down to Indianapolis. A good friend drove, because I had not slept in two days. Trisha had had to have a c-section, so she was forced to stay in Fort Wayne for several more days. I was torn, between being with my wife, or being with my son. That was hard, but we both knew Nathaniel needed me more. By the time I arrived at Riley hospital, he already had many tubes and wires connected to him. They were preparing him for the first of possibly many procedures. He did not have the luxury of crying. There was a tube down his throat from minutes after birth, for all the rest of his days.
God did not hesitate. On the drive down, I began looking for a place to stay when I got there. We could never have afforded a hotel. I called the Ronald McDonald house at the recommendation of nurses at Lutheran hospital. The lady I spoke to, gave us a room and told me it was their last. I later found out that the normal waiting list was one or two months. We were the only people that they could remember in years getting in that easy. Thank you God!
Psalms 118:1 (NIV)Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.
I went to Nathaniel’s room for the first time and found 6 or 8 nurses taking care of 10 or 12 babies. I was overwhelmed to learn that there were five more rooms in this wing of the hospital like Nathaniel’s and there were four more wings on our floor. We were on the fifth floor. There were hundreds of very sick babies with hundreds of scared, tired, worried parents there, all being cared for.
Trisha arrived two days later. She was wheelchair bound as she healed. Because of a limitation in parking, I would push her wheelchair over to the hospital and back everyday for weeks. Once again, God took care of us. We found out Trisha actually had a choice of free meals. The Ronald McDonald house had a stocked kitchen and pantry so we could cook our own meals for free. The hospital also made three meals a day free available to any mother that was breast-feeding. Trisha could not yet, with the tubes in his throat, but was pumping and remaining ready for him when he could.
A week turned into a month. A month turned into almost eight weeks. Our days blended together. We would spend all the time we could with him. Sleep, or at least try, between visits and emergency phone calls rushing us back over to the room. We were blessed with many friends that came down regularly and spent time with us. Prayed for us. Visited with us. Cleaned our house in anticipation of our return. Took care of Trisha’s cats. Even removed snow from our drive in case we would get to come home before it melted. Thank you God!
There are 50 rooms for families at the Ronald McDonald house. We got to meet many people. We saw parents disappear into thin air, only to find out their child had passed away in the night and they had left to go home. We saw parents leaving with tears of joy, when they got to take their babies home. We saw some return, when new problems arose.
I kept everyone I knew with email up to date as often as I could. I asked for prayer. I gave good reports and bad. I want to read you one I wrote two days before he passed.
email below...Hello all,
I want to give you an update on Nathaniel.
Nathaniel is stable today. He has been for two days. This does not mean what it meant last month. Last month stable was good. Today it means he is still not using his kidneys and the toxins in his blood are attacking his major organs. Until two weeks ago, our primary focus in prayer and all we thought about day and night was “Please God grow his lungs”. That has become secondary. If he does not pee, he will die. The most encouraging thing any doctor has said was said today. Doctor Little told us he considered Nathaniel a strong fighter and he was surprised (pleasantly) that he was still here. Over the last two and a half weeks, Trisha and I have had many “meetings” with doctors. We do not look forward to them. After the first few we knew exactly what we were in for. They sit us down and tell us there is nothing more they can do for him, unless we want them to pull the support early. Trisha and I have had many long hard talks about this. We have asked that he be listed as a “partial code”. This means the doctors and nurses will do everything they can if his heart stops again, except manual chest compressions. As it has been explained to us, they can use drugs and paddles without pain and with possible help, but chest compressions cause him pain and leave him worse off than before. Trisha and I look at it this way. He is fighting right now. Nathaniel is beating his heart (with the strength of the Lord) on his own without aid from machines or medicine. When he can no longer do that, we feel God will be saying “let him come home to me.” Until then, in spite of doctor opinion, as long as he fights, we stand by him. Please continue to pray for us all. Pray that God will give Nathaniel the strength to live the life he is called to, whether it is 90 days or 90 years. That God will give him comfort and not allow him to hurt during this fight. That God will give Trisha and I the wisdom, the strength, and the unity to do the jobs God has given us. I firmly believe God has put us all here for a specific purpose, we are each puzzle pieces of a giant jig-saw puzzle for God. No two pieces are alike. We all have our own assignment. I believe Nathaniel is in the spiritual battle of his life, and doing the assignment God has given him. Please pray that Trisha and I will continue to do ours. This is the hardest thing either of us has ever done. I would not trade it for anything. As I have said many times, I have been given the best gift of my entire life. It does not matter if the gift lasts days or years, I am so happy to have received him.
The next day, we both got a pleasant surprise. If you were to line up all the parents that were staying at the Ronald McDonald house and choose the least likely person to have anything to do with God, that person would have been Roger. As we were walking home early that morning, Roger came up to us and asked if we wanted to be part of a prayer circle. It seems he had spoken to a missionary that was also staying at the house while his son was being treated. The missionary had offered to pray with Roger about his daughter that was there. She needed a bowl movement to signal her recovery was starting. They prayed, and the next day she had that bowl movement! Thank you God! Now, Roger wanted to get as many parents together as he could, so we could all pray with each other and for our children. Trisha and I looked at each other with that confused “Why didn’t we think of this eight weeks ago?” look. We smiled and told Roger we would definitely be there. A few hours later we were sitting in a circle with about 15 parents. The missionary and his wife were there, and we even found an evangelist in the group. Roger started. “I don’t know much about this prayer stuff, so if someone wants to start go right ahead.”, he exclaimed. Several of us took turns, and before it was all said and done, even Roger had put in his two cents. Afterward, Trisha and I helped the evangelist lead a young mother to Christ. It was as if God stopped everything just to give us a glimpse into the “why” of it all.
The next morning, the last morning, after Nathaniel had passed away in my arms; one of our nurses stopped us and said she had worked there 15 years and had never seen what she had seen in us. She was touched by the way we handed Nathaniel back to God. She commented that we would be surprised at the faces we would see in heaven because of what they had seen in us during our stay. Thank you God!
Proverbs 10:6 (NIV)Blessings crown the head of the righteous, but violence overwhelms the mouth of the wicked.
Proverbs 2:7-8 (KJV)He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous: he is a buckler to them that walk uprightly. He keepeth the paths of judgment, and preserveth the way of his saints.
2 Timothy 4:2 (NIV)Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.
“in season and out of season”. This is not talking about fall or winter. Here it is saying, “Live a life of example for the glory of God, whether you feel like it or not.”
God always takes care of the righteous. The reason we get confused when something doesn’t seem to go our way, especially when we think we are doing everything the right way, is because we have a warped sense of what righteous means. Literally, it means “right” or “in right standing with God”. Our opinion of what is right and wrong, what is fair, and what is just; tells us when to consider something righteous. Many times Trisha and I have asked God “Why did this happen to Nathaniel?”, and “Why did we have to go through this?” We have told Him, “This is not fair!” But the truth is, if we put our trust in God, the One that made us all, then try our best-whether we feel like it or not; God has promised He will take care of everything else. When God takes care of our situations, it does not always mean He will do what you expect. Usually, it means we will be surprised.
Matthew 7:7 (NIV)Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.
Matthew 6:8 (NIV)Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
What do you want?Ask, according to His will, and He will give it to you.
God knows what you need even before you ask.
As you draw closer to God, you will stop asking for things.
“But”, you say, “Why do I ask for things, then?”
So you can get to know
HIM!
Last fall, my care group came up with something that rhymes. It is something I told them over and over again. I want you to repeat after me,
“If I do my best, God will take care of all the rest!”
Let’s pray
If you have a Mac capable of running Classic (i.e., not an Intel-based Mac) but either reformatted the drive and installed only Mac OS X, or acquired the machine with only Mac OS X installed, you may want to install the Classic (Mac OS 9) environment overtop the Mac OS X installation. Doing so is a surprisingly daunting task, but there are several options for doing so.
