A Week of Grace

It's been quite a week!

It started with the transmission in my car going out on Sunday.

So, that meant that I've been begging cars off people to drive all week. My dad has been really generous and let me drive his old clunker on prenatal days. For some reason, all of our other nicer, newer vehicles break down and have problems at least occasionally. The old white beast that he bought at an auction ($300) for the younger kids to learn to drive in? It never, ever breaks down. The door handles don't work, and the windows don't roll up and down, and it's hard to start, and the gas tank is weird, and the speedometer doesn't work, and the lights and wipers take special talent to operate... BUT it runs, once you get it started. And it sure turns heads! You'd think I was a drug-dealer or something...

The Missouri State Medical Association seems to be pulling some fast tricks on us this week. I received a really bizarre email from their main lobbyist and several of the other ladies have been getting weird phone calls. Basically, they all decided overnight that they all love midwives and they want to expand our practice in Missouri, instead of encroach on it. They want us to all sit down and tell them what we dream of for the future so they can help us however they can.

Yeah, right. I wish it could be true. I so wish it was true.

In a way, it's a good thing to hear, coming from them because it means they're desperate and out of all tactics other than trying to be our friends. We just have to figure out how to respond. "Wise as serpents, and harmless as doves" has come to mind so many times today.

I just can't get away from politics...

Then there's been other things - lots of situations and stories and happenings. All in about a week's time, there have been two shootings or murders in the news - children murdering their own parents. And we've known the family, or close relatives of the family in both cases. It makes me pray for the hearts of each child in our family. And Japan's earthquake... it could have just as easily been us. Sometimes life is just tragic, ugly, uncomprehendable.... it is what sinners make of it. But God, who made life is always good, true, just, all together lovely.

Through the whole week of car problems, insincere politicians and lobbyists; unspeakable violence and tragedy, there's been Grace. I've thought about it all week. When my car broke down, I saw Grace in my dad handing me the keys to his car so freely and kindly. When I had a couple of nights of very little sleep, I saw Grace as my already over-worked mother came to my rescue and helped me pull some things together. I saw Grace as people were nice to me when I didn't deserve it. I saw Grace when someone I don't even know sent me a gift of money (just in time to pay a bill). I saw Grace when all of my breech babies turned back to head-down! I saw Grace all week, around every corner and under every stone in my path!

...Grace to cover all my sins, and grace to cover all the things I like and don't like. Grace to be cheerful and keep working and smiling when I am utterly exhausted. Grace to rest and know that it is God, not me that will accomplish that which He pleases in my life. Grace to trust that I'll have the money I need when I need it, and not waste energy fretting over unexpected big bills. Grace to believe that some of the most awful, shattered things could some day be a trophy of God's grace. Grace to believe that my God is always good, and to believe it enough that every day is a new morning of tender mercies and a reason to rejoice!

This could have been considered a "difficult" week... but instead I consider it a happy week ~ one full of Grace!

"When morning guilds the skies, my heart awakening cries, May Jesus Christ be praised!"