I’ve decided to blog every Monday, once a week instead of once a month! So you can keep me accountable!

So… It’s Monday afternoon and I’m in our room at the Morton’s, our “home” in the mountains where we all share a room. I was tired from a few nights of low quality sleep, but here I am still awake but I don’t want to wake the kids up and go out, So I’m writing on my phone!!!

TJ left for Colorado on Saturday for a couple weeks to enhance his ministry skills in evangelizing to a certain religious group.   I’ve decided it’s single mom awareness week!  Praise God for you women out there who are doing this thing singlehandedly in a godly manner! I realize TJ only left Saturday and it’s Monday.. But regardless I’ve been asking God for grace, patience and help in parenting my children in these days. I called TJ and told him yesterday, “I asked God to help me with my children today”. And he said “you should be asking him to help you every day!” And I said “I know, but I truly, sincerely asked for his help today”, which is okay, I think God wants me in a humble place of leaning in him and asking for guidance. Especially with our kids… this can be hard! But I feel like God is asking me to seek him in this area! So I am, pray for me! I am reading “New Kid by Friday” right now, and I have found some wonderful principals in it, but I don’t agree with all of it, however I’m not finished with it yet! Next I’m gonna read “to Train Up a Child” so I have a feeling these are gonna give me a couple different perspectives, and I’m looking forward to the things God is going to reveal to me!

This week has been kind of crazy, we got to vacation with my parents last week in Santa Cruz, and go to the “beeeeeeach” as Penny kept repeating. I haven’t been on any amusement park rides since before I was married, actually since the last time I was in Santa Cruz, which was 7 years ago!  TJ and I went one night and left the girls with my parents, I felt giddy like a little girl again, I was so excited, I felt like I could get on any ride and it would be great!  We we’re standing in line for the Big Dipper, talking about my mom and making fun of her because 7 years ago, the last time I rode on this thing she wrapped her neck with her sweatshirt to keep from getting whiplash, well after we got off we said “We should have wrapped our necks like my mom!” And we were serious!

On 4th of July there are no fire works allowed in Santa Cruz, and the city doesn’t do a fire work show, so this year they were hard core on not letting people on the beach with fire works, when night time came there was NO ONE on the beach!!  Staying one block from the beach in the jam packed residential areas you can imagine what it was like to walk out your door and watch random people shooting up BIG fireworks in the middle of the streets, and in back yards, people setting them off and running away, or riding there bikes or skateboards away, however we were ALL for it because we were ready for a show!!  Ava and I dashed from street to street searching for fireworks, it was quite the adventurous evening!  If we saw cops coming down a street, there was most likely not going to be fire works on that street, so we would just move on to he next one, it wasn’t long before there was 2 cars on fire along with a power line pole and eventually the big beautiful tree. We watched as it all went up inflames…

Pretty exciting 4th of July for us!

I love all of these precious ones!

First time eating cotton candy… they loved it of course!

MaryBeth has Ava and Penny cleaning the house now! 🙂

First time on a carousal

the view from our campsite

our campsite

Went camping with this cool family, Matt and Natalie, and their 2 girls.

Looking at a scorpion on our camping trip

Penny didn’t hold back from the dirt at all

Ava pretending to be a bride

my Tuesday morning ladies Bible Study group

Got to visit with my precious friends Aubrey and Brittany

I turned 27 May 29th and TJ turned 30 on the 27th… hehehe

MaryBeth got Ava and Penny some sand for the turtle our friend Sally got them. We are loving staying with the Mortons!

Jumping on the trampoline

Taytum, Ava and Penny’s friend they see every Tuesday

Ava making a tea party for her sister

One of Ava’s birthday cakes I made

All of my parent’s Grandkids

Ava’s first set of birthday cakes 🙂 (She had 2 birthday parties)

Did you know I love to have my calendar filled?  It doesn’t even need to happen just as it says, I just like seeing that something is going to happen! Well…. things are happening and I am thriving off that!  Our calendar is full, full of spending time with precious people, full of parenting, full of calling people, writing thank you notes, emailing, texting, full of traveling, and  full of sharing our God story with people.

Why is it a God story?  It’s a God story, because it’s basically a list of miracles God has done in our lives.  He is growing us in this process of sharing our lives and hearts with people.  It’s hard for us to understand that as such weak and frail people, he is choosing to send us to Africa and he’s raising up our team, he’s burdening people for this.   We are daily in awe of what he is doing, I’m not just saying that…. We are DAILY IN AWE of what GOD is doing!!!!  Did you know he is absolutely incredible????  We went camping with our friends Matt and Natalie last weekend, and we spent some time just starring up into the sky at all of the stars… it’s absolutely amazing that the God who created all of this, you know what I mean by all of this???  This HUMUNGUS universe!!!  That God loves me, and I have a personal relationship with him! My very own relationship with him!  I am dumbfounded that God… Jesus, died for me, he paid my debt of death so that I could live with him and be restored to him.  You know what he’s growing my heart towards?  That God has people in West Africa that he wants us to share this message with.  It is so key to me that we pray that God would prepare this people for us to come, that they would be willing and ready to hear from a great God and that He would ready the harvest, that they would be ripe for picking.

That felt like a tangent… a good one at that!  🙂  We started homeschooling Ava, working on letters and numbers and such, she loves it!  TJ has been the one schooling her, mostly because the people we are contacting here and getting in touch with are people I know, so I’m the one doing that work, while TJ is graciously schooling Ava.  I am also the one who writes the thank you notes and updates our blog and newsletters amongst other things, so I am grateful for Him to be flexible in what our jobs are right now.

We are loving spending time with Del and Arielle, Ezra, Silas and baby Abel, who’s birth I got to attend!  We are loving spending time with my mom, and dad (on the weekends)  We got to go see my brother Barry and Helen last weekend, and our first night there, Barry came out with his green crumpled paper… he had a list of questions!  I was so excited that he was interested in us, and what God has been doing in our lives!  It is exciting for me when people, come with questions because they are excited about God’s work in our lives.  We Loved spending the weekend (2 weeks ago) with them, and getting to know them even better.  When you spend time with your siblings as adults, sometimes we forget that we each have a way we communicate best, and we find things out about our own siblings we never knew.  Because God does a lot in our lives as we grow into adults, there’s a lot we don’t even realize about our own family.  I love that each of my family members are serving the Lord, and as I’m specifically talking about Barry here, I love that he’s passionate about ministering to people in the business world.  God has given him a desire to share the Lord through his business, and in tern every area of his life, and I think that is really exciting!    I hope people don’t look at us as missionaries and say, they are amazing I could never do that!  Because what we’re doing is following Jesus, what Barry is doing is following Jesus.  Anyone can do what we’re doing, if we’re just following the Lord for his plan for our lives.

Doing the will of the father is what we’re called to!

Ephesians 6:5-8

5 Bondservants, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ; 6 not with eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, 7 with goodwill doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men, 8 knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free.

Thanks for reading my random thoughts

(I wrote this while listening to pandora’s “Jon Foreman” radio, so if you want the full effect, listen while you read 🙂

I love this guy more than words can say. He is my rock (sometimes an emotional rock, but still a rock 😉

Life, Expectations, dreams… there is so much that we expect from life.  When we get married we expect to be committed for life to our spouse, when we get pregnant we expect to be bringing a little baby into the world.  when we plant a tree we expect it to grow, when someone says they are coming over for dinner, we cook for them.  With the expectations comes hopes and dreams, and when they are cut short we are disappointed to say the least.  Then what?  Where do we go now?  What do we do with the lost hopes and dreams?

As you know we lost Nola at 20 weeks last October, expectations cut short.  God did miracles in our hearts and drew us closer to him, and we are changed forever.  After this traumatic experience we were not completely sure whether we wanted to try again.  We longed for another little life to care for, but not sure we wanted to put our hearts in such a vulnerable place again.

When getting back to Florida in January, my “country doctor”  and I did everything we could to detox my body, to get rid of toxins and chemicals, and make ready for a new inhabitant.  We tried for another, jumping in again believing God will take care of us and give us another baby.  Well…  we got pregnant again… he gave us another baby.  My desire to tell the world was not there because my innocence was gone.  The expectations were slashed once, I wasn’t going to jump into the unknown with my eyes closed again.  I didn’t want to be too excited I didn’t want to get too attached you know what I mean?  Making myself vulnerable to the world when I’m not sure exactly what is going to happen, yet believing God for the best.  The thing is that I did fall in love with this baby too, no matter how hard I tried to not attach myself, this little love was growing inside me.  It felt healing to be pregnant, and if you have ever experienced anything like this, you know what I mean!  Even with the tiredness and nausea, it was a delight to be pregnant.

Fast forward 5 weeks.  TJ was in North Dakota for a week working.  The morning my pregnancy was 9 weeks along, I noticed some spotting, which continued throughout the day, I wanted to believe it was going to be okay, but in my heart of hearts I knew this baby was not going to meet the world either.  This day was hard because my brother and sister in-law Del and Arielle were coming home from Africa after being there for 2 years!  I had been busy getting they’re house together, and ready for them to come.   TJ texted me encouragements throughout the day, reminding me who God is and what he has done in our lives, that He is the same God who has brought us through thick and thin, the God that has provided for our every need, and many miracles in our lives.

When they arrived at the airport my day was already tainted because of what was going on with me.  We (me and the girls) spent the day with them, and then brought them to they’r house they will be renting.  We spent a little time at the house, showing them around and letting them explore their new home for 9 months.  After a bit, we were all getting ready to leave, me back to my house, Arielle and Del up to her parent’s house for the night.  But before leaving I ran to the bathroom, only to realize I was in fact miscarrying the baby.  I came out of the bathroom to everyone outside but Arielle standing in the front door hallway waiting for me.  I began to cry, and told her what happened, Del came in and hugged me, as well as my mom.  We all stood in the hallway crying together, while Bruce and Darcy (Arielle’s parents) played with all 4 kids outside.  As I was sobbing I told Del and Arielle “Welcome Home!”  They said “Lily, we would have much rather been here for you through this, than not”  And I can see that God had them (and my mom) here for me, especially since TJ was gone.

More than ever I am screaming out to God “WHY?!!!”  You may say how could God do this?  What is he doing?  Well, I don’t think he “did” this at all.  Bad things happen.  And you could say bad things happen to good people, but none of us are good, we have all sinned against a Holy God, and that’s just the gist of it…  because we live in a sinful world, these things happen.  That doesn’t mean God doesn’t grieve with us and understand our suffering.  He very much understands our suffering, and he doesn’t ask us to suffer alone.  But just because God didn’t “do” this doesn’t mean he is going to DO something with it.  “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” Rom 8:28 ..  So the truth is that NOTHING goes unused.

As I contemplate this situation we’re in, even though I feel upset and frustrated, and completely unsure as to what to do next?  My desire is to keep my eyes open, to see what I can see… asking God to reveal more of himself to me, to use this in some way… who knows, maybe it will be 10 years before I see God using this.  A good friend said to me “I look forward to meeting your family in heaven”  I have 4 kids, my desire is that they will all end up in heaven. I pray that they will all put their trust in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of their sins.  I was talking to another friend, and I was sharing the shame I feel, she shared a similar experience of feeling shame as well… why is that?  What are we feeling shame for?  Whether we are in the midst of loosing a baby or just unable to have children, I think it’s something that Satan puts on us women, he wants us to hide our pain so that we feel like we are all alone in this, he wants us to keep our heads down and not say a word.    The shame comes from feeling like as a woman I should be able to grow a baby perfectly, and as I look at the women around me who aren’t having issues I think I’m the only one who can’t do this, but as we are living in this sinful world there are many women experiencing the loss of a dream and feeling like it’s their fault.   Well I just want to say “HELL No”  to you Satan… You have no place here in my life, and in the lives of women who know Christ!  Do not believe his lies because they are only lies.  Know that God can use even your pain to further his name, and that there is  no room for shame!    

As I look at my girls I see that they are miracles.  The process of fertilization and the growth of a baby inside the womb, it is a complete miracle, and lets remember that Satan has never had the ability to create anything, and hates that about us, the more reason he desires to shame us!  So I ask God for a miracle, I am asking God for one more little miracle child.

I asked TJ the other day, “What do we do when our fears come to fruition?”  No matter how hard, and how difficult it is to understand all of this, we trust God!  God continues to ask us to trust him, and more than ever I feel like a mere human in need of a great God.  I beg of you to please realize your need for him.  If your reading this and wondering how you can have peace in the midst of your storm don’t hesitate to ask God to reveal himself to you, and if he’s asking you to fall on your face before him, and give up yourself for him, please do it because he is so worth it!  He is more than worth it, when everything else in your life is gone, he will be the only thing left that you have.

I so Love and appreciate these two girls!

If you’re wondering how to pray, pray for the strength to move on with what God has called us to, pray that we would be guarded against depression (and shame) as hard as that is to say.  Pray that we will keep our eyes on him, and that most of all God would be glorified.  I am also praying that God would bless us with another child, as I ask for that I know it can be a selfish desire, but it is a desire nonetheless, and I believe God wants to know.  I also want God to give me the desires of his heart.  Thank you for your faithful prayers on our behalf, we appreciate you more than you know!!!

Through lots of sickness and lots of safe traveling by the grace of God we have made it to California! We left Florida March 3rd and started our way across the country.

We got to stay a little over a week with different family members  in Houston and Huntsville Texas.  TJ’s grandma Marilyn was turning 80, so family traveled from all over to be together for her birthday.

Grandma’s 80th Birthday

It has come to our realization that often we are less intentional with letting family know what God is doing in our lives and how he is leading us.  We think because they are family they should “just know” …. but they don’t, so on this trip we took the time to share more about our ministry, and how he is leading us on this journey.  As we came away from our time with the big ‘fam’, we were encouraged to say the least.  It is so fun to be in such a massive family where most everyone loves and desires to serve the Lord, he is good to use us in each other’s lives!

All the cousins going on a climbing trip

I also learned TJ’s Aunt Mindy teaches a parenting class AND raised a very strong-willed child.  I got a  lot of encouragement from her as well as some really good advice on how to raise my little fire cracker God has blessed me with  ;).  Thanks Mindy!

Love this girl!

We spent about a week and a half In Pheonix Arizona with my very good friend Valerie and her husband Ryan who we don’t usually get to see.  It was fun to have the opportunity to be with them for a bit, and build yet a stronger relationship than we already have.  Do you ever find that Satan tries to get between even the strongest relationships with the best of friends, to tear them down?  Well I love it even more when the enemy is conquered and we can see the love of Christ shown clearly, when the enemy could have won, but God prevails.  I thank God for Valerie and for what an amazing friend she is!  At the drop of a hat she flew to Missouri to comfort me in the middle of loosing my baby, she cries with me, mourns with me, laughs with me.  She loves me, challenges me, encourages me, spurs me on to better things.  She is a friend people dream of and wish they had, I am so thankful for her! I love you Val!

God has been good to burden a few family’s in Phoenix for our ministry, so we got the opportunity to connect with them more and become better partners together.  We’re thankful for the time we got to do that, and for the people God has put in our lives.  In the month of March, 7 different families committed to supporting us monthly and 2 other’s who committed to annually give. We are excited to have these people on board with us.

We got to see Dwight and Jana… precious friends!

We also got to see some of our good friends in Southern California, including this couple that we stayed with… apparently I haven’t seen them since I was a  baby, roughly 26 years ago.  They were an amazing and super encouraging couple!

We arrived in Fresno at the end of March, and have been in Fresno/Auberry for about 2 weeks.

We have moved to another place yet once again.  It is beginning to feel normal to move so much.  I am having to be careful not to come here and feel like it would be a crime to invest in people… Because we are just going to leave again.  That would totally defeat the purpose of coming.  This probably brings you to the question;  “Why are you guys in California?!”

Yes well, I grew up here in Auberry California.  In the 5 years since we have been married we have only spent about a month a year here, give or take a little.  Auberry Community Church is one of  our sending churches, and our desire is to invest time here in serving and getting to know the people better.  Because we have two home bases; California and Florida, we are hoping to build a support team in both places, since we will have roots in both these places and have the ability to spend time in both places on furloughs.

It has been hard for us to just jump in with meeting with people and sharing our ministry because… well…  Transition  is not always easy.  Even moving to a familiar place, it’s a place I’ve never lived with my little family before, I have to shop for our food, I have to find deals, remember where I’m driving, what the rules are here.  We are also finding ourselves in the midst of building relationships with people we don’t know, people I’ve known my whole life, but haven’t taken the time to get to know as an adult, and people we know well, and want to see more of.  Besides all this, we are LOVING being here with “Nonni” and “Pop’s”.  My girls are soaking up their time with my parent’s and with their baby cousin Caleb.

Uncle Bobby and cousin Caleb

Girls/Cousins… together

We look forward to spending more time with cousins in Sacramento, as Ava and Bella are becoming little cousin friends.  🙂

We are praying God blesses our time here.

And within all these people we are praying that God will burden those specific people for the work we’ll be doing and for us personally as we seek God on this journey.  We pray that he will raise up a team of people that want to be  a part of something bigger, a part of serving him, following him to Africa with us, and seeing people of Africa come to Christ because God used us as a team to reach them.

You can pray for us as we are here transitioning.  Seeing what every day looks like for us, how we will invest, how we will spend this time here.  Pray that God will burden his people for us and for our ministry.

Some things we are looking forward to:  TJ will be attending a men’s retreat coming up in May.  TJ and I are planning on going to Mexico with our church in August for a week. 

We are living in an apartment attached to my parent’s house in Fresno.  On Sunday’s we drive 45 minutes up to Auberry for church, and then will stay with friends of ours Sunday night through Tuesday night and will come back to Fresno Wednesday through Saturday night.  Our desire is to connect with people both in Auberry and Fresno as well as possibly getting involved and connected to some churches in the area.  We are praying God will make the opportunities clear.

Thank you for faithfully checking up on us and praying for us, and we cannot do this without our faithful partners in prayer.

The pastor of our church Sovereign Grace Church, asked me if I would consider writing a post for his guest Friday’s, so I chose to write on my due date, which I am so thankful that God provided this opportunity for me.  The theme is Suffering for the Gospel.  This being the week that I would have given birth to my daughter has been hard yet good to have something else to focus on, God has continued to give our story purpose and he continues to bring me through new realizations of who He is and how he is going to us it…

And once again, I look forward to seeing my baby girl in Heaven.

What is your first thought when you think of suffering for the gospel?

Today is the day, March 7th (or some time around it) that I would have given birth to my little girl, Nola Grace Shropshire…. But God knew otherwise, and readied my friends and family to minister to my physical and emotional body.

October 22nd 2013, I gave birth to Nola too early.  I know that God loves Nola more deeply than even I can understand, and did not desire for Nola to die, but he has allowed it.  He has redeemed her death for life. She, without having even taken a breath, has affected more people here than I can count or even imagine.

I found out at my 20 week ultra sound that my baby didn’t have a heartbeat, nor was she moving at all.

When you think of suffering for the gospel, the first thing you think of is being persecuted, stoned, shipwrecked, imprisoned, beaten or killed all for the sake of spreading the gospel in dark places.  God has asked me to suffer for his sake, but not in the way I would expect.

Through my family’s pain and suffering God has healed hearts of those he loves, ministered to the needy, and has revealed himself to us.  In one weeks time the Lord allowed TJ and I to know God’s heart in a new and profound way.

2 Corinthians 1:3b-4 “the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”

He has given us faith that moves mountains, trust that does not waver and a love for him that goes deep.  My desire is not to boast in ourselves, but to tell you that we can boast in these things because the Holy Spirit in our time of need met us in our place of desperation.  He became these things for us, when we couldn’t.  And now WE have the opportunity to share Christ with others, that we are desperate for him, and in need of him constantly.

Where would we be without suffering for Christ?  We would be the same people with the same level of faith that we had before, but instead God has changed us… grown us… THROUGH suffering.  And so today as I grieve the loss of my baby I am beyond sad she is not here, BUT I am thankful that God gave us the opportunity to allow others to know him more through our suffering.

1Peter 1:6-7

“In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials.  These have come so that your faith of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire – may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.”

As I look back on the several months of working through the loss of our daughter and how it has brought glory to God in such a magnificent way, I can see that no matter what we’re suffering through, big things OR little things, there is always an opportunity for it to further the gospel and to glorify God.  It comes down to OUR choice in how we respond to our circumstances.  We can suffer and wallow in self pity, or we can choose to trust God THROUGH our suffering, that he will give us the strength, the faith, and the endurance to glorify him through our circumstances.

We all have daily opportunities to suffer for the gospel.

Pastor Tim Merwin’s Gospel blog

It was Penny’s 2^nd Birthday today… Where has the time gone?! I can’t believe she has been in our lives for 2 years already. I remember thinking she was going to be a boy and when she was born and TJ said… “It’s a girl!!!” I was so surprised, yes so blessed at the same time… She felt like such a gift to me, and has always felt that way. She is such a joy in my life, always smiling, and telling us stories in her cute little voice. She loves her baby dolls, Ava, playing outside, she’s good at sharing!   She doesn’t like sitting in one place for too long.  She say “Bless uuu” When you sneeze, when she want to get your attention she says “hey, hey hey hey!”  Right now her favorite person is her little baby cousin Amelie, she has named all of her baby dolls after her, so if we ask what one of  her 5 baby’s name is, it’s always Amelie!  She always talks about her cousins and makes sure to pray for them at night.  When we’re praying for a meal, she always joins in on the prayer, when finished praying she throws both arms in the air and say “Amen!”

I Love you Penny, and I LOVE being your mom!

The day my Penny was born

Penny’s first Birthday   

Happy Birthday!

cake made out of watermelon 🙂

her new dress… I LOVE this baby!

rides around the yard with all the cousins

She got a stroller for her baby

Guess what we’ve been doing???

NOTHING!!!

That’s right… we’ve been doing a whole lot of nothing!

I am writing you from Cocoa, Florida.  Back in December, when we were planning to come to Florida, we felt like God was asking us to rest for 2 months.  Don’t make big plans, don’t meet with too many people, don’t work too much, JUST rest.  And to be honest it’s been hard.  We felt like when we left Missouri, and all the people we experienced the loss of our baby with, that we would be able to move on.  That these two months would end and we would be okay to just live normal lives again.  And yes living normal life is necessary, but the pain of losing of our baby hasn’t lessened like we thought it would.  But oddly enough… we’re grateful… because it’s a constant reminder that He is our sustainer, He is our strength, He is our source of light and truth.  He is our guide, He is our redeemer, He is our love, and He has asked us to hurt so that we can comfort the hurting, so far it’s a hard job, but if this is the way we can be most effective for his Kingdom, then I want this!

So you’re probably wondering, What HAVE we really been doing?!

Well… We became members at Sovereign Grace Church (insert WOOOOHOOOOO)  They have announced that they will officially be our sending Church.  We are so blessed to have Sovereign Grace and Auberry Community behind us as our sending Churches.  They are both passionate about what we’re going to be doing and we are truly an extension of these Churches and couldn’t do this without them behind us!

We have been living behind TJ’s parent’s house in a travel trailer, often eating with the whole family, which has been so great and a huge ministry to me to have so many meals cooked for me (Thank you Lori)  :).  TJ has been doing odd jobs in the yard, and working on little projects here and there.  We’ve been spending lots of time with good friends and family.  God is good to have asked us to rest… we needed it!

March 3rd we will begin our trek across the US to California.  1st stop: Texas, 2nd stop: Phoenix, 3rd stop: Southern California… Final Destination: FRESNO/Auberry California!

We’ll be in Fresno for about 6 months, building relationships with people in Auberry Community Church, where I grew up… where I’m proud to call home!

Ava working on her Pre-School     Rides around the yard with daddy

As of February 1st we are officially members with NTM.  This is a faith based mission which means we are financially supported only by individuals and churches.  I am not going to make a habit of asking you to support us financially, but I want to give you information so you at least have the option.  All donations are tax deductible.  We definitely appreciate one-time gifts, but need monthly commitments because of the nature of our long-term ministry. In fact we are putting most of our one-time gifts into a “set up cost” savings fund.

Our main prayer is that God would burden the hearts of people to be a part of our ministry, so PLEASE pray and ask God if this is something He wants you to be a part of.  He made our involvement in this ministry clear and I believe He will make it clear to you!

Below is a description of where all our money will be going and what we will need, This is recommended support, but we are able to change different areas if need be. If you have any questions whatsoever please ask and we will do our best to explain.
Serving Him,
TJ, Lily, Ava & Penny Shropshire

SALARY
Living Expenses $475.00 – groceries, toiletries, clothing, household supplies.
Transportation  $200.00 – daily travel costs.
Miscellaneous  $475.00 – any normal personal living expenses… life insurance, savings, vacation, cell phone, gifts and extra things.
Education $150.00 – Children education or adult education related to ministry.
Tithe $512.00 – charitable giving.
Housing $500.00 – Parsonage expenses including rent, utilities; electric and head, water and sewer, internet and local phone.
Salary Sub-Total  $2,312.00

BENEFITS
Tax $467.00 – estimated taxes on personal expenses
Retirement $300.00 – NTM encourages you to save for retirement
Medical $1,026.00 – Medical Insurance and deductible for our family.
Benefits Sub-Total $1,793.00

MINISTRY
Administration $171.00 – Voucher fees, Liability Fund, Postage & envelopes (for the home office.)
Communication $110.00 – Email, website, newsletters, thank you’s, promotional materials (prayer cards, dossier booklets, power-point/ video presentation, etc.), postage.
Equipment $130.00 – Equipment such as computers, cameras, & printers needs to be depreciated over a five year period.
Office Supplies $15.00 – Paper, ink, Rent, electric, and any other costs associated with operating a ministry office.
Travel $250.00 – Regular ministry travel on the field of service that would NOT be considered normal daily commuting or regular travel in the US.
Misc. Ministry $40.00 – House Help (giving a good testimony for ministry), Family field conference charges, promotional materials for donors, professional certificates, and more.
Legal $26.00 – Fees for documents or permits required to work on assigned field.
Furlough $170.00 – Expenses for us to return to sending country to update our donors.
Team Expense $100.00 – Ministry Expenses incurred to plant a church (Medical Care, Training Workshops, Language or Translation Helper, Team vehicle, Teaching Materials, Literacy, Lesson & Translation printing, Airstrip Building & Maintenance, Other team expenses.)
Ministry Sub-Total $1,012.00

West Africa Recommended Monthly Support Totals: $5,117.00

EFT  (Electronic Funds Transfer) Form to print out 

I just want to share what I have been processing in my mind these past 7 weeks, where I’m at now and how God has continued to stay the same.

When we found out that our baby wasn’t alive my heart sank to a deep place, and I experienced sadness like never before, yet God reached down and pulled me out of the depths, giving me peace, and life, allowing me to experience grace, love and his power. You know how the Bible talks about “not I but Christ” ?  That’s what I experienced.  My state was so low and I was so weak that I felt as though I couldn’t even reach out to God, yet he reached out to me and picked me up and held me in such a deep close way.  Because of who I am in Christ I can experience Him.

A couple weeks after Nola died I still got into the word every day and was desiring to hear from him… to be encouraged in the word, and I continued to read his word and talk to him daily.  I had no reason to leave that behind anymore, I didn’t want to waist my life not talking to him. A couple more weeks went by…4 weeks after… 5 weeks after I wasn’t healed physically and I wasn’t getting into the word anymore. I was writing to a friend one night and at the end of the email I wrote out “I’m angry at God!” which surprised me, I hadn’t realized it until that moment the words came out on the page.  I realized the reason I wasn’t looking to him anymore is because I was angry at him… and once I realized I was angry I began to process that past 6 weeks in a new light. I was grieving still but grieving more than just the death of my daughter. I had several expectations that continued to be unmet.  My soul desire is to serve people, to have them in my home, to feed them, love them, and allow them to feel at home, loved and served.  There were several people that came to visit us after Nola died and I wanted serve them(Cherie, mom and dad, Valerie)  in this way and because I wasn’t healed I wasn’t able to, I kept thinking well next week I’ll be healed, ok.. Next week I’ll be healed… Ok I guess next week I’ll be healed, and this kept going on. I realized that I find my identity in cooking good food for people, in hosting them and serving them. I also just cook and bake to relieve stress and because I was forced to rest I was unable to do this freely, I was unable to have everyone and anyone over for a meal that I cooked for them… this has been so hard for me! I have just wanted to get out go shopping do things with friends, go on walks, or a run, walk to class…. walk to HTR (Hold The Ropes) for goodness sakes… not having to worry about the fact that walking Penny to daycare may effect me negatively.

It has been like God just keeps peeling pack the onion getting deeper and deeper into my life, into my heart… dealing with things that I didn’t even realized I had issues with.  Even during all of this I just kept feeling like God was asking me to relinquish these things to him, and it wasn’t like a one time thing… this has been over and over and over. And now as I’m finally healed just in time to pack up my house and move I’m finding that I also find my identity in my things and how I decorate. I take pride that people can come in our house and feel at home because have nice decorations and a homey feel, and yet these are the things he’s asking me to get rid of. I don’t think he’s asking me to not be myself, but yet to relinquish my identity in these things to him that he may work in these areas and make me of better use to him.

In (Trials Hardships Suffering class) our teacher George Walker shared so many good verses and applied them so well to our lives. Provers 13:12 “Hope deferred makes the heart sick” I feel like this is referring to expectations not being met… over and over MY expectations are unmet. For a week I believe I was really depressed… not really sure how to move forward, stuck on the unmoved escalator as George says. Hebrews 4:15-16 “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”

Matthew 11:28-29 “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” I love what George said here “ When you fear… Have faith! That doesn’t mean that when there is faith there is no fear” he also said “For when I am weak, then I am strong”. Man is this true! I love that! For when I am weak I am strong, when I am weak, that is when God can be strong, and even though it’s hard and it hurts, thats actually where I want to be. And I love that fear and faith go hand in hand… just because we fear doesn’t mean that we don’t have faith. Because we are afraid, that is especially when God is asking us to step out and have faith in him. George talked about God leading us by flashlight, just a little bit at a time, and I’m actually so grateful for that… and I think he knows we can’t handle much more than that.

I love one of these last passages George brought up. When Jesus walks up to the lame man who had been that way for 35 years and he asks him “Do you want to be healed?” What kind of question is that?! And George was equating that with those of us who are stuck on the unmoving escalator, do I want to be healed? Or do I just want to sit there and sulk, and feel sorry for myself and be depressed? Luke 11:28 “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it” Instead of sulking and not moving in my Christian walk, even if that’s for a day… I must move on, take a step of faith in my faithful God and obey him… daily choose to obey my creator.

 I’m feeling God is really pushing me on in maturity towards him, and that’s really just meaning a heavier reliance on him as well as understanding where my identity lies, and experiencing the stripping of my earthly identity.

Phil 1:6 “For I am confident of this very thing that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ”

I just want to share with you some picture over the last month… I have so appreciated those of you who have continued to pray for us as it seems to have only sunk in more by now.  I’m so grateful Valerie came to be with me, she is is such a special friend to me and I’m grateful God has blessed me with her!  I’m so glad my parents got to come and that my mom was able to stay for an extra week, this was such a blessing!

We will be graduating next Friday, and leaving on Sunday to go back to Florida, we will be in Florida for 2 months and then will be heading to California for 6 months, then back to Florida until mid 2015.  We look forward to seeing many of you in the coming year!

Short but sweet visit with my dad

Our Bible Study with good friends that we do once a week

The kiddos during Bible Study

making Christmas cookies together

I LOVED having my mom here

Valerie having fun with the girls!

Staff friends

My girls think she’s a gem too! 🙂

So grateful Valerie got to come!

People had given us money with was really nice our whole elongated date was paid for and our good friends stayed with our kids for the night!

A few weekends ago we went out of town for a night where a friend had given us a free hotel room

TJ’s breakfast

delicious breakfast at “On the Rise” bakery in Osage Beach

Okay, so I’ve been processing the past few weeks of my life, and as I’ve sat down several times to write I have a hard time putting words down. I have already erased a few paragraphs the past few days so here we go again. 🙂

A few weeks before finding out about Nola I did a little study with a few friends on the question Jesus asks in John 1:35-39, he asks “What do you want?” And we dove deeper into that question to just see where is my heart? What do I want in life? What do I want from God? What do I desire? What are the longings of my heart? And no matter what these things are, God wants to know them, he wants us to share that with him, he wants to work through those things with us what ever they are! And as I was reading in my journal back on this day when we dove into this question… the main thing I earnestly desired was a strong relationship with the Lord. I struggled with sitting down every day to study his word, to come before him, and I felt like because of my busy life and my busy children taking all my time I had a hard time peeling out the time in my day for God, BUT none the less I desired that, and even before that questions was asked of me it has been an unreached desire for a long time.

Since the day I knew Nola died, the option for me to give up time with the Lord doesn’t even exist…Why would I go a day without coming before the Lord giving more opportunity for him to speak to me, to minister to me through his word, how will I experience his love and all that he can pour out on me if I’m not getting in his word. The other part of it is that I can’t survive without Him you know?

If God’s purpose for us is to glorify him, I’m wasting my precious life if I’m not spending it with him, if he’s not being glorified through me. Please understand I’m not trying to “toot my horn” if you know what I mean. I’ve had a little paradigm shift, and part of that is my need for him has become so apparent. And as I look back on this day when I spoke these desires to know Him in and deep intimate way I can say thank you to him for changing my outlook for allowing me an opportunity to know him better, to give a me a chance to realize that I can’t go a day without him.

When we started attending class again one of the classes we had was “Christian life” which pertained so well with things God was (is) teaching me. We studied the difference in meanings of “desires” and “goals”. The only way our goal will not get accomplished is if WE get in the way. Desires always include others in order to be accomplished, and I believe that sometimes all this takes is a mind change (other times not). Spending time with God was a desire for me and therefore generally didn’t happen.

However, there has been a mind change for me, spending time with God has become a goal, and I am the only one who gets in the way if it doesn’t happen. I don’t want you to confuse this with legalism, but rather the importance of understanding our constant need for Christ in our lives. My question for you would be, what is stopping YOU from getting together with God each day? And the question for all of us is what are we gaining by NOT spending a moment with the Lord each day?

You young mothers (like me) must be thinking, but how do you do it?! Well lets just say I’m not spending hours with the Lord, dissecting the bible inside out, BUT even if it happens to be a busy day my girls are running around, I can just open my Bible and read from His word a little, and other days (like today) I find myself having the opportunity to spend a couple hours reflecting on what he’s taught me, what he wants to teach me, and I get to talk to him and dig into his word… these are precious times! How cool would it be to see how weak the Devil is in our lives because we are so dependent on God’s strength. Praise GOD!!! 🙂

To share a little bit more about how I’m doing, these past few weeks have been a little weird as far as time goes, it feels like it’s been weeks and weeks. A few days after getting home from the hospital my sister in law Cherie Shropshire left her 2 boys in the care of family, brought her baby girl and flew up to see me. This spoke mountains of love to me, she spent the weekend with us, cleaning, washing clothes, dishes, an the most important part, just being with me… I will never forget her willingness to do anything for me, including flying from Florida to here at the drop of a hat.

I have gotten countless messages, texts, and emails from people that care for us, and honestly every single one meant so much to me, and was encouraging to me in different ways. People have sent us cards, money, a free night at a hotel, 2 beautiful necklaces in memory of my sweet baby, packages of fun and yummy things. I loved all the verses and passages of scripture people recommended for us to read, I loved how the body of Christ around the world came together to pray for us! I thought it was amazing how The Holy Spirit would put it on people’s hearts to give us a certain verse that I NEEDED, or a prayer for me specifically that pertained to fears that were beginning to creep in. I realized even more how God cares for every detail in our lives, and he uses his people to do that! The day we came home from the hospital, we didn’t want to see ANYONE!!! (other than those who went to bury Nola with us) but God put it on a staff couple’s heart to come over and pray with us, AND I loved that they called us right after we put the girls to bed and said they wanted to come pray with us and that meant so much to me. But I also loved that God didn’t overwhelm us with lots of people that day, but He did put it on this ONE couple’s heart to pray with us.

My emotions have gone up and down. Maybe a week after giving birth to Nola I felt very distant from the situation, like it was someone else’s story, I felt no emotions for several days… but slowly they came back which was more healthy I think. I would say I cry about once a day now, or maybe every other day. I forget what happened to us, and then all of the sudden everything will rush back and the feelings of emptiness set in, the feelings of loss, loss of knowing what the relationship with my daughter would look like, loss of a life I thought would last my life time, loss of expectation. I also cry because of the love I feel from those pouring out God’ love on us.

For those of you who have prayed for us and shown us love in different ways, Thank you!!!

I also praise God for how he has used our story to bless you and encourage you in your faith, I think it is absolutely incredible how God can use a painful circumstance and redeem it into something beautiful. I am so honored that he would use us… Nola to bring others closer to himself, he loved you THAT much, he loved ME that much! And just think he chose to give up HIS only son so that we could have life. To God be the glory! Don’t miss out on the chance to have life through Jesus Christ!

I have LOVED this Psalm these past few weeks

Psalm 139

“O LORD you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD. You hem me in – behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.

If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,’ even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. 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. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you. If only you would slay the wicked, O God! Away from me, you bloodthirsty men! They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name. Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD, and abhor those who rise up against you? I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them my enemies. Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Se if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” 

baby Amelie came to visit us 🙂

We couldn’t be more grateful for Cherie’s visit!

Ava and Penny LOVED Amelie!

Having “church” as a family

Since the day we came home from the hospital Penny brings a book to me every morning to read to her, and we snuggle 🙂 So here she is replicating what we do every morning… Love this girl and how she loves her babies!

Flowers from Nonni and Pop’s

Ava and her friend Hudson

My parents came to visit this weekend… I’m loving their visit!!!

Well… where to start, hmmm…

About 4 months ago I learned I was pregnant with my 3^rd child… the excitement for my precious baby and the anticipation to know who she is has been brewing for months now.

As I share this story, I want you to remember who Jesus Christ is in my life, how his grace and power has been shown. The compassion, love and strength he gives is indescribable, and my understanding for God’s heart has grown leaps and bounds in a matter of 48 hours, and continues to grow as time goes on. We see how he uses the body of Christ to hold us, love us, and encourage us.

For several weeks now I have been planning a gender reveal party where we have people over, and I have a friend read the secret envelope with the gender information, she then makes the cake and at the party when we cut through the cake in front of everyone, we find out if it’s a girl or boy depending on whether the icing on the inside is blue or pink.

I had made an appointment for Tuesday the 22^nd to get my 20 week ultra sound as well as finding out the sex of our baby, then we would have the party that night, an appetizer party… we were excited!

It ended up that ultra the sound tech was not going to be able to do it Tuesday so we decided to go Monday instead she had a 5:30 appointment we could come to.

So… to back up a week, when I hit 19 weeks I noticed that I wasn’t feeling a lot of movement from the baby, and I knew that with Ava and Penny, by now they were kicking up a storm. And so to say the least, I was worried… I started laying down a lot trying to feel a kick or something, and after a few days of intentionally looking and feeling nothing I began to feel worried. TJ tried to comfort me and tell me it was otherwise, but as the days went by he stopped reassuring me.  As I was laying awake one night I told God if this is what I think it is please give me strength for what’s ahead.

So back to the story. Sunday the 20^th our good friends J.Jay and Jaleigh Carr came to visit us, and we were so excited to have them here, we had a hard time making the decision to leave them and go do the ultra sound, but thought it would be the best thing. The whole ride there I felt nervous and wanted to be reassured that my baby was fine.

This ultra sound tech that I found is a strong Christian, Tammy Cowan her mission is saving babies and providing a ministry to women, that’s what she is passionate about. She gives free ultra sounds to those considering abortions and I loved that! When we got there we walked into the room, and I laid down on the table, as I laid there I was shaking because I was so nervous Tammy allowed a girl in training to begin doing the ultra sound and right away Tammy asked if she could look, and before she said a word… I knew… my heart sunk… It was what I thought it was. Finally a couple minutes later I asked her what she was looking at, she said “well… I’m looking at your baby” and from what I could see that baby wasn’t moving. She had a hard time letting the words come out of her mouth. She said “I’m not seeing a heart beat, and from what I can tell there is not movement”. She started crying. I couldn’t cry yet, I knew if I did I would completely loose it, so I just laid there and watched the screen while she tried to find out the sex of the baby. Eventually she could tell that it was most likely a girl. She left the room to give us a couple minutes, as she walked out she turned on the florescent lights which I wished were still off. I sat up, covered my face and began sobbing… feelings and emotions began rushing in. I was right… my baby was dead… but why?! I knew God didn’t desire this, but he did allow it and right away, I wondered what he was trying to teach us, who would we be when this was over? Ava kept asking questions about why I was crying and why were we sad? We explained to her the best we could, but it was hard for her to understand although she knew there was something wrong.

The ride home was a little surreal, I texted everyone I knew was coming to our reveal party and let them know there would be no party. We were overwhelmed, but tried to let close friends and family know . I also called my midwife Jennie Joseph and she gave us some different advice that was helpful. The first stop we made before going home was to my mentor friend’s house Gayle and her husband Britt… I wanted to tell her in person and ask her to come to the hospital with me. When we got home J. Jay and Jaleigh had kept to our 2 week simple living rules of no lights past 8:00 pm. So when we came inside, the house was clean and all the candles were lit. The chipotle pepper pork butt I had been roasting all day, was shredded and ready for eating. I was so thankful that J.Jay and Jaleigh were there… God knew that we would need them, I know that for sure. We spent the night making tortillas and talking about “other” things. I wasn’t hungry at all, nor did I feel like eating ever again. But I had planned on this meal for weeks now, we cut up lettuce, I had made salsa, we had sour cream. We sat down to a candle light dinner and I ate half a taco.

We all went to bed around 10:30. That night we decided on a name, Nola Grace. Nola, because I liked it, Grace because of the grace God was pouring out on us and for the grace we knew was awaiting us. I didn’t sleep much as now I knew I was carrying a lifeless baby girl. The next day we made the decision to go to the hospital, we decided to go to a hospital an hour away because it had a better reputation than the closer hospital.

Tuesday morning TJ was playing with the girls in our room. He put Ava and Penny up on the ledge by our room window and he said “Jump to me!” and they did one at a time, jumped into his arms trusting him fully as he caught them. At the same time I could hear God saying to me “Lily, I want you to do that today, I want you to step out in faith and jump to me”. While taking a shower and crying to myself the Lord brought Psalm 23 to my mind, and I recited it out loud as I sobbed, I remembered every word:

“1 The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. 3 He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake .4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever. “

We left the house saying goodbye to our girls, trusting that they were going to be well taken care of. Before going into the hospital my good friend Gayle who came with us prayed for us. As we were walking in I felt nervous about how they would treat me, what they would think of me and some of the personal decisions I had made. This is part of the grace of God that we experienced, every person that cared for us was compassionate and caring. We went through the emergency room, but they sent me directly to OB and delivery. Once we got in and were admitted, it took a little while for them to induce me because they were busy… but God’s time was good, processing everything was good. Going to the hospital was okay for me. I knew so many people were praying for me, and they must have been praying for strength because I had it. I wasn’t too emotional, I was ready to do the next thing. I knew it was going to be hard, I knew I would have to go through labor, but God would sustain me. I love Nola more than words can say and if I could go through this labor to deliver her alive, because I loved her so much and wanted to honor her I could do this with her dead too. This was a necessary process, and I was ready for it.

We arrived at the hospital at noon Tuesday, and at 3:40 pm they began to induce me. I was feeling crampy for the first 4 hours, and they gave me more of the pills about 8:00 to continue inducing labor. We watched several hours of cooking shows… which was interesting because I couldn’t eat solid food the whole time in case they had to do a D&C (you can look it up). My contractions only got stronger, I was grateful that it was like a normal labor, the contractions were not too unbearable. About 10:20 they were about 10 seconds to 1 minute apart and I wasn’t sure if that meant I was close or not based on the this inducing technique, so I told my nurse and she checked me and my cervix which was still closed. It was sort of painful, it threw me into my first emotional moment in many hours. It was getting painful and I was worried it would become like Ava’s labor which was 3 days long and I wouldn’t be getting the same result. I sat back and cried as TJ and Gayle held each one of my hands. TJ laid in the bed with me and began helping me with my difficult contractions, they started to become overwhelming and painful. Because I wasn’t concerned with a live baby I was okay with taking medications if it was too painful, so as it got really painful we called the nurse in and we started asking her about the side effects of each one, and even an epidural, she was waiting for my contraction to finish so that she could keep talking and it wasn’t ending, finally I had to sit up because it hurt to sit on my butt, and I had to pee even though I had just peed, but as I stood up I realized I was ready to push her out, so I’ll spare you all those details, but my body was able to deliver everything at once which means they didn’t have to do the D&C to get everything else out… I was so thankful to God, I even said out loud “Thank you God!” Nola Grace was born at 11:09.

After a bit, we asked to see her, so they brought her to me. I held her for a couple minutes, she was about as long as my hand, then TJ held her and I felt like that’s all I could take. I began to cry… I began to sob, this was my baby… she wasn’t supposed to come out yet, she isn’t supposed to be out of the womb this small. I wanted to hold her when she was big, when she had her normal skin color, I wanted to hear her cry… I felt caught off guard by all the emotions. Next the doctor came in and let me know that the cord had been wrapped around her neck twice and was in a tight knot and that was most likely the reason she died, but they couldn’t say for sure. I felt instantly angry because it seemed like such a stupid reason for my baby to die… she was otherwise perfect! And I was instantly reminded that God has a reason for everything, He didn’t want this to happen, but he allowed it and is using it in our lives to be of better service to him.

I just want to say, we got what seemed like a thousands texts from all sorts of people, family, friends, people we didn’t know that were praying for us and had been praying for us ALL day! How incredible is the body of Christ and the love we can experience through “the church” around the country. Thank you to those of you who prayed for us and are praying for us, it was so evident and still is how God is using you!

To continue the story, I didn’t sleep well that night, and in the morning TJ crawled into my hospital bed with me and held me while I sobbed. I felt empty, like something was torn from me too soon! As we experienced all this emotion and emptiness I realized none of this would be a problem if it weren’t for love. If we didn’t love Nola, we wouldn’t be going through this, and then we realized that God IS love and if it weren’t for God we wouldn’t love. God is the one who gives us the ability to even love the way he loves. Gayle came back to the hospital to pick us up. We were discharged and handed our baby in her little casket. It felt odd to walk out of the hospital with my little girl in a box.

We stopped and got some coffee on the way home. We also stopped at Dierbergs to get flowers for Nola and for her burial. We went to the flower section and were looking around (with me sitting in my electric cart), a employee manager looking man walked past us quickly and said “you guys having a wonderful afternoon?” We weren’t sure what to say, we almost told him what we were doing there, but instead both just sort of stared at him as he walked past seeming to feel a little awkward… poor guy would have felt bad the whole day, but I guarantee he would never ask that question the same way again :).

We arrived home to our children well taken care of, it was so healing to see them and hug them knowing God has blessed me with them. We put the girls down for a nap, and when they woke up we got them ready. I did my hair and put on some make up, I told the girls we wanted to look pretty for Nola. Ava drew pictures for Nola, and she kept calling her “Granola” which made us laugh :). We had good friends that made Nola a cedar box, and had dug her a grave in the perfect spot by the woods here on campus. We invited 4 people to go bury Nola with us, we didn’t want there to be many people, but we also didn’t want to be alone. Jason and Jonie Mellinger came, as well as Matt Zawada and Gayle Hemphill. When we got there, we kneeled down by Nola’s box with the girls, and we showed baby Nola to Ava, so that she might be able to grasp a little more what was really going on, we wanted this to be real to her and be as honest with her as we could be. We put Nola in her box and surrounded her with pink Calla lilies, and a big lily, Ava put the cards she drew for Nola in the box as well as a letter that I wrote to her.

My friend Gayle said a few words about Nola and about what we’re going through. The main thing she said that stood out to me was the fact that God created us FOR him, we were meant for relationship, we were meant to glorify God. But Nola Grace, she was meant just for God all along, He made her specifically for himself, she went right to him. How true that is. After she said a few more things, she played an Andrew Peterson song called “More” that we had listened to that night before. The box was sealed, we put her in the ground and TJ and Jason filled the hole, when they were done each one of our immediate family members put a rose on Nola’s grave. This was extremely hard. We were saying goodbye. We were burying our daughter, and that was the reality. God provided grace, he provided strength, and I can now say I know God more now that I have ever known him before. He has given us more compassion, and more love than we’ve ever had. He has shown us a piece of his heart and allowed us to know him better and I can’t be more grateful to him for that.

We are saddened by the loss of our little Nola Grace, and will continue to take one day at a time. We look forward to meeting our baby girl in Heaven.

Being admitted… I was so thankful to have Gayle there as well!

Ava drawing “Granola” some pictures

Ava’s letter to Nola

Hard day.