Cancer; To the Glory of God September 26, 2007

I recently found out that, one of my adopted families while I was in Knoxville, has had cancer touch their lives.  The Riley family did so much for me while I was in Knoxville and have richly blessed my life from all that I learned from them.  Dan Riley is the senior pastor of Calvary Baptist, the church I attended in Knoxville during college, and the first senior pastor I had a close relationship with.  He and his wife Kathy would always go out of their way to have me over for dinner, a Braves game, or just to hang out and chat.  Kathy woke up last Friday without feeling in her right arm and the doctors discover a tumor in her brain the size of a golf ball.  Rebekah, their daughter, called me Sunday to tell me about it and before i could even console her she said, “Pray that God will receive the most Glory out of this situation.”  It is easy for folks to sit back and write or talk about giving God the most Glory in all situations, but when something like this hits close to home, and when your own mom has a brain tumor you can still say that, it reveals alot about that person.  So what gave Rebekah the strength to say that?  The very person who has been diagnosed with the cancer, her mom.  If anyone that I know personally can handle this kind of situation it is Kathy Riley.  She is the exemplary wife, friend, and mom; who continues to live for the Glory of Christ.  The reason I wrote this blog was to ask for prayer for the Riley family, ask for healing, and ask that God truly would be given the most glory, no matter what He decides will give Him the most glory.

Here is a link to a article by John Piper the night before he went into surgery for prostate cancer.

The frozen 400,000 September 11, 2007

Emily started her new job today as a nanny for an obstetrician.  She is a single mom who adopted a frozen embryo.  In vitro fertilization is growing thus leading to over 400,000 frozen embryos in IVF clinics across America.  After a couple decides to use IVF they have to supply he clinic with 12 eggs from the female and sperm from the male.  They combine the two in a laboratory dish (in vitro) and after the fertilization has accord the couple then can choose from the embryos which ones they want to use.  A majority of couples use the procedure because they are having fertility problems but this still presents a problem for the remaining fertilized embryos.  Some couples use the procedure so they can choose specific traits in their child.  Albert Mohler said “The desire for a baby of a specific sex is not new, and it ranges from a mild preference to an absolute determination — whatever the costs in money and morality. Any technology that creates custom human embryos undermines human dignity.”  The Christian worldview should see this as a major problem when most Christians define human life at conception.  A decision has to be made by the couple after pregnancy, what to do with the unused embryos.  Either the couple can put them up for adoption, save them to use at a later date themselves, donate to stem-cell research (which is un-lawful, so the embryo sits in till SCR is allowed), or destroy the remaining embryos.  In one decision couples are allowing the killing of up to ten human lives.  With all that said, Emily’s new employer had a heart to save these frozen embryos.   I have heard of IVF before but I was not fully aware of the huge number of frozen embryos.  This single mom who was getting past the age of fertility decided to adopt.  After being denied by several countries for adoption she turned to frozen embryo adoption.  This is an extremely noble undertaking and she IS saving a human life.  The longer these embryos sit in a frozen state the probability of them taking in the woman decreases drastically.  This is an option for adoption that most infertile couples do not know about and what better undertaking then saving a human life.

I don’t really know how to blog September 7, 2007

So, Ryan is the blogger in this marriage. The only blogs I have ever read were the Rings and the Barretts and really I only looked at the pictures on those. I decided this morning that I was going to post on our blog, and then I realized I didn’t know the website address thing. HA Luckily Ryan knows. I get to the website and decide to write and I don’t know how to “blog,” luckily Ryan knows. Now I’m here after a desperate call to my husband asking for help to blog…I’m making my first post in the blogging world hoping that someone besides me is interested. Now that I”m here I don’t really have anything to say I just wanted to leave my mark. I really wish I could leave a picture on here but that will have to be a lesson for another day! Ryan was talking about marriage and how we have been getting to know each other and it is really fun. He says I’m a laundry freak, but he’ll be thankful when he comes home tonight and has clean socks. ha-ha. Okay in all seriousness, we’re enjoying the married life. Without being too mushy…I love my husband and I’m thankful for Ryan and the fact that he knows more than me!