"Brace Yourself"

Week of April 28

 

We are driving home from lunch after church in a driving rain, As usual I’m sitting in the back seat of our van beside our six-month old baby, Rachel. She is strapped in her rear facing car seat and is having a serious crying episode.

 

After several minutes of trying to comfort her, I realize that she has a very soiled diaper. No wonder she is screaming. I said to my husband, Bob, who is driving,

 

“Brace  Yourself, I’m taking her out of her car seat for a minute to change her diaper.”

 

I place her on the carpeted floor and change her diaper and remove her stained pants. I think I was still leaning over tying the dirty items in a publix plastic bag when I hear Bob yell, “WATCH Out!”

 

Our van is T-boned, hit right in the back seat drivers side door. The impact busts out the window beside me and sends our van spinning in the middle of the intersection (Bahia Vista and McIntosh. Rd.)

“Oh my God,” we are in a wreck and Rachael is not in her car seat. Glass is raining over both of us.

 

 All I see is little Rachael in mid-air seemingly suspended there for a moment, her bright blue eyes looking right into mine. And then woosh…she sails out the window…floating like a frizbee through the rain…across that intersection landing in a puddle, on her bottom, screaming and crying.

 

I am screaming, “my baby, my baby.” My sweet Bob, who doesn’t know Rachael has been ejected, turns around to see about us only to find me stuck in my seat  yelling and pointing across the road screaming, “Go get her, please. Go get her.”

 

A kind man in a light blue sweater, who sees the accident, gets out of his car to help. He cautions about  not picking her up. Try telling  a daddy he can’t pick up his crying  baby who has been thrown 30 feet through the air, landing in a puddle  inches from the metal base of  a utility pole.

 

Bob says he knew she was “whole” when he put his hands under her to lift her into his arms. The kind man in the blue sweater,  holds a poncho from sea world over Bob and baby and walks them back as I crawl over the front seat and out of the van.

 

The ambulance arrives with the EMT’s who see our baby bleeding from the mouth, strap her on a back board and take us all to Sarasota Memorial Hospital. Several tests are made while we wait three hours for the storm to pass so that Bay Flight can air lift her to All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg.  Only patient and flight crew can go in the helicopter so our pastors drive us to St. Pete.

There are four days of MRI’s, ct scans and other tests. Everyone is amazed there are no broken bones, or internal hemorrhaging.

 

The bleeding from her mouth turned out to be a small glass cut. Doctors and specialist kept coming in and out of Rachel’s room, all amazed and totally not accepting that she is really ok. They all keep telling us that when someone is thrown from a spinning vehicle the ending is always sad, severe injury or death.

 

Yes, finally everyone agrees. This is a miracle.

Bob and I are so thankful that our baby was not seriously injured and following checkups have confirmed she is 100% fine. She truly was touched by an angel.

 

When we share her story people can not help themselves from wanting to touch her.

 

She is now eight-years-old and we look at every day as a true gift. Thank you for reading Rachel’s story and pass it on. Choose to live your life today to the fullest. Brace yourself and live today with passion.

 

Dundie Crisp                                                                                                                                   

Sarasota, Fl.

Who Else but God

 

Week of April 21

I had gone to the mall for a job interview. I spotted a man pushing a broom when I entered and I figured he must know where the main office is.  He was very pleasant and appeared to know a lot about this mall.

 

During my interview for a management position I mentioned the nice man I encountered pushing the broom. Guess I thought I would put in a good word for him since he showed kindness to me. After I described him they smiled and said, “Oh that’s Jeff, he owns this mall. That is one of the ways he gets to talk with the customers.” I was hired as a manager of that mall.

 

After that Jeff and I kept bumping in to each other. He was always cordial and we would have friendly albeit brief conversations. Several months went by and then I learned that Jeff had sold this mall for something around $29,000,000. Shortly after this the new owners gave me an envelope to deliver to Jeff’s home.

 

I wasn’t surprised to find that his home was a mansion right on the water but I was surprised when I pressed the front door bell and it was Jeff who opened the door. He greeted me warmly and invited me into his home. He opened the envelope and told me that it was a sizeable check representing his part of the commission of the sale of the mall. He or someone in his family was a licensed real estate broker. Then he shared with me that his family foundation was inundated by requests for money. He said he was really looking “to find something to give to that is making a difference.” Since I didn’t immediately respond he said, “If you run into any, let me know.”

A couple of years went by and I was going down a back road near the coast when I see a guy standing by his car on the side of the road. It is Jeff. He has run out of gas and I offer to take him to the nearest filling station. It turns out to be some distance before we reach a station. We chat. I ask him if he is still looking for an organization to give to that is making a difference. He asks what I have in mind. I tell him about a new organization called Gifts From God, which is feeding the hungry and helping families needing furniture or providing a car free to struggling single moms. By the time we are back to his car with a can of gasoline he has agreed to meet with Mike Butterfield, the president of Gifts from God. From that meeting came a much needed seed grant from Jeff’s family foundation.

 

A year later I am driving on Laurel Road in Venice and I am rounding a curve and there is Jeff standing by his car on the side of the road. Yep, out of gas again.  “You have come to my rescue again, it must be time for another grant to Gifts From God,” he grins. It was.

 Who else, but God ,could orchestrate such timely chance meetings like this?

 

Lloyd Keith

Osprey,Fl.

Driving through a fog

Week of April 13

 

I was traveling out of town on a freeway when the weather turned bad and fog began to limit visibility. Traffic slowed and eventually became stop and go.  I decided to get off the freeway and exited behind a car that had a number plate that was outlined by a purple neon light. I couldn’t see very well but I could see those purple lights. As I was driving slowly through that fog I began thinking about the past five months.

 

A transition team I had been a part of was charged to find a new senior pastor for our church.  I was lamenting all that time spent in confusion and seeking direction. I now realized that this had been a process. It wasn’t about finding a new pastor it was about being humble and obedient to God.  Like the church at Ephesus, we had to be reminded, “You have forsaken your first love.”

 

  I followed that car for an hour and a half. It was as if God was using the neon light to say, “you need me, keep your eyes on me and I will lead you one step at a time.” The fog lifted and the car in front slowed to turn back onto the freeway. It was then I drew close enough to see the words at the bottom of the number plate. It read, “Jesus Loves You.”

 

Frank Burns

Dallas Texas

Shift Lanes

 

 Week of April 7

When I was 19 years old I lived in Tracy, California. One night I was out with some friends in Stockton, about 20 miles away. I was driving home alone about 2 am on old Highway 50. The highway splits into two high narrow bridges over the San Joaquin River, one for north bound and one for south bound traffic. The bridges are steep so that you can’t see the other side.

 

There was no traffic on the road at that hour and I was traveling the speed limit. I was in the left hand lane going up the south-bound bridge when, for some unexplained reason, I steered into the right hand lane. A moment later I was in the middle of the bridge when out of nowhere, a car came speeding the wrong way in the lane I had just left.

If I hadn’t changed lanes there would have been a head on collision in the middle of that high narrow bridge. There was nowhere to go except over the edge into the river below. I know that I would not have survived the crash or the river.

 

Decades later I still shiver at the thought of what could have happened that night. There was no reason for me to change lanes. I was saved by an angel that night, I’m absolutely sure.

 

Mary (Kiser) Bartlein

Tracy California

Pray Specifically

 

 

Week of April 1 (no fooling)

 

 She is introduced as Ms Julie. You don’t use last names when you are running from an abuser. She rode a bus to Florida with one suitcase and the clothes on her back. She had been directed to a shelter. She obtained a job waiting table at a restaurant within walking distance of the shelter.  

 

 

 

"What I really needed was a car to go on interviews and find a better job. So I prayed very specifically for a four-door Camry (she had had one once) so I could take people to church with me. I wanted a clean beige or brown car.

 

"A few days later I received a call from a caring organization that donates used cars to needy people. They had heard of my plight and called to say they had a car for me.

 

“When I arrived to pickup my car I was told the donor had taken it to a car wash. A few minutes later a car entered the parking lot and I knew it was a gift from God. It was a sparkling beige four-door Camry and it was clean.”

 

Ms Julie

Sarasota County