It's been awhile since I posted anything and today's particular post is something that I was reminded of this morning. It is a story that many close friends and others have heard but I wanted to put it down here because it is an important story in my life and deserves to be put out there.
My partner and I have been married for 16 years this August. A couple of years after we were wed we decided to try and have children. After many months of nothing happening we went to the doctor and were put through the usual gamut of tests. Ultimately, my partner was diagnosed with a condition known as Poly-Cystic Ovary Disease. What this meant, according to the doctors, was that we would never have children naturally. We were a bit devastated but not without hope as we could get treatments done to get pregnant. Unfortunately, those treatments are expensive. As is adoption which was are next avenue of thought. It seemed we were destined to not have children.
However, as the years went by we sought second and third opinions. There were many tears as doctors insulted my partner, blamed her for the situation and as we sought to figure out how to afford something like the treatments. It was a tough number of years, yet we never seemed to give up the idea of children completely.
Finally, life took a turn for us as I left full-time work to go back to school and my partner started a new job. These changes got us thinking that maybe we should just go for the treatments. We would do what we had to to pay for them, even if I had to go back to work. So, back to yet another clinic to look into beginning fertility treatments, cost be damned.
In our fifteenth year of marriage we were about to start treatments when my partner called me the day we were to begin with the news that she was pregnant. You could have bowled us over with feathers. After years of being told we could not have children naturally, it happened . . . naturally.
This morning as I was watching my 9 month old daughter play on the floor I was just reminded of this story and how amazing the God I serve is. I smiled as she crawled around on the floor and tried the beginnings of words (mainly gibberish, but the most beautiful sound in the world, let me tell you). She is my joy. I took a quiet moment to say a quick prayer of thanks to my God because, while He loved us so much to send His Son to die for us, He also loves us enough to send a beautiful child into our lives. My daughter will forever remind me of the miraculous nature of my God and I am so thankful to Him for that and for her.
This story is important to be told. It reminds me of what my God is capable of. Many will say that it is a coincidence how everything happened, but my partner, family and I know better. My daughter is a gift straight from God, a miracle. Proof that the God I serve still performs miracles in this modern day and age. My hope is that those reading this will be encouraged. Maybe you are struggling with something, wondering if God is there, or if a miracle can come your way. Don't give up hope. His timing is always perfect and His plan is perfect and He will see you through.
Maybe there are those reading this who don't know this God of which I speak. If not then I would love to answer any questions you may have. I don't have all the answers but I do know He is there and waiting to hear from you.
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Importance of Community
Over the past couple of weeks the idea of community and the importance of it has been brought to my attention. I was researching a paper and came across an article that was about how in our modern day and age with our quasi-public spaces (such as shopping malls, privately owned, but public encouraged to be there) that signs are how we determine our social behaviour now. A more recent blog post I read today was about how community and the gathering of neighbourhoods is what teaches us social behaviour and how to act in public.
This is interesting to me because it appears that we have lost something then if our learned social behaviour is coming, not from the public around us but from the signs we see posted, or the security officers patrolling the malls or even the closed circuit cameras that are always watching us. It is interesting that this has partly happened through he loss of true public space. As a result of this, individuals no longer know how to interact with other individuals. While a shopping mall may appear to be a public space, your behaviour is tightly controlled within and you are encouraged to not interact with others but to shop. It is not like the medieval marketplaces of old where everyone gathered and ideas were shared and conversations struck up and a general equality amongst people was seen.
The blog I read recently (see references below) pointed out that people are more likely to do a thing if that thing is considered to be normal for the whole of society. We see this today with the number of people willing to use pesticides when they may not want to, all to keep up the social norm of a green and perfect lawn. This idea works in a positive way as well, if the social norm became such that a meadow as your front yard was the acceptable than people would start letting their lwns become meadows, which they naturally want to do anyway. People respond and act based on what the majority of the community sees as acceptable. You may be asking, "What does this have to do with the article about signs?" Well, I'm glad you asked. You see with the loss of public space we do not interact with our neighbours or communities anymore to determine as a community what those norms should be. We allow private corporations and privately owned, controlled spaces to goevern what the societal norms should be.
Also, since I have a degree in theology, I cannot help but think back to the early church in the Book of Acts. The early church met as a community and shared everything. All were equal, there was no longer rich or poor, free or slave, but simply followers of Christ. In community they taught each other what their ideas of social norms were and acted upon them, even though a lot of times they were contrary to that of the state.
In the end, this post is here as an outlet for my thoughts, but I hope it got you to think about how you may or may not be controlled in the spaces you occupy, whether private, public or quasi-public.
Williamson, K. M. (n.d.). Civility proxies and social tolerance in American marketplaces. (2002). Sociological Inquiry, 72(3), 486-99.
http://www.good.is/posts/how-to-make-a-dream-neighborhood-resource-sharing-and-collaborative-communities/
This is interesting to me because it appears that we have lost something then if our learned social behaviour is coming, not from the public around us but from the signs we see posted, or the security officers patrolling the malls or even the closed circuit cameras that are always watching us. It is interesting that this has partly happened through he loss of true public space. As a result of this, individuals no longer know how to interact with other individuals. While a shopping mall may appear to be a public space, your behaviour is tightly controlled within and you are encouraged to not interact with others but to shop. It is not like the medieval marketplaces of old where everyone gathered and ideas were shared and conversations struck up and a general equality amongst people was seen.
The blog I read recently (see references below) pointed out that people are more likely to do a thing if that thing is considered to be normal for the whole of society. We see this today with the number of people willing to use pesticides when they may not want to, all to keep up the social norm of a green and perfect lawn. This idea works in a positive way as well, if the social norm became such that a meadow as your front yard was the acceptable than people would start letting their lwns become meadows, which they naturally want to do anyway. People respond and act based on what the majority of the community sees as acceptable. You may be asking, "What does this have to do with the article about signs?" Well, I'm glad you asked. You see with the loss of public space we do not interact with our neighbours or communities anymore to determine as a community what those norms should be. We allow private corporations and privately owned, controlled spaces to goevern what the societal norms should be.
Also, since I have a degree in theology, I cannot help but think back to the early church in the Book of Acts. The early church met as a community and shared everything. All were equal, there was no longer rich or poor, free or slave, but simply followers of Christ. In community they taught each other what their ideas of social norms were and acted upon them, even though a lot of times they were contrary to that of the state.
In the end, this post is here as an outlet for my thoughts, but I hope it got you to think about how you may or may not be controlled in the spaces you occupy, whether private, public or quasi-public.
References
Williamson, K. M. (n.d.). Civility proxies and social tolerance in American marketplaces. (2002). Sociological Inquiry, 72(3), 486-99.
http://www.good.is/posts/how-to-make-a-dream-neighborhood-resource-sharing-and-collaborative-communities/
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