Chicago Doctor Returns from Haiti Medical Trip - Chicago Breaking News

Here is the story and pictures of the medical team that I wrote about in an earlier post.

Chicago Doctor Returns from Haiti Medical Trip - Chicago Breaking News

A Word About Haiti: 12 Hours on a Bus

A family friend who is a physician's assistant to a group of orthopedic surgeons recently left for Haiti with the doctor who fixed my elbow. The doctor's brother, who is also a doctor, received a call from a Catholic Missionary group, who he knows. They were desperate for help. Though they are not located in Port-Au-Prince, they were also affected by the earthquake and were trying to help as many people as possible.
The team of doctors flew into the Dominican Republic (they couldn't get on any flights directly into Haiti); and they took a 12 hour bus ride, at night, over very difficult terrain to get to their destination.
My husband spoke to our friend's wife who relayed this information on the situation. "Very bad, they have to put toothpaste in their noses to clear the stench of death.
Lots of amputations, the ones on children very sad. The doctors are working around the clock with as little as sleep as possible because there are so many to help." Our friend actually saw a case of tetanus, which is very rare here in the states. The families of the doctors are worried about them. Please pray for their safety and health as they try to help as many people as possible. And the people of Haiti, pray that they may feel the love of God and the hope of a Savior.

No wonder non-Christians think we're nuts!

Another burning at the stake! This time it was an English Reformation holdout who wouldn't sign Henry VIII's six articles of faith of the English Church. Cromwell told his friend, "Henry's a Catholic at heart. He just doesn't want anyone else to boss him around." (paraphrase) Last night my husband and were watching episode four of the third season of THE TUDORS. This is a Showtime Cable series about the life and times of Henry VIII. It's portrayal of that era is racy at times, but I must say the program's depiction of the fighting within Christianity is the most interesting part of the series. Each episode features another group being killed.

In the prior episode before Cromwell's friend was burned at the stake, the leaders and followers of a Catholic movement to restore the monasteries in England called the "Pilgrimage of Grace," were all hung, including women and children. At the beginning of the series, Thomas Moore, who most Catholics regard as St. Thomas Moore was also burning men who the Catholic church considered heretics. In almost every episode someone from one side or the other of the debate over who is the "TRUE" religion is tortured and put to death for either heresy or treason. How this must have grieved the heart of God to see his children killing each other in his name. It is scary indeed, because I wonder if this can ever happen again? It was about 500 years ago, but are we still capable of killing each other in the name of Jesus? Now, I'm not talking about other religions, I'm talking about fellow Christians: Protestants, Catholics, and Orthodox believers.

One of my favorite chapters in the New Testament is John 17. Jesus is at the last supper and praying for his disciples and future believers, (verse) "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you....May they be brought to COMPLETE UNITY (my caps)to let the world know that you send me and have loved me and have loved them even as you have loved me."

Let us all pray that we, Christian believers, do become one, so our Daddy can smile and not pace the heavens because the kids are fighting.

NO TREE POLICE

It's January 5, 2010. Do you know where your Christmas decorations are? Neatly packed away or still shining brightly? I used to always hurry to put the Christmas decorations away right after New Year's Day. Maybe it was because we always had a real Christmas tree and I felt it was a fire hazard to leave it around, with its constantly falling needles; or was it perhaps because the media resoundedly ended the Christmas season on January first with commercials about tropical vacations and the upcoming Valentine's Day? Or maybe it was just another task on my "to-do" list. I'm not quite sure. However, since we have purchased a fake tree (much to the chagrin of my children), I have decided to leave up my Christmas decorations until some unspecified date in January. There are, after all, no tree police issuing citations for having Christmas decorations up until sometime in January. This decision has given me an unbelievable feeling of freedom. I can continue to enjoy the warm Christmas feelings that can be so often pushed away with the stark and cold January realities of life. Do we really want to banish that Christmas spirit for another eleven months? Do we desire our lives to somehow get back to normal? Hopefully normal is always Christmas. Always a time for gathering with family and friends. Always a time for singing,"Alleluias." Always a time for giving and receiving. We haven't even lived through the twelve days of Christmas.What about the lords, pipers, and drummers? Don't we owe them at least some type of audience response? Though we have had over two thousand years to ponder the mystery and majesty of Jesus' birth, I still think that we don't quite get it or we would keep that Nativity out year round. GOD OF THE UNIVERSE TOOK OFF HIS ROBE OF GLORY AND BECAME A HUMAN BABY TO SET US FREE FROM SIN AND DEATH. WOW, will I ever truly understand the implications of this event in the history of mankind or my own history? I doubt it, so keep those decorations up and keep singing, "Gloria in Excelsis Deo." The picture at the top of this post is a little Nativity that I keep up year round on my book self.

Allelulia's Year Round

In heaven Christmas isn't over. It's Christmas year round. Alleluia begins and ends every sentence spoken. What would it be like to be near love incarnate? To see Jesus, the very source of love. To feel that love radiating into the fibers of my bones. Love in the nucleus of every cell?

That must be how we are transformed and our bodies made new. The essence of God's love takes over the nucleus of our cells and we become like our resurrected Lord. What a wonder awaits us all!

Thank you, Lord, for snow, because it gives sparkle to the gloomy grey landscape. It causes me to think that your grace is like snow. It drapes our gloomy existence and makes us free and pure and innocent. We become children again. Making angels in the snow is the game you gave us to draw us out of the seeming security of our possessions into the freedom of a grace filled life. SNOW, a reminder that the darkness now can be transformed in an instant by the touch of the Creator's love. Don't live another day without it.