renewed faith

   Dear Family,

   The sonogram on Tuesday morning revealed no heartbeat. This was difficult to see, but we are hopeful that God will work through this loss. We were able to get an appointment with Dr. Hoffman at Baylor that afternoon. He performed the procedure to end the pregnancy. He was a kind doctor and combined with all the Midwives at Baylor, we could not have been in better hands. While Tuesday was a tough day, we felt the comfort of God's people. Thank you.

   Ally rested at home until this morning.

   There's a certain amount of awkwardness in suffering publicly. Especially when you put your dire situation out there for prayer. Many pray for something miraculous to occur, and then seemingly, it doesn't. Our main request for prayer though was for increased faith. Your prayers are still being answered. The very definition of faith being "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen". We had much that we had hoped for in this pregnancy, but not having seen God answer the prayer for a child yet, all we could do was believe. We believed, but it didn't happen. Yes, I would love to be a dad, and Ally would love to be a mom, but it just didn't happen. It stinks. There's no other way to say it, but it's not the end to our story. We know that there are new mercies out there that we will experience together (see: Lamentations 3:22-23). The realization of these mercies are proof that your prayers are answered.

   My eyes opened this morning to find Ally dressed and ready for another day. She was wearing jewelry, make-up, perfume and all. She said, "I'm going to work." I was shocked. How could a girl who had gone through this be ready to start again? And it hit me: it's her faith. She has amazingly strong faith. Together, our faith has been broken down, but it's being rebuilt. But we say that our strong faith does not equal strength. It equals weakness. Faith is the willingness to be weak and to let our God do the rest. We are weak. Tears come at random times. My knees get weak and I have to sit. My thoughts are dizzying to a point of actual dizziness. Ally gets that blank stare: the one where it's obvious what she's thinking about.

   We are a picture of weakness. We are not a picture of strength.

   Our God has provided strength when we need it. This comes as a result of our weakness. He works through suffering. It's the catalyst for joy. That has been proven throughout history, and He is still proving this to us.

   Your emails and comments (and that huge box of cheezits waiting for us on the porch) have helped to sustain us. We are blessed to know you and blessed to be able to share our sufferings with you.

   Love,

   Zeb & Ally
   Romans 8:28

life

    Dear Family,

In June of last year, our lives changed. We became parents to a little girl that entered into eternity at birth. Allison carried her to 28 weeks, and she was born on August 14th, 2009. We named her "Glory". Her name was a reminder for us, and every one who knew us, that everything was and is meant for the glory of our God. We held a fund raiser in honor of our daughter and sent more than $70,000 to the children of Ethiopia. That event helped us to remember that God works through tragedy. We felt it was part of being obedient to Him.

  We hope that one day we can send you all a letter with so-called "good news" informing you that a little one has arrived, but today is still not that day. After you go through a hard time, it's easy to get caught up in the thinking that God owes you something, or that hardship is behind you. This is not true.

  In January of this year we faced another trial. We learned that a baby was on the way, but after only 7 weeks another miscarriage occurred. It was again hard to make sense of this. It seemed so pointless to us; pointless that a life would begin and end with no fanfare, no cribs, no bottles, no diapers, no little league, or music lessons, or sunday school, or graduations etc. etc. etc., but it did, and we are working to heal from this.

  Ally is pregnant again now. She is currently at 12 weeks. We've been cautious, but optimistic. Early blood work showed that everything was in line, and that this pregnancy had the chance of being as normal as any other. A sonogram on Monday though was accompanied by difficult news: the baby is not growing properly, and we're to expect an early miscarriage. This news came about in the same hospital room it did last June. The same technician revealed a potential malady. The same doctors sat down with us to talk over the future. The same instructions were given: come back next week. And the same emotions followed. The word "surreal" defines the scene.

  After we concluded our visit with the doctors on Monday, we went to eat some Tex-Mex. (We've learned that this is just what Texans do to deal with grief.) After lunch, we both decided to be "Big Kids" and head back to work. Ally had not shared the news that she was pregnant with any of her co-workers, and so she did not share the news of her lunch hour either. She just went back to work. It's something we learned last summer... to just keep going. If you stop, you feel sorry for yourself and selfishness, and bitterness, and anger take over. If you keep going, and remain faithful to what is in front of you, blessings take over. Last year, it was the opportunity to bless orphans in Ethiopia. We don't know how God will use this chapter in our life, but we know He will. It may not be as grandiose, but He will use it. I don't write this to say that we are handling this perfectly, or that we have this whole grief thing figured out. We don't. I do feel selfish and bitter and angry. I ask all the same questions: "How...?" "Why...?" But continuing to move helps to diminish these emotions.

  We sat on the kitchen floor yesterday, drowning our sorrows with snacks, and talked about the reality of our situation. We discussed the possible pain of another miscarriage. We talked about the fear of not having children. We talked about how tired we were of sharing bad news. We talked about our extended families. We talked about our friends. We talked about our future. We talked about our emotions. We talked about how life is different than we had pictured. We talked about the obvious whole in our world. We wondered together about what was next. Then--- I asked Ally the question, "Did you just eat that whole box of cheezits?" And she said, "Yes". And then we went on with our evening. I share this to tell you that while we are sad, we are not crushed. We talk through things and when we're done talking through them, we laugh through the tears.We are on a journey together, and our love for each other continues to grow. We both agree that God is doing something. We just don't know what that something is. Most of the time we don't even agree with the way He does things. We feel patient at times, and at times we feel betrayed as our hope of having children keeps getting dashed.

  We write to ask for prayer. Pray for our faith most of all, as it is weak. Pray for a miracle after that. Miracles don't happen if faith doesn't exist. At this point, we know that whether this child lives or dies, our faith is all that we will have. Miracles are up to God. Faith is up to us. We believe that He can do whatever He wants. All we can do is believe. 

  We have an appointment for a sonogram tomorrow morning at 9:45. 

  We will keep you posted. 

  Love,

  Zeb & Ally

 Romans 8:28