The New Look

Isabel, the artist, is back!  Today she decided to play around with a different palate and look for this blog space, to reflect her own design preferences in lieu of those that were made some two months ago on her behalf in keeping with the somber outlook that blanketed our hearts.

How many of us thought we'd never again see the world through her eyes?

Thank you, Isabel, for sharing the way you see with the rest of us!  We are honored to share in your enthusiasm and this positive affirmation of re-creation!  We see God in you and Praise Him for being there!

Hallelujah! 

The times they are a-changin'

According to Wikipedia, Exponential Growth occurs when "the growth rate of a mathematical function is proportional to the function's current value."  The best way to understand this sort of explosive growth is with a parable:

According to legend, a courtier presented the Persian king with a beautiful, hand-made chessboard. The king asked what he would like in return for his gift and the courtier surprised the king by asking for one grain of rice on the first square, two grains on the second, four grains on the third etc. The king readily agreed and asked for the rice to be brought. All went well at first, but the requirement demanded over a million grains on the 21st square, more than a million million (aka trillion) on the 41st and there simply was not enough rice in the whole world for the final squares.

So how does this relate to Isabel?

Updates on the blog have been in short supply recently.  This hasn't been because there isn't any news to report--the problem has been just the opposite:  There hasn't been time to disengage from Isabel's EXPONENTIAL day-to-day improvements in order to catalog them.  What was newsworthy yesterday is being completely overwritten today!

Rick's last update only a little more than 48 hours ago captured the beginnings of this process with the simple statement that Isabel is demonstrating "increasing levels of awareness."  In less than three days, God's reservoir of mercy has been overflowing and at an exponential rate; and while He and Isabel will undoubtedly be working to obsolete this list no sooner than it is published, it is important to provide everybody a chance to participate in the wonder of God's work as "hour-by-hour fresh mercies we see!"  Praise God as you consider this cataract of blessings (added to the earlier chronicle posted on July 29th): 

• Isabel is completely self-aware--she expresses the same likes and dislikes that have always been characteristic of who she is as a person!
• She is sitting on the side of the bed for 25 minutes at a time, feet on the floor!
• She is working without the trach for extending periods during the day (moving toward likely removal altogether--an important step in a full return to natural speech)!
• She is able to kick a balloon across the floor upon request!
• She is following complex conversations and responding to appropriate questions and comments; her ability to understand the spoken word seems to be "spot on!"
• She understands teasing (a complex form of communication)!
• Her gestures and facial/body expressions are appropriate to conversation, e.g.,
• Responding to questions and preferences by means of head nods (up-and-down and side-to-side for "yes" and "no")... She is clearly indicating HER preferences, which gives her increasing measures of control over how people respond and assist her!
• She moves her head on the pillow in order to follow conversations taking place across the bed, tracking and following who is speaking at the time
• Occasional smiles and facial movements!
• Shrugging her shoulders when she has no preference to a particular question!
• Purposeful full movement in her left leg and arm, with her right side now exhibiting the very same sort of rapid progression as we witnessed on the left (in just a matter of hours the right leg went from almost imperceptible motions to full intentional flexing of the leg and knee!) 
• She is eating small amounts of soft food, demonstrating that her throat and tongue are under her full control!
• She is sitting up in a wheel chair which will enable excursions outside her room!
• She has expressed on several occasions that she is bored (which is indicative of her readiness to advance into more challenging levels of rehab)!
• AND, THIS JUST IN (before this update was even published):  The Creator is now working on her speech!  She is starting to mouth simple words and experimenting with her vocal cords!

The abilities Isabel is demonstrating are all pointing to an amazing recovery--far beyond what many of us dreamed possible.  We dutifully marched around her comatose walls and prayed over and over for God's mercy and wondered if He would at least allow us a peek inside.  But now that those massive walls are crumbling before our very eyes, our hearts and minds are amazed and humbled to see His mighty hand!  Come, witness the water that pours forth from The Rock!

Come gather ’round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone
For the times they are a-changin’

Come writers and critics
Who prophesy with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won’t come again
And don’t speak too soon
For the wheel’s still in spin
For the times they are a-changin’ 

-Bob Dylan 

Continue to Praise His Holy Name for His faithful mercies and this staggering display of power and love.

On behalf of Rick and Mary

There's change in the air...

Behold!  I bring you tidings of joy!  God has heard our prayers on the insurance front.  The bureaucracy is now fully supportive of Rick and Mary's desires to get Isabel into an advanced rehab facility in order to ride the gathering wave of returning function and capacity.

To that end, Rick and Mary feel led to move Isabel to St. Mary's Rehab Center in Richmond Heights (just 5 minutes from the Wimmer-Brown home!).  Everybody at the St. Charles facility is frantically working on getting the paperwork done so that the transfer could happen TODAY!

Everybody, buckle up!  The Holy Spirit is on the move!

To those of you who have signed up for the Care Calendar vigils for Isabel: We're just going to keep the same assignments even though the venue will be different.  If that presents a problem for you, let me know and we'll look for replacement vigilists (I just made that term up!  Reminds me of the word "pugilist!") :-)  For those of you who have assignments in the next 48 hours, please keep a close watch on the blog--we'll update everybody once the move is finalized and Isabel enters the next road on her amazing journey back.

Watch for an update in the next couple of hours or so that will attempt to catalog a little bit of of Isabel's amazing restoration cascade over the past 78 hours.  It's happening faster than we can keep up--literally hour-by-hour!

Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost!  

What is like this?

Photographic images of outer space from the Hubble-spectacular, amazing.

7 children carried in the womb and birthed-some may say this is remarkable but what is remarkable is that each is a singular, unique, inexplicable work.

Watching an infant develop, grow, express his inherent individuality-oodles of books map out the develpmental process (but not the individuality part).

But watching Isabel...watching Isabel "rise from the dead".  What is like this?

July 2 "may not live through the night"  to August 9 initiating purposeful movement, turning to look at one who calls her name, filling her glowing face with a smile and twinkling eyes in response to a dear friend's silliness, furrowing her brow at an inconceivable suggestion and by August 11 deliberately lifting (with aid from her papa) a spoon with an ice chip to her eager open mouth.

No book has been written nor could be with a logical progression of waking and coming back to life.

We watch and live in this moment of abundant, spilling over wonder.  Don't we all?

Daily bread is given and received.

Life and love are freely given.

Forgiveness and abounding love are repeatedly applied to our failures at aforementioned life and love.

"Who is like You, O Lord, among the gods?  Who is like You, glorious in holiness, awesome in splendor, doing wonders?"  Exodus 15:11

Thoughts from Mary

Fearfully and wonderfully made

Isabel is drawing circles. How great is that?

"Those who wait for the Lord will not be put to shame."

While we've been waiting our minds and hearts have been attuned to a number of medical details. I've been thinking alot about the natural healing properties of our bodies, in this case, Isabel's body. Hardwired into our flesh and blood are capacities for the reproduction of cells and the replenishing of damaged systems, the restoration of damaged tissue. Some forms of swelling involve life giving blood rushing to the scene of the accident, so to speak. All of this is in addition to "Plan A," our natural immune system. This system is constantly warding off viruses, bacteria and other nasty things that have the power to kill us. That these things are "natural" seems a bit understated.

King David may have known nothing about immune systems but he surely witnessed plenty of healing of broken bones, deep wounds, and perhaps even people coming out of comas. It shouldn't surprise us I suppose that he marvels at the human body in his memorable song that we know as Psalm 139. There he celebrates the fact that he is "Fearfully and wonderfully made!"

Isabel shares with us all this condition of being human with all these built in, hardwired, body systems that God has designed with astounding complexity. Yes, Isabel's experience has shown us all how fragile life is and how quickly it can be taken from us. But she is also a living testimony to the resilience of the body with all its natural restorative powers. We are witnessing in our sister what has been true for a very long time. God uses lots of different ways to heal us!

Kurt Lutjens

Unlike Lot's Wife...

While we "watch and wait," let us not forget the mercies God has showered upon Isabel (functions that have been restored that were at one time in trouble or under stress):

1. Heartbeat is strong and regular
2. Heart rate is normal
3. Swelling in her face and limbs as a result of medication and trauma is no longer present (she looks just like Isabel!)
4. Blood pressure is right where it should be
5. Oxygen uptake (O2 saturation) is perfect
6. Her breathing has been normalized
7. Intra-cranial pressure (ICP) has been stabilized at normal levels
8. Breathing tube has been removed, a major milestone
9. Isabel is breathing on her own for the major part of each day without mechanical assistance
10. She maintains a sitting posture for long periods with no negative impacts on vital signs (a very important milestone)
11. All sedation and most of the various assortments of IVs have been removed; Isabel has already begun responding to external stimuli (early stages)
12. She routinely opens her eyes and is tracking movement in the room (and could that be a smile she's showing once in a while?)
13. As confirmation that her medical condition is stable and improving, Monday of this next week she will be moving out of St. Clare's Intensive Care Unit (A HUGE MILESTONE!) to a qualified transitional center where the goal will be to completely wean her off any mechanical assistance 

It's been less than four weeks since we looked out over the bleak and joyless desolate landscape that dawned on that July 3rd Lord's Day... We each and collectively raised our voices in anguish and sorrow to God the Father pleading for His divine assistance and mercy.  And while our journey out of that spiritual city of sorrow and doubt isn't by any means complete, we mustn't forget to look back from time to time and marvel at his handiwork and gentle faithfulness.

Let us all now, each and corporately, praise the author of our salvation and deliverance for the work His is doing in Isabel!  And in us!

Praise God, from Whom all blessings flow;
Praise Him, all creatures here below;
Praise Him above, ye Heavenly Host;
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

And all of God's people said...

Was something wrong with the spit?

I love the story but I don't understand it.

I'm referring to the story in Mark's account of Jesus' life, chapter 8, verses 22-26. Some folks bring a blind man to Jesus, begging him to touch their friend. Jesus takes the blind man's hand in his, and together they walk outside the village. Did they talk as they walked? I suspect so. What about? Probably not about the hot sun or other small talk. I imagine Jesus wanting to know the man's name and at least something of his story. And what was it like for the man to be holding Jesus' hand? We can only imagine. The two of them stop and suddenly Jesus spits on the man's eyes. Yikes! Did it feel like a gross indignity or healing salve? Perhaps Jesus told the man exactly what he was going to do to prevent any insult. Jesus asks if the man see's anything. The man looks back toward Bethsaida. "I see people and they look like trees walking." Some of you might remember that nearly 40 years ago Johnny Cash made these words sing!

The man has vision now. You can hear the excitement in his words still! But his vision was blurred. People looked like Olive trees on the move. This kind of vision is hardly ideal and could become the source of embarrassment or even danger. What was wrong? Why does the spit not work as it does in the healing of a deaf mute in the previous chapter? (Mark 7: 31-37) And why the spit in the first place? Why not just use healing words as with the centurion's paralyzed servant in Matthew 8:5? Aren't words more sanitary? Well, we can't know the answers to these questions, though I suspect that the Lord delights in our asking them. What we do know is that Jesus put his hands on the mans eyes a second time, "...his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly."

What does this have to do with Isabel? We have been asking Jesus to touch her. He is hearing our prayers and acting-but the healing is gradual. Today Isabel's open eyes were following my voice. Not so last week! The master has a long history of working this way. For Isabel's good he seems to be orchestrating a remarkable array of his gifts, from the natural healing capacities in Isabel's body to the strikingly good nursing care to the newly installed shunt. These things and more we pray, are going to lead to a level of healing unthinkable on the morning of July 3.

Yes we long for more dramatic progress for Isabel's and her families sake. But don't you love the fact that Mark includes this story in his gospel despite the questions that it raises? He certainly had enough other healing accounts to recount without running this risk of making Jesus look inept or less than omnipotent. But it happened this way so he tells it like it was. There is a lesson to be learned. Our Lord Christ is the healer. He's not trying to impress or bedazzle us. He can use hands, words, spit, neurosurgeons, ventilators, and second efforts. Methods for Jesus are apparently secondary and adaptable. What is central is that we ask him to work and that we trust his love, wisdom, and power.

Let me invite you all to a time to do just this and together! This coming Sunday night, July 31 from 7-8 PM we will gather in the chapel at St. Clare Hospital to pray for Isabel, give due praise to our Savior, and trust him despite his puzzling ways-which can become part of what we love about him.
Kurt Lutjens

Ten Thousand+ Pageviews!

Take a look over on the rightmost column of this blog at the number of times Updates On Isabel has been accessed since the site was created on July 2nd...  That works out to something over 500 times per day!  Guardian angels don't need blogs, so these "hits" are from brothers and sisters all over the world who love Isabel and her family very much and are continually supporting them in prayer and service!  WAY TO GO, CHURCH!  Keep going!  This is one of our most vital responsibilities in this fallen world!

"This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of the Lord’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, others will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!"

— 2 Corinthians 9:13-15

“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief…and unspeakable love.” 

— Washington Irving

Before Jehovah's awful throne,
Ye nations, bow with sacred joy;
Know that the Lord is God alone;
He can create, and He destroy. 

His sovereign power, without our aid,
Made us of clay, and formed us men;
And when like wandering sheep we strayed,
He brought us to His fold again.

We are His people, we His care,
Our souls, and all our mortal frame;
What lasting honours shall we rear,
Almighty Maker, to Thy Name.

We'll crowd Thy gates with thankful songs,
High as the heavens our voices raise;
And earth, with her ten thousand tongues,
Shall fill Thy courts with sounding praise 

Wide as the world is Thy command,
Vast as eternity Thy love;
Firm as a rock Thy truth must stand,
When rolling years shall cease to move.

— Isaac Watts

Waiting is hard

For the last fourteen days we have been waiting for Isabel to awaken.

Noah and his family waited months for a good rain.
Abraham and Sarah waited 25 years for a child.
Moses waited 40 years for the right time and right way to liberate his fellow Hebrews.
(Moses may not have known he was waiting. But 40 years in Midian tending sheep had to be hard on a man who grew up in Pharoah's court with the movers and shakers of the world.)
Simeon and Anna waited their whole lives to see the birth of the Messiah.
Mary waited 30 years to see the prophecies concerning her son Jesus begin to play out.

And so on.........

Isabel sometimes looks after Lillian and Grayson Maynor when Peter and Melanie need child care. Some of you may have read Melanie Maynor's "comments" a week ago. She quoted someone from her past who made the observation: "Waiting is worship." It would be hard to capture the biblical teaching more concisely or clearly. We stand in a long line of men and women and children who waited for the Lord's salvation. It was part of their submission to God as God, part of their trust in his fatherly goodness. But depending on the circumstances, even one day of waiting can seem like an eternity.

And why is waiting so hard? Probably for lots of reasons. We do like control, and as a rule, waiting kills that. But I think another reason is the deep ache in our souls for all things wrong to be set right. It's part of being created in the image of God. There is a constant ache for redemption and life and the fullness of God's glory to be revealed. It's an ache that we live with and when someone we know is suffering it can surface with remarkable power.
We know Isabel was created for life and vitality and joy and so we are heartsick when we see her as she is in ICU. We pray that God will raise her up. But since he hasn't yet, we are all waiting.
Waiting requires radical dependence. And radical dependence is what worship is all about!

"It is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord." (Lamentations 3:26)

"Since ancient times no one has heard,
nor ear perceived,
no eye has seen any God besides you,
who acts on behalf of those who wait for him." (Isaiah 64:4)

With Rick and Mary we all are waiting for God to act in faithfulness to his word. We are waiting for Isabel to wake up and we are all waiting for our Lord to descend with magnificent authority to make all things new. They are both hard to wait for. But this is our worship.

Kurt Lutjens, Isabel's pastor

The Church Universal

I just pulled these stats for Isabel's blog.  The body of Christ in action!

We thank Thee that Thy church, unsleeping,While earth rolls onward into light, Through all the world her watch is keeping, And rests not now by day or night. 

From Kurt Lutjens

Things are not the way they are supposed to be. This is hardly a deep insight.

My name is Kurt Lutjens and for the last 16 years I have been Isabel's pastor. Over the last few, one Sunday a month around 9 AM, Isabel, often with Katherine or Louisa, would come into my study to get supplies needed for her work. Isabel is one of the people who prepare the Lord's Table for our weekly feast of wine and bread at Grace & Peace. Isabel is always very quiet in this, probably not wanting to disturb me in my pre service mode. We would greet each other and Isabel then scooted out with supplies in hand. Her low key service did not escape my notice. Now I don't know if Isabel will be back to my study. This is now the seventh day of our little sister's suffering. With my sadness I also have questions.

It may be tempting at a time like this for pastors and others to offer explanations for the reality and meaning of suffering. There are actually important things that can be said because God has not left us without some understanding. Such help comes especially from the stories of people in the Old and New Testaments who endured much turmoil, loss and death.

But this is not a time for theologizing. Job's friends did not seem to understand this. They started out well by sitting quietly with their friend in his misery. It was when they started defending God and accusing Job with doctrinal pronouncements that they began earning the Lord's rebuke. When someone we love is in pain it is a time to just be with them. When someone we love is suffering it is time to "...pour out your hearts to the Lord, for he is our refuge." (Ps 62:8) It is a time to make our complaint known to the God of all the earth as Job, Hannah, David, and many others learned to do in times of trouble. The Holy One can handle our confusion, anger and grief. This is the time for being thankful that in Jesus of Nazareth, God himself entered into our suffering, not with philosophical answers but in his own agonizing death on a Roman cross. After all, is it answers really, that we want most of all? God knows that it is him that we are longing for as we wait for a hopeful word on Isabel's condition.

There is a question in the Heidelberg Catechism that helps to capture the larger picture in God's sometimes inscrutable ways of caring for his creation. It relates directly to Isabel and our hearts aching for her:

Q. What do you understand by the providence of God?
A. The almighty and ever present power of God whereby he still upholds, as it were by his own hand, heaven and earth together with all creatures, and rules in such a way that leaves and grass, rain and draught, fruitful and unfruitful years, food and drink, health and sickness, riches and poverty, and everything else, come to us not by chancebut by his fatherly hand.

This probably raises more questions than it answers. That's OK. Those who love Isabel and the Wimmer-Brown family don't need answers at this point as much as we need to know what is unshakably true. For over 19 years of blessings and difficulties, Isabel has not for a moment been cut off from the fatherly goodness of her God. For all of our questioning, this has not and will not happen!

The Pink Bandanna Club!

Check it out!

Isabel's favorite color is pink so her cousin, Maria came up with the "pink bandanna club"! Join in on the fun as we think about and pray for Isabel.

Gus W-B

¹ Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have^[a] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, ² through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. ³ And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; ⁴ and perseverance, character; and character, hope. ⁵ Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

Romans 5:1-5

From Gus W-B

Save me, O God, by your name; vindicate me by your might Hear my prayer, O God; listen to the words of my mouth.

Strangers are attacking me; ruthless men seek my life, men without regard for God.

Surely God is my help; the Lord is the one who sustains me.

Let evil recoil on those who slander me; in your faithfulness destroy them.

I will sacrifice a freewill offering to you; I will praise your name, O Lord, for it is good.

For he has delivered me from my troubles and my eyes have looked in triumph on my foes.

Psalm 54

Keep praying.

Some pictures

Check out this link to see a slide show of Isabel with her family and friends. You can see she is loved by many.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NybNTiSs5k