Daily Encouragement

Tuesday, October 1, 2024

Yesterday we stopped by the Shady Acres Farm Market on Etown Road.

Click on photo to enlarge

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Message summary: The Creator made each of our constituent parts with a function and we live as each part does its work. We profess our belief in God's creation and surely praise God that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. What about you today?

Listen to our message on your audio player.

"I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, I know that full well" (Psalm 139:14). "...from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love" (Ephesians 4:16).

Our daughter Ester was born March 9, 1989 with complex congenital heart disease (pulmonary atresia). She came to America from Guatemala at three months of age and due to her serious condition, the medical team couldn't assure us that she would even survive the flight to the U.S. She's been through many surgeries and pacemakers and continues to have various challenges even now at 35 years of age.

This last weekend she had a spike in her INR* level that required an emergency room admission at Hershey Medical Center since her INR level was "greater than 17.4" when it should read between 2.0 to 3.0. INR measures the viscosity of her blood. If her INR is too low her blood is too thick and she is prone to blood clots, if too high she is prone to bleeding. She takes warfarin due to having Afib (that's when her heart races into 222 BPM requiring a cardioversion to come out of it).

After two doses of Vitamin K over the past two days, along with a lot of prayer, her level dropped to 5.3 yesterday. Still unacceptable but not so alarming. Today it has risen to 5.4. We will be getting more Vitamin K at the pharmacy today as prescribed. Her anticoagulation pharmacist is perplexed but that is not unusual. From the time Ester has received medical care as an infant she has always perplexed her doctors, yet has become a champion at overcoming!

In a healthy condition our body's ability to regulate our blood's viscosity is a part of the many components that makes us fearfully and wonderfully made. We don't even think about it.

At the time the Bible was written little was known (by man) about our inward parts such as how our blood works. But with the advancement of medical knowledge the truth of David's psalm is all the more evident.

The Creator made each of our constituent parts with a function and we live as each part does its work. If a body part does not work well whether inward or outward it affects all of our body. However when each part is working properly we give them little thought. How many of you woke up this morning and thought, "I am sure glad by blood viscosity regulates itself".

David wrote some 3000 years ago long before mankind knew the intricacies of the human body "I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made". There is so much to unpack in that statement that it will take each of us a lifetime to fully grasp the awe of God's creative power within our own physical bodies. And on a natural level, understanding the complexity of life due to the advance of scientific studies, we should realize this even more than David.

Doctors and scientists who study this remarkable machine increasingly find ever more remarkable evidence of just how fearfully and wonderfully we are made. Yet so many (but not all) reject the faith of the shepherd (David), who continues the verse with "Your works are wonderful, I know that full well".

We profess our belief in God's creation and surely praise God that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. What about you today?

So fearfully and wonderfully made,
How could they say there is no God?
Reminded every breath that I take,
It's by Your hand I have been formed
So what am I going to do with this life You gave me?
What could I do but live for Your praise?

Be encouraged today, Hebrews 3:13

Stephen & Brooksyne Weber

Daily prayer: Father, we are in awe as we consider the work of Your hands, for who on earth has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand or marked off the heavens with the breadth of his hand? When we meditate on Your unsurpassed power we are humbled and eternally grateful that in Your marvelous creation plan You made man in Your own image, male and female You created them to the minutest detail that we might be able to live and survive the ills that come our way over a lifetime. We are a grateful people and we express it well when we love You with all our heart, soul and mind and thereby dedicate our lives to You and to Your service. Amen.

* INR stands for international normalized ratio. "The prothrombin time (PT) – along with its derived measures of prothrombin ratio (PR) and international normalized ratio (INR) – is an assay for evaluating the extrinsic pathway and common pathway of coagulation. This blood test is also called protime INR and PT/INR. They are used to determine the clotting tendency of blood, in such things as the measure of warfarin dosage, liver damage, and vitamin K status." (Wikipedia)

Today's Suggested Music and Supplemental Resources

"Fearfully and Wonderfully Made" Listen on YouTube Matt Redman

"Wonderfully Made" Listen on YouTube Ellie Holcomb

That you knit me together in my mother's womb
And you say that I've never been hidden from you
And you say that I'm wonderfully, wonderfully made

"I Believe" Listen on YouTube

Throughout our rural area we see these yard signs that state "Farmer Steve Needs A Kidney". Our kidneys are two reddish-brown bean-shaped organs we probably spend little to no time thinking about unless we have a problem. I remember my Dad had kidney stones and the agonizing pain he endured. Our kidneys are essential to our life and well-being. For those with kidneys that don't work properly dialysis is available but not nearly as effective, convenient, available or affordable as our on board, God-designed kidneys!

Steve is a bit younger than me and his kidney problems began with an injury playing softball in his youth. My abdominal wall problem (hernias) is also a result of a little league baseball injury.

Here's an interesting article as I searched kidney transplants: Missouri farmer, 80, boasts one of the world’s longest lasting transplanted kidneys. His sister’s kidney has lasted 56 years and counting.

We are thankful for modern medicine and many of us have been the recipients of caring and competent medical professionals. It is very unlikely that Ester would even be alive without this (apart from God's supernatural intervention). Legitimate medicine seeks to restore our bodies to God's original design.

But where is the line with what is called "medicine" on several fronts?

Consider the fallacy of elective abortions (murdering an unborn baby developing in the womb as God designed) being referred to as "reproductive medicine".

Or the demonic notion of being the contrived word "transgender" and surgically and/or hormonally changing one's birth gender which is absolutely outrageous. Now we read of the efforts of transplanting a womb so a man can carry a baby.

Or any of the other constantly expanding gender wannabes. Now we also have species wannabes, that is those who claim to identify as another species! I read a story about a woman who identifies as a wolf!! (See here).

These perversions gravely violate the design which was clearly established at Creation. "So God created mankind in His own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them" (Genesis 1:27).

This utter rejection of God's design and plunge into moral anarchy prompts a consideration of the phrase, "God gave them over to degrading and vile passions" in Romans 1:26. We wonder when the Creator God will say, "Enough is enough"?

Each day (seven days a week) we receive a "One For The Road" devotional from our friend Richard Dresselhaus, a retired pastor from California. This morning's message gives an insightful perspective:

The mindlessness of godlessness. Have you noticed how Satan uses this to deceive people?

How is it that people do not understand that a boy is a boy…a girl is a girl? How is it that people are confused about the sanctity of life? How is it that people think that one’s gender can be determined after birth?

Mindlessness comes with godlessness.

How can this happen? First is the absence of what is God-given common sense.

Second is the disregard for the commandments of God. When His Word is considered irrelevant…the door is open to total confusion. Truth is mocked…and decency is destroyed.

God has given generously the gift of intelligence. But when Satan seizes control…that gift is kicked to the curb — and mindlessness takes over.

Choose godly wisdom.

We stopped by a supermarket yesterday and met Brian who is going down to serve in the areas devastated by the flooding from the hurricane along with his dad. He was picking up cleaning and water supplies. His shirt indicates he was a participant at a City on The Hill Youth Leadership & Worldview Conference hosted by the Pennsylvania Family Institute which equips young people to stand up for righteousness. He enthusiastically told us of his experience being a part of Youth Leadership. See this video.

Let us continue to pray and support the huge clean-up and rebuilding efforts in the flooded areas of the southeast. It will surely take years for businesses to be restored and houses to be rebuilt. Thank God for individuals like Brian and ministries like Blessings of Hope and Convoy of Hope that are ministering in these areas.

We normally don't take the route by the Shady Acres Farm Market and stopped in for the first time yesterday.

This is the view across Elizabethtown Road.

Click on photo to enlarge

The Shady Acres Farm Market uses the lower level of a barn.

Click on photo to enlarge

Shady Acres Farm Market gourds and pumpkins.

Send a message to Stephen & Brooksyne

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