Friday, February 22, 2013

A New Chapter

A new chapter in my life has begun.

While I was just living my life, God began to work in a major way, unbeknownst to me. He was preparing the road He wanted me to be on.

He is so good!!

As you all know I go to the support group MEND (Mommies Enduring Neonatal Death). I have been going since June 2011,  the month after Gideon died. And after some time, as God has been mending my heart, I started to take on some leadership and helped out at our Walk to Remember and the Christmas Ceremony. God has brought in my life healing, peace, joy he used MEND in my life to get me there. And he has given me the most amazing friends I have met through MEND.

MEND is a Christian nonprofit that has 10 chapters throughout the United States. MEND is a support group that walks with parents that have experienced the death of a baby. We have monthly support group meeting and 2 big events every year. We have walked the journey of grief with thousands of hurting families since MEND opened in the mid-90s.

I will be the new chapter leader of the Houston chapter.

Yeah. I am totally blown away.  I am excited and scared. I am so touched and honored that I get to lead the group of the most amazing,  strong mommies I have ever met. I am so driven to love these hurting parents the way Christ loves. To minister to hurting hearts.

I can still hardly believe it.

In December, the woman who has been the chapter leader of the Houston chapter for 8 years, Jaimie, asked me to pray about taking over for her as leader. She wanted to retire as leader; to move to doing other ministry.

My heart wants to help other mommies and daddies who have lost babies.

So I prayed.
A lot.

And God continually confirmed that this is what He wanted. He spoke to my heart and said "Remember the promise I gave you that Gideon's life would reach many for me? This is one of the ways I will do that."

Wow.

So the next day I told Jaimie I wanted to apply to do it. I went to the leadership conference and met all the ladies from the other chapters and the board of directors and the sweet woman who stared MEND after her son was stillborn. They are such an amazing group of women!!

I applied, got all my paperwork and personal references in order. Had everything sent in and the board approved me! I was so very excited! This year I will be trained by Jaimie and she will be working with me on teaching me everything I need to know about how to run the chapter. And together we will do the Walk to Remember and the Christmas Ceremony. But next month will be my first month to start leading the meetings.

I am more than honored!!! I cannot even begin to express in words how much this means to me.

Wow. Thank you Jesus for being so good. Thank you for making beauty out of such immeasurable pain. Thank you for loving me and for holding our precious firstborn, Gideon and little Avery in Your arms. I cant wait until I get to hold Gideon again and hold Avery for the first time. Thank you for giving us a hope and a future. And I pray and hope that I can be a vessel to show others Your hope and love.

Next month, I will run my first support group and I will start to take over all the responsibilities that come with being the chapter leader. I am beyond excited that God would use me to help others!I am just beginning to see the way God is going to use Gideon's life to bring people to Him, through MEND and through the care packages we are giving to the hospitals through Gideon's Warriors Ministry.

Thank you Jesus for truly making beauty from ashes.

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of all compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 2 Corinthians 1:3&4

If you are a mommy or daddy who has experienced the loss of a baby through miscarriage, stillbirth or infant death and you live in the Houston area please know that you can come to one of our meetings any time. It doesn't matter if your baby passed last week or 40 years ago, you are welcome to come to a meeting and I would love to meet you. You can also email me at any time at stormym@mend.org