Update on Charity - 2:30pm

• After many long hours of sitting and waiting (a very long time) to get into a private room, mom just let us know that they have finally situated her in a room on the 7th floor, section "B" room 124. Praise God for this small bit of progress! Still a long way to go to figure out what the diagnosis is but He is faithful and all we can do is wait on His will.

Please keep praying...

Update on Charity - Saturday A.M.

"Do not be afraid.
Stand still and see the salvation of the LORD,
which He will accomplish for you today."
Exodus 14:13

Dear Family, Friends and loved ones,

Once again we would covet your prayers for Charity and the situation with her health. I know many of you rejoiced with us when she was able to come home on Monday, but since then, she really has not improved at all. The home care nurses that came to help out with her antibiotics, were quite concerned with her over-all appearance, and specifically with her swollen legs and shallow, rapid breathing, and fast heart-rate. They both said that she needed to go back to the hospital to get those symptoms checked out. She also was put on two new antibiotics after they found that she had a different bacteria in her blood.
We finally decided that it would be better to take her to U of M in Ann Arbor where we knew she would receive for specific care regarding her Lupus and we were referred to a very good cardiologist there. Mom and Dad drove her out there last night (around 8:30pm) and they ended up staying there all night. The hospital staff are trying to get her a private room, because they are worried about her bacteria.

• Please pray that they will very quickly be able to get Charity into a room, so that she will be more comfortable and will be able to get some much needed rest.
  

• Also that she would be seen by the Doctors soon, and that they would be able to give her some clear diagnosis, and began to get her heart rate and swelling under control. As of 10:00 am this morning, only the regular E.R. doctor had been in to see her. (although U of M is a good hospital, it is also a very busy hospital!)
  

• Please also keep Mom and Dad in your prayers. That they would stay alert, and that God would give them strength during this exhausting time.
  

"The LORD will fight for you,
and you shall hold your peace and remain at rest."
Exodus 14:14

Pray Without Ceasing

"Thus saith the Lord God; I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them." -Ezekiel 26:37

Prayer is the forerunner of mercy. Turn to sacred history, and you will find that scarcely ever did a great mercy come to this world unheralded by supplication. You have found this true in your own personal experience. God has given you many an unsolicited favour, but still great prayer has always been the prelude of great mercy with you. When you first found peace through the blood of the cross, you had been praying much, and earnestly interceding with God that He would remove your doubts, and deliver you from your distresses. Your assurance was the result of prayer. When at any time you have had high and rapturous joys, you have been obliged to look upon them as answers to your prayers. When you have had great deliverances out of sore troubles, and mighty helps in great dangers, you have been able to say, "I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears." Prayer is always the preface to blessing. It goes before the blessings as the blessing's shadow. When the sunlight of God's mercies rises upon our necessities, it casts the shadow of prayer far down upon the plain. Or, to use another illustration, when God piles up a hill of mercies, He Himself shines behind them, and He casts on our spirits the shadow of prayer, so that we may rest certain, if we are much in prayer, our pleadings are the shadows of mercy. Prayer is thus connected with the blessing to show us the value of it. If we had the blessings without asking for them, we should think them common things; but prayer makes our mercies more precious than diamonds. The things we ask for are precious, but we do not realize their preciousness until we have sought for them earnestly.

"Prayer makes the darken'd cloud withdraw;
Prayer climbs the ladder Jacob saw;
Gives exercise to faith and love;
Brings every blessing from above."

from Spergeon's Morning and Evening