Life of A Writer

Over the 4th of July, hubby and I took the kids camping at Glen O Jones Lake. My oldest son, JB, enjoyed the fishing, and on day two of our camping trip, he got his very first big catch!

“I think I got a big one this time!” He shouted with excitement.
“I’ll get the net,” his younger brother, Joe, said as he ran a few feet to the campsite.
“Hurry, bubby!”

In less than a minute, Joe made his way back to the lakeside just in time to scoop his brother’s catfish into the net.

“I believe you have the biggest catch of the day,” my husband told him.
“Bring your fish over here so I can take a picture,” I said.

As he carried the fish over to where I was, he said because Joe had helped, he wanted him in the picture too, so using the camera on my cell phone, I took a picture of the boys holding JB’s fish. Because of the poor quality of the picture, you may not be able to see the excitement on JB’s face well, but I can honestly say, he was grinning from ear to ear… and he remained that way the rest of the day.

A week before the camping trip, the local news forecasted severe thunderstorms for the 4th of July weekend, and since I’m not big on being outdoors during storms, I began praying a few days before the planned camping trip. My prayer was, of course, for no thunderstorms. The night before we were due to leave, I asked God to change the forecast, adding that I didn’t mind a few rain showers, it was just the thunder and lightening that I didn’t want.

The next morning arrived and hubby was determined to take the kids camping -- rain or shine. Therefore, we headed to the store to purchase some camping supplies and food. While in the grocery store, my husband greeted a lady he knew (a friend of his nephew), and she told him that her and her husband were going camping with my husband’s nephew and his wife. Shortly thereafter, my husband went to the store next door to purchase something else as I paid for the groceries. As I stood in the checkout line, the lady my husband had greeted got in line behind me, so I chatted with her. During our conversation, we discussed the weather, and she told me that they were going to cancel their camping trip, but said when she woke up that morning, she watched the weather and discovered that the forecast had changed to only a few rain showers.

“That’s wonderful!” I told her, and silently thanked God for answering my prayer.

From then on, I was as happy as I could be. Not only because the weather forecast had changed, but mostly because God had answered my prayer!

There were no thunderstorms at all the entire weekend, and the temperatures stayed below 70. We did have a few sprinkles every now and then, but that’s all it ever amounted to -- thanks to my prayers.

Come Sunday morning we packed up to leave. Once we arrived home, I called my mom to let her know we all had a great time. After I told her about the camping trip, she revealed a bit of bad news to me. She told me that my cousin -- who’s more like a brother to me instead -- was headed to the local hospital. She went on to say that during our camping trip, he had been sick in bed and wasn’t able to urinate. To make a long story short, when my cousin arrived at the hospital, they ended up calling the life flight to have him sent to a hospital in Evansville, Indiana. Turns out his kidneys had shut down, so they put him on Kidney Dialysis. In addition, his blood pressure was dangerously low (both numbers were below 100).

My cousin spent approximately a week in the hospital on Kidney Dialysis, but today I’m happy to report that he’s home and able to urinate on his own again. Yes, another answered prayer. However, this time God answered the prayers of many, because I wasn’t the only one praying for my cousin to have a quick recover; my family as well as many church members prayed for him too.

What did you do over the 4th of July holiday weekend?

My daughter, Cyndie. She had the smallest catch of the day. She likes to bank fish.

Posted by Misti Sandefur, Christian author/freelance writer at 6:08 PM