Sharing the Wonder of Luke's Birthday

by Sarah

It feels impossible that nine days ago our sweet son, Luke was born into our arms and then passed away a few short hours later.  These past nine days feel like an absolute blur of acute emotion mixed with pain, grief, gratitude, peace and numbness.  I have been blessed to have had Joe beside me every minute and his presence has without a doubt sustained me.  We have had the luxury of time together to remember, share and retell each other the story of amazing wonder that was Luke's birthday.  We know without question that it was a day of miracles, blessings, gifts, and rich, rich, memories that we will treasure and cherish all the rest of our days.  Our experience of Luke's birthday as a day we will hold close to our hearts is of course the result of finally getting to meet and love our son in person as well as so many heartfelt prayers that were lifted up on our behalf by so many of you.

It has been difficult to translate our overwhelmed hearts and experience into words, but we finally feel ready as we want to remember and record every single second and experience we shared that day with Luke in as much vivid detail while it is still fresh in our minds.  We also want to share with you the miracles, wonder and grace we experienced because you too have been part of Luke's story and we desperately want you to know how much your prayers helped us and how truly good God was to Luke, Joe and myself on January 4, 2010 (and many other days as well, but that day in particular).

In thinking about how to write about our experience in meeting our sweet, little Luke, we feel like the best way would be to break up the story into segments because there is simply so much we want to share and remember together about how God showed up and was not only present with us on Luke's birthday, but he was BIG.  Our prayers were answered in ways BEYOND what we had hoped and we remain humbled by His response to our cries and prayers for that day.  We are profoundly honored that He entrusted us to love, carry, honor and cherish His beloved and absolutely beautiful Luke.  We remain forever thankful.

       - Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be the glory...
                                 - Ephesians 3:20-21a