there but for the grace of God . . .

Y'know that phrase "there but for the grace of God go I?" Well, here a little tale of my past few days, that I'm calling "there for the grace of God go I."

Tuesday I was happy to announce to my friends and family about the birth of my son: God was very kind to us: all ten fingers and all ten toes present and accounted for. The little tyke weighed in at a mere 8 lbs. 14 oz. and measures 21 inches long.

(somewhat sarcastically I now note, I didn't bother to count kidneys that day)

Friday we go in for the checkup and circumcision. He's down to 7 lbs 11 oz (later that day in the hospital he's at 7 lbs 6 oz], very jaundiced and um, well. Can't remember the technical term for this, but the hole where "pee pee" is supposed to come out? Well, it's not exactly in the right place and it's bigger than it should be. They usually can't find this 'til they start the circumcision, and that's true this time, so they stitch him back up and when he's about one, they'll use the foreskin to do a little reconstructive surgery (that was the plan on Friday anyway, before the rest . . . who knows now).

So anyway, they admit him to get some light therapy for the jaundice and an IV to get the weight back up. Being thorough, they take a blood sample and YIKES! kidney-related stuff is off the charts . . . So we get an ultrasound. 1 kidney is covered with cysts and very small. The other looks fine, but isn't doing the job.

Fast forward to today. The light therapy did it's job, as did the IV. The kidney stuff is better, but far from great. We may be talking dialysis in years to come. We may be talking transplant. The doc (who's a greater blessing than I could've imagined) had a good talk with my wife tonight. Said it's not a life or death issue, it's a quality of life issue. Which frankly at this point in time is enough for me. Looks like he gets to come home tomorrow, which is a huge relief. We'll see the specialist in a week and a half and start to plan out the next few years... :)

Anyhow, the last few days have seen tests of faith, and my report card could look better. But by the grace of God, I'm getting better at simply trusting Him. God's grace is richer to me, the prayers of the saints mean more to me now than before . . . because of the grace of God, I went there.