Death HAS Lost It's Sting!

   Today as I was driving home from a church I visited this morning, I received so much encouragement and insight from the Lord. It was beautiful and worthy of sharing...  

   This morning the sermon was about the power of words and the power of the tongue. One of the main points that Pastor Wickham kept coming back to is that our words can either bring life or death. One thing he said in his message was, "A person will eat richly of the consequences they have spoken; whether bad or good. The fruit of a person's mouth satisfies their life." The more I read over my notes, the more the reality of this truth sets in...What kind of life am I going to live? Pastor Wickham said that we have a lack of victory over things in our life because we are constantly speaking of what we are not, when we should be speaking of what we are, even if it does not feel in that moment that it is what we are (keyword: feel).

   As I was driving home in the pouring down rain and praying, God was speaking to my heart that I am speaking death and defeat over myself when I tell myself that being single is hard, when I am telling myself that I just can't do it or that I am lonely. I speak death over myself when I tell myself or others that it is so hard to be pure and that I need that other person to feel love. And then He [the Lord] took it a step further in saying it is not just my words, but it comes in my thoughts as well. It's not just words that have the power of life and death, but the thoughts that we dwell on have the power of life and death. Praise the Lord we do NOT have to settle for death. 

   I felt the Lord speaking to my heart that the reason it is so hard because I make it hard for myself, because I speak death over myself, because I speak death over being single. The Lord began to show me things that I watch and listen to and people I hang out with that feed that death - there are things that I put into my heart that make it hard. And why? What for? The more I listened to the voice of the Lord, the more I realized how not worth it those things are, it is not worth the consequences or the pain of putting those things into my heart. 

   Pastor Wickham started this 21-Day Campaign last week (I believe) with his congregation to go 21 days without complaining. To help remind them, he had bracelets made (the Live Strong type) and the purpose of the bracelet was to remind you not to complain, but if you did happen to complain (in that we are human) you would switch the bracelet to your other wrist to signify that you are acknowledging that you complained and you are starting off fresh. 

   I am not a huge fan of the Live Strong bracelets, the width is just to thick for me, but the Lord gave me the idea to use a hair gummy and instead of using it to remind me not to complain, using it to remind me that I need to be speaking life over myself, especially in the area of singleness. And when I do speak something or say something that is not life giving or watch or listen to something that is not producing life inside of me, to switch the hair gummy to my other wrist to acknowledge my actions/words/thoughts and in that moment repent and ask the Lord for His strength and that He would lead me into the glorious harvest of speaking life. 

   Pastor Wickham closed out his message with the following words: "Our words not only impact the life of others, but it impacts our lives as well. Our tongues carry the power of life and death. Because we are created in the image of God who spoke with creative power, our words can have power in them for life. Start speaking life to yourself, your family, to your marriage, to your children, to your jobs, etc. and being to enjoy the harvest!"

   We have a choice. We can no loner by into the lies of the enemy and believe what he says about us. Speak life. Breath life. Proclaim life. Pursue life. That's beautiful.

Oswald Chambers once said "The great test of a man's character is his tongue." 

(The scriptures from the message: Proverbs 18:20-21; James 3:2; James 3:3; James 3:4-5; James 3:5-6; Romans 10:9-10.)

Part 3: Ethan made the PAPER!

Honestly, I am not quite sure where to begin with this post or what my first words should be. As I am sitting here thinking about it, so many different possibilities are running through my head, but which one is the best way to begin part 3 of Ethan's story? 

The easiest and most effective introduction that I can think of is that...ETHAN'S STORY MADE THE LOCAL NEWSPAPER! Before I begin unfolding the events, I want to begin by first saying that Ethan's story did not have to make the paper and getting in the newspaper was never a goal or motivation for me. Throughout all of the business and at some moments frantic emotions of collecting the cards for Ethan, Wendy (my step-mom) reached out to the local newspapers to see if there was anything the newspapers could do to help us reach the goal that Lord had laid on my heart. Without any expectation that the newspaper would even be able to help, a reporter replied that they would not be able to do much to help in regards to meeting the Christmas Eve deadline, however, they wanted to write about the Ethan's story and the card campaign. 

After I had gotten the call from my step-mom, I felt the Lord's goodness in my life. He was setting the stage to show off above and beyond what I could have ever thought or expected by providing not only 1,000 cards but 1,500 cards. 

The day before the reporter came to the house to interview Ethan, my parents, and us kiddos, my dad and my step-mom laid out all of the cards on the dining room tables (1) so that they could read through them all and (2) so that the reporter could have a better look at all the cards. When I arrived at the house that afternoon the tables were filled with cards. 

There was so much color, creativity, and encouraging messages! It was beautiful!  The reporter (Chris Basham) came the Monday after Christmas. She sat down with our family and she asked questions and took pictures. A few days later we got the call that the article was being printed in the Wednesday edition of the Enterprise. A few days later we were notified that the Recorder was also going to be printing the article. God is just so great! 

This is a picture of the article in the Recorder
(picture on the left - full page) and the Enterprise
(picture on the right - half page).

Article in the Calvert Recorder: Seeing Miracles in the Mail

Article in the Enterprise: Support for a Miracle in Mountain of Mail

Part 2: Ethan's Christmas Afternoon

Christmas day was a great day! After we [Grant, Kaitie, and I] had a lovely Christmas morning with our momma and step-dad, we packed up my car and drove to deliver the cards to Ethan! As any 6 year old boy would be, Ethan got so excited when he saw the huge box come through the front door and of course the first thing out of his mouth was, "is that for me?"


We decided to let Allison open her gifts from us first, because I wanted the box of cards to be the last gift to be opened. So after Allison opened her gifts and Ethan tore through the other gifts we had gotten him, he was ready to open the BIG box! BUT before I let him open it, I told him I needed to tell him something very very important.


Ethan climbed up in my lap and I began to tell him about what was inside of the box. I told Ethan that there  were tons of people who had heard about his eye and wanted to let him know that they are thinking about him and praying for him. I told him that I had contacted some of my friends and asked them to make him a card that would encourage him as his eye heals. I told Ethan that I asked God to give me 1,000 cards for him and that God didn't just give me 1,000 cards, but He gave me 1,503 cards for Ethan!

At that point I am not sure if Ethan new exactly what to do with himself; I have no idea what must have been running through his mind, but I think at some moments he was not sure what to think. As he opened the box and saw all the cards, his little face lit up! He had this huge smile on his face and he immediately started to pull cards out of the box and look at them. 

The first card he picked up was a card from his dog Kenza. Obviously Kenza could not have made the card all by herself, so I had to give her a little help. But Ethan loved the card, he thought it was cool that his pal and best friend made him a card.


After the first few moments of sheer excitement, Ethan started picking cards out of the box and asking us to read them to him. As my dad was reading the cards out loud to Ethan, Ethan sitting next to him and looking at the pictures and the drawings with a smile on his face! It was truly a kodak moment! However, it REALLY became a kodak moment when my dad started crying while he was reading the cards and we had to get him a box of tissues! :)

There were SO many cards...

We went through as many cards with Ethan as we could, but eventually he got worn out and he just wanted to rest! He was ready to move on to some quiet time of relaxation. He got his pillow pet and curled up in the chair and rested while watching TV, which concluded our Christmas afternoon! Ethan loved all of the cards and he thought it was cool that so many people were praying for him. 

This is the massage table that Ethan lays on to keep pressure on
his eye. Although he did not use this Christmas day, I did have
him lay on it so I could take a picture to show you.
Ethan is such a good sport!

Part 1: Cards for Ethan :)

I want to start out by extending a huge THANK YOU to everyone who made a card for Ethan.  When I first got this idea to ask people to make cards for Ethan, I felt the Lord laying on my heart to set a goal for 1,000 cards. Not only did we get a 1,000 cards - we ended up with 1,503 cards! Thank YOU for making this possible and I want to thank the Lord for His provision and faithfulness, He is just so good!

The past few weeks have been such an adventure and for me have been filled with so much joy! It has taken me a little while to take everything in and process it all, but it is just so awesome! I know that many of you are eager to hear the details and see pictures, so I will do my best to catch you up on the exciting events of the past few weeks.

As most of you know, the Campaign for Ethan was "born" on December 11, 2010. Before I left school for Christmas break, I asked my peers, as well as, some people in my church to make cards for Ethan. I also began to vigorously send out notes on facebook and emails to numerous people asking them to partner with me by making a card for Ethan. When I came home for Christmas break on the 17th, I had a little under 100 cards. I only had 7 days to collect another 900 cards and I had no idea how 900 cards were going to come together in only a weeks time. 

On the 19th I was spending time in prayer lifting up the campaign and the upcoming week, and I felt the Holy Spirit telling me to reach out to some of the schools in Calvert County. I was not sure about this, but I decided I would give it a try, what did I have to lose? Since Grant, Kaitie, and I have all attended Huntingtown Elementary School, Northern Middle School, and Huntingtown High School, I sent out a mass email to all of the teachers asking them if they could have their classes make cards for Ethan on either the 20th or the 21st (the last two days of school before Christmas break). I got some emails back from teachers saying they could and some saying they just did not have time, but I had no idea what the Lord was about to bring. 



December 20 was the day that cards started to pick up and they began to just pour in. I was picking up cards from people, people were delivering them to my house, and I was getting endless amounts of cards in the mail. On average, I would get about 50-100 cards in the mail a day! Monday afternoon I received a call from Mrs. Dorris who is a 5th grade teacher at HES. She informed me that her class had made a gingerbread house and they wanted to give it to Ethan and that it would be waiting in the office for me to pick it up. I figured it would be a tiny gingerbread house made out of the milk carton like I made when I was in elementary school, but boy was I in awe when I walked into the office at HES and saw the gingerbread house that this 5th grade class made. 

This gingerbread house was beautiful! It had Christmas lights strung on the house, there was a bird bath made out of candy with birds sitting on the edge...I was speechless! Once I saw the gingerbread house I knew there was no way that I could keep this intact until Christmas day so Grant and I delivered it to Ethan that night. When we went to visit him, he was so excited! He loved the gingerbread house and when he first saw it his mouth dropped and he was like, "What is that?" Just seeing his face was priceless! His favorite part was the smoke coming out of the chimney because it was made out of cotton candy. 

When I got home Monday night I spent some time counting the number of cards that I had for Ethan - the total as of Monday night was 164 cards. Tuesday afternoon when I counted the number of cards I had, the total was 932 cards! By Wednesday evening I had 1,304 cards. And Christmas Eve as I counted the final number, I had 1,503 cards! In under 4 days, over 1,000 cards had come in. It was utterly amazing!!!! 

So many cards came in that I had to find a larger box, because, as you can see, the box that I was using was too small and it could not hold all of the cards. This picture was taken on Tuesday, so even more cards came in that were not included in this bunch.

I greatly enjoyed reading through ALL the cards that were made for Ethan. They were not even for me, but yet I was so encouraged by what I read. The cards were creative, colorful, thoughtful, sweet, funny, inspiring, and made with love. As I was reading through the cards, I took pictures of some of my favorite cards or cards that really stood out to me. I cannot post every single picture I took because you would be here all day, but I will post some and over the next few days I will make a slideshow of all of the cards I did photograph. 

These were cards made by elementary school students. I loved the creativity and the time that these students put into making these cards. I love the pictures on the front, they are just so precious and they make my heart smile!

These two cards had 3-D aspects about them. The one on the left was a 3-D manger scene with baby Jesus. The card on the right had a 3-D Santa and presents that popped up when you opened the card. Young kiddos made these which is extremely impressive!

These cards were among the most creative and the most colorful cards! The card with the candy cane hearts said, "6 candy canes, 3 hearts, 1 happy boy." The two bottom pictures are pictures of a shark card that a HHS student made for Ethan because he loves sharks. The outside is the sharks fin and eyes and then the inside is the inside of the sharks mouth.

One student from Huntingtown High School put ten dollars in his card. The outside said: "You know what cheers me up when I am down? Cold...Hard...Cash..." And the inside said: "Merry Christmas Broski! -Aaron the awesome mexican ninja." It was cute!

There were two elementary school kids (I believe from Sunderland Elementary School) that made the sweetest and most encouraging cards. The one on the left was from Peyton Hertez who said: "I know my handwriting is not so great and I am sorry about your eye...Although I think a missing eye would be kind of cool...Hey, although I am not the coolest kid around but someday I have hope that someday I'll be famous and the key to that is follow your dreams...Some day this might happen to you!" The card on the right was from Austin Lee Fowler who said, "U R A Warrior Ethan! Don't give up the fight! Get well soon! I will prey for you! Don't accept "stupid" doctor's messages." Wow. My heart is smiling as I am re-reading over there words. Such profound words of encouragement from elementary students. Thank you Peyton and Austin!

These two sets of cards really stood out to me. The cards on the left were made by a class from Sunderland Elementary and what I really loved about these cards was that the students put their pictures in the cards. With over 1,000 cards, it was awesome for Ethan to be able to put a face to a name and actually "see" some of the people who were making him cards. I thought it was really thoughtful and a great idea! The cards on the right were actually cards that I made. Ethan is such an animal lover, especially when it comes to dogs. It is something that we share. While I was still at school before break ended I decided to make cards from the dogs I have at school, as well as my dog at home, and then Ethan's dog. I traced the dogs paw inside of the card and wrote a cute message from each of the pups and then glued a picture of them on the outside. Ethan really enjoyed reading these!

Now on to the most encouraging cards...

This was made for Ethan by a girl named Rachel at Huntingtown High School. The front side (the picture on the left) is Ethan now with his bad eye and the back side (the picture on the right) was when Ethan is all better. I am so confident that the Lord is going to do a miracle in Ethan, and this card is a confirmation of that!

These were the two most encouraging cards in my opinion. The picture on the left is a card from a girl named Tara who goes to Freedom Valley Worship Center, the church I go to at school. Tara wrote, "Here are some bible verses: The Lord God will bring into the land that you are going to occupy and he will drive many nations out of it as you advance he will drive out seven nations larger and more powerful than you." I am not exactly sure why she chose this verse, but it so encouraging to me that a girl in elementary school wrote down a bible verse for Ethan without even knowing if he believed in God. The faith of a child... The picture on the right is a card from a freshman boys floor at Messiah College. Matthew James Dean, the R.A. on the floor and a dear friend of mine wrote, "Even though we haven't all met you, we know you are loved in God's sight, in the palm of His hand, and in our prayers! Keep fighting on warrior of God! You're the man!" This brings tears of joy to my eyes! Thank you Hess (floor 3) gentlemen for being such an encouragement!!!!

The picture on the left is a group of cards from Dusty Carpenter's college bible study. The pictures on the outsides of the cards were precious and the words of encouragement were amazing. On the insides of the cards, each of the guys put a joke. Ethan loves to make people laugh and he loves to get attention. These guys took there time to find some jokes and write them down, it was extremely thoughtful! The picture on the right is a group of letters from Mrs. White's 12th Grade AP English Class at HHS. I was blown away by what these seniors wrote and it touched my heart so deeply. Ellie Frazier wrote, "Hey Ethan! So many people are hoping and praying for your eye to get better. Hang in there! You're so strong, Merry Christmas. Ethan, never lose hope!" Joel A. wrote, "Dear Ethan, I hope you have a Merry Christmas! You can pull through it! You can do whatever you set your mind to." Laura Lambourne wrote, "Dear Ethan, Merry Christmas! I believe you can fight this and your dreams can come true. You are in all of our prayers." The most encouraging of them all was written by Kelsie Hancock who wrote, "Dear Ethan, Merry Christmas! I love being with my family during Christmas. We always have so much fun! I know your family loves you very much! You're a really strong and tough kid. Even though you might not know now, I just want to tell you that you are a HUGE inspiration to many people. It's amazing that a 6 year old boy like you can be such an influence in someone's life. I hope you have a GREAT Christmas and a Happy New Year! Know hat your family loves you, and there are people thinking and praying for you! Smile!" Thank you so much Kelsie for sharing your heart. You are beautiful and such an encouragement to me!

Almost to the end... Sorry it has been such a long post, but I do not want to leave anything out! These cards were made by Mrs. Farrell's 3rd Grade class at Huntingtown Elementary School. The moto or theme of her class is "Believe." Her class made the most precious cards, they were so encouraging and uplifting. One student wrote, "You will be able to see! Anything can happen! Just believe!" Corrine Curtin wrote, "Believe, Ethan, you can do it!" Andrew C wrote, "Believe in yourself." Delaney Clime wrote, "You can believe Ethan! I know you can do it." Joey Downing wrote, "I know you can believe in yourself! You can do it!" Olivia C. wrote, "Believe, believe, believe, believe, believe, believe! Be joyful!" Brandon wrote, "Believe in yourself. There's always americal. Believe in the doctor. Believe! Dreams come true! Dreams and miracles happen!" The most encouraging card in the bunch was written by Savannah MacAulay; Savannah wrote, "Even though you had an accident, always believe in yourself. Don't loose faith, always believe. You always have to get back there and say 'I believe in myself!' You can do it! Never lose faith, always believe! A miracle will come!"

Last but definitely not least, both of these cards melted my heart and were the most precious cards of all. I am going to start with the card on the right this time, it was made by a student at HHS and she wrote "Think bright! Think positive!" And she made a sun out of construction paper. When I read this card to Ethan, he just smiled and I told him that he was my sunshine, and he truly is! The card on the left is from our cousin John who is 3 years old (I think). He drew a picture of he and Ethan and then he placed all of his treasures into an envelope and sent it to Ethan. I can just imagine little John searching for these treasures and having so much joy over the fact that he gets to share them with Ethan! 

All of the cards were so beautiful and all I can say is THANK YOU! I do not think I could ever say it enough! As I am sitting here finishing out this blog post, I am sitting in the family room and my momma is watching The Celtic Women on PBS. As I am typing out the last few words, the song "When You Believe" came on. For those of you who are not familiar with the song you can listen to it here: When You Believe ... this song is beautiful! The chorus says "There can be miracles, when you believe. Though hope is frail, it's hard to kill. Who knows what miracles you can achieve. When you believe, somehow you will. You will when you believe." As I am closing out this post and listening to the words in this song, I hear the Lord speaking to my heart that Ethan will have a miracle because of the faith of all of these people, because of YOUR faith. It's like the song says, hope sometimes can be frail, but it is hard to kill! My family, Ethan, and myself refuse to settle for anything less than complete healing in the name of the Lord! This miracle will be done, and the Lord is going to use it for His glory! People are going to come to know Him through Ethan's miracle! Praise be to God! Jesus, you are so good!