Dear Family and Friends,
Just a quick note on God's timing. Having started out my academic career in the world of math and physics, I am always delightfully amazed that the "coincidences" of my life cannot be explained by the laws of time and chance. We have just celebrated the second anniversary of Matt's second liver transplant. Those of you who have been following Matt's story for awhile, may remember that Matt's grandfather, who was dying of congestive heart failure, seemed to have waited to hear the good news of the successful operation before gently passing from this life into his eternal reward-on the same day as the operation. "Coincidently", Matt's second cataract operation was scheduled for the second anniversary date of his second liver transplant! (It was not intentionally scheduled that way by any of us!) I do not know how God does that, but there are these strange reminders that our days are in his hands, that he knows the number of the hairs on our heads, and that not a sparrow falls to the ground unknown to him. Mysteriously God is at work in the timing of the events of our lives. Matt's recovery from the cataract surgery has been stellar and he continues to be stable with regard to kidney function.
Towards the end of the summer I had a one on one, father -son conversation with Matt. One of the main subjects of the conversation was Matt's music. He felt it was not going anywhere at that point in time. I shared with him that I felt he needed to work on talking between the songs and singing about the supernatural medical journey he had been on. He shared with me that even though he was grateful to God for supernatural deliverance from death, he wanted to move on. He didn't want to visit again in his mind those places of pain, anxiety and uncertainty that were also a part of that journey. A fatherly prayer ensued, and as I was praying some of those unplanned, Holy Spirit words came, and I found myself praying for God to give Matt some new songs. A few weeks ago Matt came by and said something like: "Dad, I've got some new songs I want you to hear." He's been singing them in church, and in the Gospelfest event that we had last week. He told me they just keep coming. They're songs of gratitude and songs of deliverance. It has been years since he's written new songs. Matt's working on putting the songs up on a new website. When he's done with the project I'll pass on directions to you so you can find them in cyberspace.
"...you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD. You hem me in -behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. ...All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." Ps. 139 1b-6; 16b NIV
May you know peace in being known by God,
George
