Grace upon grace

Six years ago Bill and I sat in a hospital room trying to decide what the newest Sullivan's name was going to be. We originally thought we'd just do "Anna Grace," after my mom, but we were worried that her name "Annie," would be confused with big brother Andy's name. "Let's do Annalee Grace," Bill suggested. "Sounds good to me," I agreed as he wrote it down on the birth certificate. We ended up calling her Annie anyway, which was fine except for that day when she was pretending to be a princess and insisted that, "My name isn't Annie, it's Cinderelella!"

Anyway, I was looking up the meaning of her name the other day, and I remembered that Anna means "grace," and, of course, her middle name is "Grace." But when I looked up "Lee," I found that it means "sheltered from the storm." God certainly has sheltered her from this storm, I thought. The mercy of her brain injury seems to be that her little mind has been protected from the grief she may have experienced...but I don't really know, it's just what I sense.

Looking back, we know it was God's grace that miraculously healed Bill from PSP, and God's grace that enabled this elderly mom to have Annie as a little celebration gift on April 7th, 2003. It is God's grace that wakes us up in the morning, God's grace that helps us keep pushing Annie to recover lost abilities, and God's grace that has rescued us a million different ways these last two years.

And as we step into Passion Week, it is God's grace that because Jesus died for our sin and rose from the dead, we know that one day Annie will be restored to complete and perfect health--either here or in heaven. And until our hope is sight, each day He gently gives one blessing upon another: grace upon grace.

Jean


And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. John 1:16-17