Barcelona Bound!

The tickets are bought, the reservations are made, the schedule is complete. All that's left....packing! Good thing I've got a whole day left to finish this task!

Take-off is 12:50 Sunday afternoon. Check back in for updates!!

Merry Christmas to all!

Please Pray

This is the "official" e-mail that was circulated:

Most of you received word earlier this evening that Melissa Cribb fell from the second story window of her home at about 4:30 this afternoon. She pushed through the screen of an open window and fell to the driveway below. She apparently landed on her side, which given the circumstances, and in God’s providence, was probably the best possible scenario to help absorb some of the impact of her fall. D’Anne was home during the accident, but she did not witness the fall. Some neighboring children saw Melissa fall and D’Anne heard them screaming. Melissa was apparently leaning against the screen in an effort to talk with some of the children who were playing outside.

Melissa was air-lifted to Scottish Rite Hospital where the doctors were able to stabilize her. She sustained three fractures to her skull and she has some bleeding under the skull in two places. There is, however, no bleeding in her brain. The doctors expect that the fractures will be able to heal with no surgery and that the blood will be absorbed back into her tissues without issue. Although Melissa has been basically unconscious, she has moved her arms and responded to pain in various places of her body. The doctors are keeping her medically sedated and keeping her in a partial pharmacological paralysis, so for now they cannot ask her any questions about pain or feeling in other parts of her body. Their main concern over the next 24-48 hours is to watch for swelling of Melissa’s brain, which could also be accompanied by seizures.

Jay was working in Maryland today when this all happened, and he caught the first available flight home. He was expected to get into Atlanta at around 9:30. The other children (Megan, Mallory, Mitchell, and Meredith) were at the hospital with D’Anne tonight, along with a host of others that the Cribbs know from their connections with HEDGE, the Kings Academy, and Hopewell Baptist Church, not to mention Faith Community Church. I know the support was very meaningful to the whole family. Melissa has been moved into PICU, and the visitation is being restricted to family at this point.

The doctors expect that she will be in the hospital until at least next weekend, perhaps longer. The other Cribb children will be coming home tonight and will be staying at home for the most part. Megan (19 years old) will be watching out for them mostly, along with a young lady and family friend named Danielle, who has been staying with the Cribbs while she attends KSU.

Please keep all these matter regarding Melissa and her recovery in your prayers. We praise the Lord that Melissa is doing as well as she is under these circumstances. Please also keep Jay, D’Anne and the children in your prayers.

Also, if any of you would like to be involved in ministering to the Cribb family by providing a meal at some time over the next couple of weeks, please contact Mary Dettman at (678) 574-5408 or also feel free to call the church office.

What's been going on

Well, since the last update, I have started working at the Consulate General of the Republic of Korea. It is proving to be quite a challenge, but such a blessing. The only other American that I work with is the sweetest girl ever, and get this, she is totally a Christian! That is such a wonderful thing to have at work, especially when things get a little difficult!

Neal continues to work diligently on his Senior Design project. They have a meeting next week and will find out how the professors are thinking that they are doing!

Neal also received word yesterday that his appeal to the OMLP program at GE has been reconsidered. They are going to send him an offer by the end of the week! Another answer to prayer!

Other than that, not too much has been happening. Young married's Bible study is this Saturday night. All are welcome!

Until next time,
Deborah Lynn Parker

YAY!

Well, it has finally happened! (Finally to me, of course, God's perfect timing!) I got an offer that I accepted today! I am an official employee of the South Korean Government! I will be working at the Republic of Korea Consul downtown. Job requirements: executive assistant to the consul general and general office management and event planning. Yes, almost too good to be true. Plus, it is right on the marta train line, and since we only live about two blocks from another train station, I'll be taking that to work. Save on gas!! We are both very thankful and grateful for this job!

On other news, Neal's school is still incredibly time consuming. He is doing well, and the senior design project has come out of the slump and is really moving along in a positive light...which is a GOOD thing! He tends to stay pretty busy with homework and group projects.

Oh, if anyone was interested, CVS is having 90% off of all of their flip flops. I got some yesterday and they have a lot that are really cute. I paid, get this, $0.59! Yeah, pretty amazing!

So that's all the news I can handle right now! Will post again with more!

Abortion is About God

I was reading this on the latest post of the Desiring God blog. I think it is really important to get down to the true issues of the social questions we are facing. Read the article below, it is really short, and it will really prick your thinking.

Abortion Is About God Posted: 01 Sep 2008 02:21 AM CDT (Author: Joe Rigney) They say that nothing is certain except death and taxes. In America, at least, we can add one more thing to the list: Every four years politicians and pundits will wax eloquent about the "difficult" and "controversial" issue of abortion. Debates about "a woman's right to choose" and "a baby's right to life" will quickly degenerate into shouting matches that obscure rather than clarify the issues. As Christians, we don't have the luxury of speaking with vagueness, ambiguity, and cliché. When we open our mouths, we must speak clearly (Ephesians 6:19-20; Colossians 4:3-4). But if we are to speak clearly, we must first think and feel clearly about difficult and controversial moral issues. So we need to realize that abortion is not mainly about a woman's right to choose. And it isn't mainly about a baby's right to life. Abortion is about God, the Creator of the universe, the Giver and Sustainer of all life, the Judge of the living and the dead, the Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and the Redeemer and Forgiver of all who trust him. Abortion is about God. To leave God out of the picture of abortion is to trivialize it. All things are trivial without God. God is the ultimate reality over the universe. All other reality is derivative and dependent and has no ultimate meaning at all without reference to God the ultimate reality. In him we live and move and have our being. If we leave him out of account, we know nothing of any lasting significance about ourselves or the world. (John Piper, "Where Does Child Killing Come From?") During this election season, as politicians court the evangelical vote, it is vital that Christians remind themselves why abortion is the transcendent moral issue of our time. To that end, The Bethlehem Institute has designed a unique, six-week Sunday School curriculum advancing the truth that the deepest evil of abortion is that it defies God's supremacy over life in the womb. Entitled Abortion Is About God: Reframing a Moral Issue, the course provides a biblical and theological foundation for the pro-life cause from a God-centered perspective. At a time when being pro-life is marginalized in some evangelical circles, we want to lift up the cause of the unborn and urge our fellow Christians to not grow weary in doing good. We will reap a harvest if we do not give up. And the strength to persevere comes from realizing that God's supremacy over all things includes his work in the womb. Abortion is an assault on the person-forming work of God. Children are a gift from God. To reject them through abortion is to reject him. But we do not merely preach against sin. We also preach Christ crucified—crucified for women who have had abortions; for family members who have pushed for abortions; for doctors who have performed abortions; and for Christians who have failed to love both mother and baby as we ought to. In that spirit, we commend this new curriculum to you. Our prayer is that God would use it in churches around the country to reawaken people to the centrality and supremacy of God in the cause of the unborn so that one day soon abortion will not only be illegal, but unthinkable. * * *