Tell What He’s Done for You

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“Evangeline Joy”

We would like to share the story behind the name of our third child…

I suppose that all the tempest described below could be traced back to a simple but earnest prayer I prayed soon after my second appointment with our midwife, whom I’ll call Maria. In our first visit, I had told her about how God healed my leg joint and caused it to quit popping out, as it had done ever since I strained my leg in month four of my previous pregnancy with Judith (our second child). A year and a half later, Judith had just turned one when the Lord abruptly ended the problem and I could walk, climb stairs, and run. I could even play Capture the Flag on the beach with the others—my husband and I won for our team! Hearing the story of the healing, our midwife Maria rejoiced with me. But by the next visit she had forgotten all about it. I was dejected. Why were people so hard? And the ones that seemed to really rejoice soon forgot as daily cares choked it out. I prayed, “Lord, would You help that somehow Maria will really believe in Your power? Can’t You do something that she won’t forget? Even if You have to use me, it would be worth it.” I knew He heard me, and so left it there and focused on other things.

I was unaware that I had low blood sugar, and at the beginning of Evangeline’s pregnancy I struggled with a sleepiness I could not shake, no matter how many extra hours I got. I would nearly faint while combing my hair each morning, and I had to force myself to eat. Finding my blood pressure low, Maria advised eating salty foods and drinking tons of water. My blood was not circulating fast enough, and that was the cause of the lightheadedness. Following this advice, after a month or so I could brush my hair without fainting. But I still struggled to make breakfast, which rarely tasted good. Long after normal morning sickness should have passed, I would feel like throwing up the eggs. I felt drugged all the time, and dragged through the duties of the day.

It was hard to be sweet to the children, and I began to implore the Lord to give me something to overcome how I felt and be able to love them and enjoy life with them. In my difficult postpartum with Judith, I had learned how to not complain about how badly I felt, and to give thanks for very little things. Again I used this tool until it clave to my hand. Yet I still lacked something—I knew not what.

One morning I sat in the children’s Sunday School class listening to them sing. I felt like a worn-out wash rag, dried stiff in the sun. My attention suddenly riveted on the words, “My God shall supply all your need, according to his riches in glory….” Once I had seen a picture of King Jesus and His treasure chest of supplies; a beggar girl stood in front with her hands outstretched. Yes, I was the beggar girl. And God said, “I can supply your need.” “Yes, Lord,” I said in my heart, “I want it.”

So I went home. And every time I ran out of strength, energy, or wisdom how to handle my weakness, my children, and my duties, I would bring out my ticket for divine supplies. “Lord, You said You would supply all my needs—I need help with this one.” And He would help me, divinely. Not the same every time. Sometimes He would give abundant energy for an hour or two. Sometimes He would calm someone down, and sometimes it was a flood of love to deal with a difficult child wisely. Several weeks passed before I woke up to the fact that that scripture really worked! It was a jaw-dropper. God could supply any need I had. Completely! Totally. His treasure chest was in mint condition. Nothing was stolen or missing! I didn’t have to wait in line while someone else used it. Dimly, I recalled that this was the God that had spoken the earth into being; He had needed nothing to get started creating it. So of course, even if His chest of supply was “missing something,” He just needed to speak to create it and meet my need. This was exceedingly comforting to me. And it filled my heart with praise. I was so limited by afflictions, but God really cared, down to the tiniest detail of my day. Over and over He could step in as soon as I asked (sweetly) and would adjust me, or my children, or my strength. Soon after, I found this song:

“I have found His grace is all complete,
He supplieth every need;
While I sit and learn at Jesus’ feet,
I am free, yes, free indeed.

“It is joy unspeakable and full of glory,
Full of glory, full of glory;
It is joy unspeakable and full of glory,
Oh, the half has never yet been told.”*

I taught it to the children, and we sang it lustily with the piano, and any other chance we felt like it, which was often. So much blessing came down in our home, that a lot of the children’s behavior issues melted away, for Joy had flooded the home and Jesus had made Himself at home in our house. Several more weeks went by, and one Sunday someone picked that song. Though my oldest seldom sings in public, both she and her little sister sang it at the top of their lungs, much to everyone’s amusement. Afterward, I was asked, “Do you sing that a lot at home?” I smiled and said a little shyly, “Yes.” For it was our victory song; my secret and very powerful weapon against despair and anger toward impossibilities. But with God’s weapon He gives you, all things are possible.

We decided that if Baby was a girl, her middle name would be Joy. Little did we know what trials would bring forth the rest of her name. It is good that we cannot see ahead very far. It is better to hold God’s hand instead, and walk trustingly like our little ones do. I surely couldn’t have borne to see the suffering I would go through before her birth.

Unknown to me, I was collecting fluid in the womb. I was measuring larger than usual, but there was some confusion about when the pregnancy started, and I personally thought that maybe I was a month ahead. And because there are twins on both sides of the family, during the last two months all of us began to wonder if it were twins. My midwife hung back on the fact that she could only find one rate for heartbeats instead of two.

I learned to work about an hour (serving breakfast), then rest. I went through the whole day like this. One day my mother said to me, “Pretty soon you’ll be getting that nesting instinct, I guess.” I said, “I have it, Mama. I just can’t do anything about it.” My parents soon left on a trip, and only a few days later, I noticed I could work more. Because I had outgrown some of my other maternity dresses, and the seamstress I knew was filled up with orders, I began to sew them myself. And I got two done. Very amazing! I obtained a new perspective, almost as though I had finished one pregnancy and started a new one. So armed with these victories, I worked on the house. And very gratefully, too. When I joyfully told my mom about my new energy, she said, “I was praying you would be able to start working.” Wasn’t God so good to answer her prayers?

The last two and three weeks, I was so huge, and I began to hurt really badly when I would get up or down. Pain would rake up my belly no matter how carefully I tried to move. And I was so bulky it was hard to move with grace to spare the lurch that would send the rush of pain. When I could hardly bear to get out of bed, I began to beg the Lord for mercy to end this pregnancy. I thought of the motto I had taken up a few months back:

It is by no means enough to set out cheerfully with your God on any venture of faith. Tear into smallest pieces any itinerary [plans] for the journey which your imagination may have drawn up.

Nothing will fall out as you expect.

Your guide will keep to no beaten path. He will lead you by a way such as you never dreamed your eyes would look upon. He knows no fear, and He expects you to fear nothing while He is with you.

[Streams in the Desert Vol. 1]

Certainly nothing was falling out as I expected. And my pain was so great that I began to mentally grasp straws—maybe I was carrying twins. Maybe that was why the baby was so active! Both my grandmothers had had twins in their third pregnancy. That would explain why I was so huge. Two babies would surely make it worth it all.

My midwife also became excited at the possibilities of twins, though the heartbeat was a real puzzle. She advised an ultrasound. After much discussion and prayer, we decided to do it. But then I went into labor, the night that Maria was out delivering a baby, beyond cell range. I deliver really fast, and I really started praying and quoting the last line of the motto to Him: “Lord, You know no fear, You expect me to fear nothing while I am with You. You know Joel and I can’t deliver twins by ourselves. And I don’t want to go the hospital and have to have a c-section because some unknown doctor doesn’t know how to deliver twins either.” And toward the middle of the night, instead of intensifying after having a shower like my contractions always have done, they abruptly stopped. God just stopped them. I was so grateful.

A few days later they started again, then stopped. My feet began to swell; something that never happened to me before. I also began to have vomiting in the night. I always managed to keep it down, but I would wake up to it filling my mouth and nose. I began to feel real jittery. Was I going to fall apart before this baby/babies came? Protein started showing up in my urine samples, and Maria explained that a lack thereof could cause vomiting, and certainly was the cause of my feet swelling. She thought then I really must be carrying twins and advised me to eat protein every two hours around the clock until we got my symptoms under control. That worked. Though I sat still when she gave me the good news about my protein, my heart danced all around the room!

And then (two weeks later) we went to have the ultrasound. It wasn’t very enjoyable; my skin reacted to the gel and the longer they scanned the more itchy my skin felt; then it began to hurt until it was hard to lay still. “There is just one baby in here,” the doctor, a nice man, informed us. “What?!” I thought. “Then I must have a tumor in there with the baby,” and held my breath for the bad news. But he only exclaimed, shaking his head, “You must have a quart of fluid in there!” After getting some measurements, it was finally over, and he took my hands and helped me sit up. I gasped at the consuming wave of pain that rushed over me. Fire like I have never felt, except for when my first baby’s head crowned, engulfed me. Had that stranger, the doctor, not been there I would have screamed and screamed, holding myself off the seat with my hands. It was probably only a minute or two, but it went on and on and on and on. Joel came near and tried to help and comfort me, and him standing close to me was a comfort in the fire. When it subsided, I felt like weeping. Controlling myself with a great effort, I managed to say thank you, and got out to the car, where I could weep “alone.” I cried most of the way home, an hour’s drive. I had been to my hoped-for-twin baby’s funeral, and yet I still had to deliver a girl baby. Grief over my loss and resentment for the trouble this girl baby was causing strove in my heart for mastery. Tears, then anger, round and round, till anger finally dried my tears. At home over the phone my sister helped me work on the resentment until I felt like I could accept another girl into my heart.

As soon as Maria heard about the fluid, she put me on a strict diet of protein and vegetables, and non-gluten grain. No sugars whatsoever. And within two days I could roll out of bed without anguish and really no pain at all, just discomfort. This was an enormous relief to me!

Two days later, we gave birth. When my water broke in the middle of the night, I called Maria right away, as she had carefully instructed me. She was concerned that the extra water would wash the cord between the baby’s head and the cervix or even out into the birth canal. She lives only fifteen minutes away and so she got here soon after. The baby’s heartbeat was fine.

While we waited, Maria was treated to an exciting and stirring account of a miracle only a few hours old. You see, the previous morning my sister had woken up to find her young son drinking eucalyptus oil from the diffuser she used for allergies. But when taken internally, even small quantities can be deadly. My sister took him to the emergency room within an hour, but he was as limp as a rag doll. No one offered any hope, and after awhile they advised her to call someone to pick up the other children, so they wouldn’t witness his death. While my parents started out to get them, my nephew fell into a deep sleep, most likely a coma from which he would never awake.

I knew nothing of all this, but all the previous night I had been heavily burdened for them. Before bedtime, I had even called my sister, and throughout the night I had woken often, always thinking and praying for them. I thought, “Surely I will have prayed through by morning.” But it did not leave me, and got stronger the longer the morning progressed. Shortly after noon, my mother-in-law came over and said, “Did you hear about the Danielsens?” My head jerked up, my heart thudding with dread. The Danielsens? What happened? Are they okay? She told me all about it—and that my nephew had awakened from sleep perfectly okay. Perfectly okay?! God is good indeed! They hadn’t called me earlier for fear I would go into labor. According to what the hospital staff told my sister, there are eight cases recorded in the United States of children consuming eucalyptus oil and none of them survived.1 It was a miracle indeed. A prelude to my own.

So I lay on the couch, happy thoughts streaming through my consciousness, and Joel went back to bed. Maria lay on the hassock two feet away. My contractions weren’t hard, but I couldn’t really sleep, though I tried. They were fifteen or so minutes apart. I was so full of thanksgiving and admiration of God’s love, that I wasn’t really thinking about how I was feeling until three really hard contractions came, still far apart. I reached for Maria’s hand, because I felt so lonely. After another three or four of the same, I forgot about my nephew and remembered that I wanted a water birth and that the pool wasn’t aired up. So patiently Maria padded back to the bedroom to ask Joel to air it up. Just as she rounded the corner of the hall and disappeared, I had a contraction and felt the tingly, tickly feeling of my baby descending. My baby! It would be here within an hour! And then—wham! A really hard one. Wow! I had forgotten how hard those last ones were. I moaned, and just at that moment, Maria rounded the corner with Joel behind her. She looked at me. And I saw her eyes drop the plan for the pool. She grabbed some stuff to protect the couch as best she could and started coaching Joel.

Evangeline’s birth happened so fast, even faster than Judith’s birth had been. I never had a more peaceful birth—or one in which things felt (and were) so out of my control and God was so in control. I never had experienced trusting God like that. From the bottom of my heart I believed that God loved me, and He had all my concerns and fears and feelings in His hands and that the plan He had laid out for me was really best. I loved Him from the bottom of my heart, and though I was working with all the strength I had, my heart was bursting with praise and confidence. Praise that I could do this. Confidence that He would take care of all the concerns for our baby.

Joel and our midwife saw the baby arrive with the cord wrapped three times very tightly around her little neck. Our midwife told us about the Wharton’s jelly protecting the cord, which is God’s way of getting nutrients through the cord when there is a knot in it. When Maria got the cord off the baby’s neck, and put her up on my stomach, the baby wouldn’t breathe. She wasn’t blue, just wouldn’t breathe. It took longer than we wished, but after some baby spanks on the bottom and back, Maria suctioned out her mouth and we heard the indignant baby wail. What relief! What joy!

Maria says that if God hadn’t sent such fast labor, Evangeline would not be here alive. Smiling. Cooing. Finding her hands. Sucking on her fingers. Laughing at her sisters’ jumps and tricks. The second miracle in twenty-four hours.

Joel writes a poem for each child. This is Evangeline’s:

I could have touched those angel wings
That bore you safely to our arms,
And at the thought my spirit sings
The love that lifted all alarms—
I praise the Heart of Love divine
That favored me and made you mine,
Evangeline.

O messenger so lately sent
From realms surpassing far the sun,
How many meanings may be blent
And bundled wondrously in one?
Such wisdom I cannot divine,
But good is all God’s grand design,
Evangeline.

I find affliction, threaded through,
Has been reborn in God’s employ,
And sorrow must enhance each hue
When fashioned by the Source of Joy;
I praise His skill to intertwine
This glorious tapestry divine,
Evangeline.

This handiwork of Heav’nly fame,
In which what lavish thought was spent—
No angel artist e’er could claim
Quite half the picture you present;
And think that He should then consign
His masterpiece to me and mine,
Evangeline.

Evangeline means “messenger of good news.” This baby was our little messenger that God has joy available for us even in great suffering and limitation. Thus we named her Evangeline Joy. Precious baby, we love you! You are a miracle like no other.

—Coquetta Erickson

I Have the Joy, Joy, Joy…

Lately I have had to battle allergies. One evening when I was feeling pretty irritated at the way my nose was itching and my eyes were watering, I went to my mother and asked her how to get rid of them. She answered in her motherly way, “Niki, you just have to find a blessing in everything, including allergies.” So I thanked her for the advice and began to “count my blessings.” First of all I thought of the people I know that have allergies and that I am not alone in the “battle.” Second, that my allergies don’t last forever and also, that God is able to help me in this trial and give me joy. I then asked our heavenly Father to help and give me His overcoming joyfulness. I still have allergies, but instead of irritation I have joy. Praise the Lord!

—Niklanna Kornoff