Page 14 - Evidence of Things Unseen

them than an unseen God. Even when man’s solution led to financial bondage, many
Christians preferred bondage to trusting a God they could not see.
Pages could be filled in detailing the vast number of ways in which men and women
today demonstrate their unbelief in God’s presence with them, but I would prefer to press
on and to cite some examples from my early Christian life where God made His presence
known. This I will now do.
In our second year of marriage, my wife became pregnant and we had much
anticipation for the child that was to be born to us. From my teenage years on up I had been
captivated by the thought of being a father. I suppose I was influenced by TV shows such
as “The Walton’s” where family life was depicted as being so rich, and the family bonds
between generations so enduring. I thought of how marvelous it would be to have a large
family one day, and I wondered what my children would look like, and what their voices
would sound like.
When I learned that my wife was expecting I was filled with excitement, and we
prepared a room in the house to be a nursery. I painted the walls in pastel colors, and some
ladies from the church made curtains and matching wall decorations for the room. We
set-up a crib and a changing table and all the things that go along with taking care of a baby.
My wife was doing fine throughout her pregnancy, and she had that glow of expectant
motherhood about her. As the day approached for the baby to be delivered all things
appeared normal. The due date arrived, but there were no signs of labor yet. We were told
this was normal for first births, as they often came late. One week went by and then two,
and finally the doctor said that, if the child was not born by three weeks after the due date,
he would induce labor.
The day before Tony was to be admitted to the hospital to have the baby delivered she
began experiencing some pains, and, not knowing if they were normal pains, she wanted
to see the doctor. We arrived at the doctor’s office right before they were to close and the
doctor was evidently in a hurry to get home. He listened to the baby’s heartbeat with a
stethoscope and concluded that all was well. Since Tony was already scheduled to be
induced in the morning, he advised us to go home and come back to the hospital as
previously planned. The doctor did not run any type of fetal stress tests, or check on the
welfare of the baby in any other way.
That night was a difficult one for Tony as she continued to experience pains. Since this
was her first pregnancy she did not know if these were the normal pains associated with
labor, or not, and neither did I. Both of us passed a restless night, and early in the morning
I took her to the hospital. I checked her in and she was then taken to the birthing suites
while I filled out paperwork. When I had finished I went up to the maternity ward, and I
found the department in a rush.
When the nurses had hooked my wife up to a fetal monitor they found the baby’s
heartbeat to be erratic and in distress. The medical staff immediately decided to perform
an emergency C-section and they were wheeling my wife back into the operating room when
I arrived. A short while later the doctor came out and told me that my son had died, and
that my wife would be taken to a hospital room where she would most likely be kept for a
week or longer.
It was all I could do to go to a phone and call a dear woman from our church and ask
her to let the other church members know what had happened. I was able to see my son,
and my wife held him for a moment. He was a beautiful baby, and I could see my features
in him. We learned later that because he was so long past his due date that he had his first