Praying for Linda's family

First, I want to thank all of you who have so generously donated to help Linda's family with expenses associated with Katie's death last week. As you can imagine, they are having a very hard time right now. Linda wrote to me yesterday.... "this isn't happening, it's not real. We were not made for this. I think that the grief that Jesus saw, on the woman that lost her son- you remember the story, they were carrying the boy and the woman was weeping, and Jesus raised the boy and told her to take him home. Jesus hurt to see her hurt so bad. I know HE is with me, to walk through this with me, but, I still have to walk through, and it hurts."

On Christmas Eve after the visitation for Katie, a second child of Linda's was hospitalized. Bennie has been in intensive care on a ventilator since then. I received this email from Linda this morning regarding his progress:

Sent: Wednesday, December 27, 2006 11:56 AM
Subject: [OLL] Bennie-please share
Ben is weaned off the epi drip for his heart and he can hold his own heart beat. His ventilator settings are being weaned down and they are doing a c-pap setting trial- with him still intubated.
He cannot hold his temp. without lights. Nutritionist called and they are going to start a trial n-j (into the intestines- so he can't reflux) drip feed tomorrow, to see if he can tolerate it.
They are raising his DDAVP dose because his sodiums are still high. Everything is heading in the right direction, it will just be a long road.
Linda

Tonight when I got home from church, there was another email from Linda detailing another sick child:

Sent: Wednesday, December 27, 2006 6:44 PM
Subject: Hosanna needs prayers now

I just had the ambulance take my third child to the hospital. Hosanna has cystic fibrosis and her stats went down and she was coughing up a storm and was going down fast, so another 911 call. Hossie is 6 and tiny because of the c/f. She was jabbering away this morning.
Whatever this is- I hate it.
Linda

Updated - Thursday morning with this email:
Sent: Thursday, December 28, 2006 10:10 AM
Subject: Re: Hosanna needs prayers now

This morning Jim called. They were in the E.R. all night! She has an IV for fluids; and an IV for 2 antibiotics, that she's getting IV. She has all the supports in place, but they had to be in the midst of everything, so no rest. Her heart had gone to 50 and was dropping, she was in trouble. Praise God that we got her in time. Whatever this is attacks the heart. Please pray that a bed opens up in the unit this morning, so they can move up to a room.
Linda

I can't imagine having a child die and 2 more in the hospital at the same time all in the span of 6 days. Linda and her family could really use your prayers. And if you would still like to donate money to help out this family, please contact me at huddleston@insightbb.com or do so directly through Paypal, using that address. Thank you for praying for this family.