Our Wilderness Story

This is a long blog but any story worth telling is worth the time it takes to share it.

Our (my wife and I) first true wilderness experience began in December of 2002 only a few days before Christmas. My wife and I were overwhelmed with the expectancy and joy of life as we went to get an ultrasound of our first baby. We couldn’t wait to find out if the child was going to be a boy of girl. It was a girl, our little Madelynn Grace. Our life changed that afternoon. The OB called us in to tell us that it looked like Madelynn had too much fluid in her brain. She sent us to a perinatologist who told us the next day that he thought Madelynn had a cyst in her cerebellum. He then literally told us to, “Go look up on the internet what was going to be wrong with our daughter.” This was Day 1 of our wilderness experience. All our plans about what we thought our life would look like evaporated.

As a male my first thought was to “fix the problem” and since medicine had no answers I immediately began memorizing and proclaiming every “healing” scripture in Bible. I was convinced that our only path out of this wilderness was through a miraculous physical healing. The path I envisioned involved us getting back to the plans we had made for our life before we received this diagnosis. This mindset lasted for about a month or two and it was definitely the worst time of my life because with each subsequent ultrasound the cyst remained and declared (in my mind) that the problem must have something to do with my faith.

Then everything changed. I can still remember the night when Staci and I lay in bed discussing the story of “the man born blind” found in John 9. The disciples were asking Jesus if his blindness was the fault of his sin or his parents’ sin. Jesus response was liberating and challenging, “this happened that the work (or glory) of God might be displayed in his life.” That night was the first night we allowed ourselves to consider what our lives might look like if Madelynn was born with disabilities. Prior to this, at least in my mind, I wouldn’t allow myself to even have this thought. There was only one way out of this wilderness.

Following this discussion we prayed the most difficult prayer we have ever had to utter. It went something like this, “God, we know you can heal our daughter and you know that is our heart’s desire, but if you choose not to heal her we will still praise you and trust that your glory will be displayed in her life (and ours).”

This was the day we acknowledged that God might have a different path out of our wilderness. This is a lesson we have had to learn over and over again since that night.

Madelynn was born healthy and happy and MRIs showed that she had been healed. Before she was born a neurosurgeon told us, after looking at her last ultrasound, that we must have been praying to the right God. But when she was 9 months old she stopped meeting milestones. By 18 months she had lost around 25% of her body weight and was receiving occupational, physical and speech therapy. The doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with her. Before she was 5 we noticed she was having mild seizures. We later learned she was having multiple global seizures every second. She is 6 now and the seizures continue. Despite the physical challenges she is a beautiful and extremely happy girl and we are so blessed to be a part of her life. She brings us so much joy. As Pastor Jason said on Sunday, there are good days and there are better days. I like that.

This is definitely not the path out of the wilderness I envisioned back in Dec 2002. But with every smile and hug my daughter gives me I sense the glory of God. She has taught me more about the nature and love of God than all the sermons in the world. With every opportunity we have to share the love of Christ with others in their own wilderness times we see the works of God being displayed in our lives. God has used Madelynn for His purposes and He is telling a beautiful story in her life.

We journey still but our prayer is the same. Allow God to open your mind to the possibility that He might have a different path out of your wilderness. It may not be the easiest path but it will be the one that enables you to best be a part of the redemptive work God is doing on this Earth.

Chad Quarles

Outreach Coordinator