Second Chances

“I love spring time, everything is just so alive”, my husband’s voice abruptly pulled me from my never-ending thoughts. I looked over at it him for a moment, reminiscing. We were on our way to my niece’s gender reveal party, to celebrate a new life. The combination of this celebration with his comment caused my mind to flutter quickly back to a time in my life, when being alive was the most important thing on my mind.

It was April seventh on an early spring afternoon. The air was warm but not quite hot yet, and the trees had just begun to bud, although there were no blooms in sight. Everything was trying to come to life, but just like me, it hadn’t quite happened yet. I had just finished cleaning my car, inside and out. It was sparkling clean and I was ready to go. I quickly put away all the cleaning supplies as I called out to my mom from the front porch that I was leaving and that I’d be back soon.

“Bye, I love you” was our normal exchange and it was the last thing I remember before jumping in my car and taking off. What I didn’t know, something in fact only God knew, was that April seventh, that very day was anything but normal and that it would change the course of my life forever, beginning with a car ride just on the other side of the golf course we lived behind.

I woke up in the hospital with my neck in a brace and my left leg stiff as a board. The next few days were a blur of faces and voices as I was in and out of consciousness. My mom, brothers and sisters, friends, nieces and nephews, and strangers all circulated in and out of my hospital room as it filled up with flowers, cards and balloons, all with the same message – “Get Well Soon”. As I became more awake, alert, and aware, it came as a surprise to me and everyone else that I had no memory of the accident, nor the first few days after it. My family began to fill me in on the circumstances of my situation – all with paralyzing agony in their voices and tears in their eyes. I learned that my car had a mechanical failure that caused me to side-swipe two other vehicles going the opposite direction of me. I have no recollection of the events that led to me being extracted out of my demolished car by the jaws of life, nor do I remember being air-lifted to the hospital, the numerous surgeries and life-giving blood transfusions that followed. To this day, the only memories that serve as a reminder of the accident and first several uncertain days are the accounts of my family and friends and a few pictures of the wreckage that used to be my car.

The memories I do have are so much sweeter. I remember my mom spending every day with me at the hospital and in rehab. I remember the love and affection my family showed one another in the days, weeks and months that followed my accident, because we were all raw to the awareness of how fragile life is. I remember my brother-in-law painting my toenails so that I would feel pretty. I remember thanking God that I was alive. I remember the vulnerability of not being able to do much for myself and how my mom helped me every day in the bathroom and I remember how my sister shaved my legs because I was incapable of doing it myself. And I remember the determination that I had every day at therapy, to learn to walk again and gain my independence back.

Yet I also remember my family attempting to recall exactly what it was like for them when the doctors delivered the initial message that I might not make it. The brokenness in my sisters’ voice still brings tears to my eyes when she told me about the phone call attempts and hang ups to my high school to let them know why I wasn’t going to be there. Sobs grow in my chest now remembering being told how helpless my twin brother felt as he cried out to God that it should be him and not me. Utterly broken with their recollections, I was also filled with an immense joy that radiated off of them when they began to recall the growing hope that seemed to spring up like a geyser when I began to make it out of the woods.

But the thing I remember the most was the ride home from the rehab hospital. I remember that the heat of the sun on my skin through the car window left my forearm sticky, and that the air was heavy with humidity. The trees and bushes lining either side of the road were full, lush and vivid shades of brilliant green. The flowers had brightly colored petals that seemed to smile upward toward the sunshine. The sounds of lawn mowers and children’s laughter melodically drifted in from the rolled down windows. And oh the smells! The scent of freshly cut grass, pollen thick in the air, the smell of roses and magnolia blossoms – it all made me shut my eyes simply to breathe it in. My senses were so alive; I could almost taste that it was spring.

I remember that my thoughts on that ride home were consumed with how beautiful it looked to see all of creation alive. I remember thanking God that I too was alive. I remember soaking in each moment, knowing it could be my last. There is something about a brush with death that makes you mindful of how precious time really is.

As my husband and I drove down that road, I shared the accident, my family’s recollections, the emotions and gravity of where I’ve come from with him and my heart overflowed with thankfulness. My tears broke loose past my lashes and ran down my cheeks, and I felt God speak to my heart just as He has done so many times in the past. He reminded me that He spared my life that day. He spoke a fresh reminder that He spared my life because He had a greater plan for it. Not only was it just not my time to die, but it was my time to live. Live for Him. Live in Him. Live to share Him. He had ordered my steps and days long before that time with all the things He would do only through me. This thought made me think about David’s prayer in Psalm 139. In verse 16 David says “Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.” KJV.

God knew before the foundations of this Earth all the days He had ordained for me and all the works He would do through me. It has always just been up to me to be obedient. This post is my step of faith, to be obedient and allow God to complete the work He started through me.

You see, I began writing when I was young. I wrote poems and short stories mostly, but as I read those things now as an adult – I realize that I had wisdom beyond my years. Back then, I thought it was just a hobby to pass the days by, but what I didn’t realize is that it was a calling on my life. Writing a Christian blog was a mere idea He embedded in my heart six years ago. It was something I announced in a Facebook© post so flippantly that even I knew I wasn’t serious. But two summers ago, while walking through Lifeway© bookstore, God named my blog and my heart began to germinate this seed.

I did research, I journaled like mad. I spent 6 months in a writing coaching group with an established, successful Christian writer / speaker who encouraged me to move forward, I wrote in my ‘spare time’, but I didn’t do anything sacrificially in sheer obedience.

It is only now, through the reminders of the time He spared my life; that I know what I am supposed to do. I am supposed to be the salt and light that Jesus speaks about in Matthew 5: 13-16 – “Ye are the salt of the earth; but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” So here begins this mission to be the salt and light & encourage others to be the salt and light by simply shining Jesus through Joanie.