Our awesome God

Well, we here at the Skelly household hereby proclaim "Pray for James" a resounding success. No credit to us, but all to the LORD, with HUGE THANKS and gratefulness to all who participated (by signing up and by just praying without signing up)!!

In spite of the sign up not working entirely like I had envisioned, and the links from the blog here not working like they were 'supposed to' (due, primarily, to my ineptness and inexperience), 19 people signed up for 22 of 47 slots to pray for James. Others called or e-mailed and said they couldn't sign up for a particular time, but that they would be praying extra for James. A dear friend from church and member of our community posted a note on her blog, asking readers to help cover James with prayer.

We, including the children, were blessed and humbled as we watched the sign up e-mails come in the first evening. There were many names we'd heard, of people we do not know ourselves who have been praying for James and our family.

Yesterday, Hannah and I saw from a computer at the clinic, that our own "Skelly children" signed up to fill a gap. Later, they told me that one had prayed "that someone would sign up for 4:30" and when they checked after their time, someone *did* sign up for 4:30 (Thanks, Mrs. Stevens!)

Along the way, some would suggest we e-mail a bunch of folks, friends who might not be reading the blog, to tell them. I didn't feel like we were supposed to do that, so I didn't. I didn't have a good reason, just a check. This morning, Katie commented that it seemed that God wanted us to see that this was bigger than us, bigger than our church, bigger than what we could do ourselves and that we would be humbled and He would get the glory.

As the day progressed yesterday, the children asked what we should do about the night-time slots that weren't filled. They thought I was going to assign them times to wake up and pray! LOL! I had this sense that the Lord was going to fill these slots and I looked forward to hearing from folks over the next days and weeks about how they woke up in the night and prayed for James. I expected He would wake *me* up to pray, but He didn't. I had a wonderful night of full sleep (James and Hannah did too!) I do not even remember my head hitting the pillow.

In this morning's e-mail, I learned from a sweet friend in Minnesota that her church's sister church, in a nearby larger town, has round the clock prayer. One hundred sixty eight hours a week, they have church members who come in for an hour of prayer around the clock! So this friend put a note in the chapel asking folks who were there to pray for James during their hour! Providentially, one of the people who prays early each Friday morning was Katie's and Hannah's piano teacher (and lover of our eggs and chickens) when we lived in Minnesota!

This morning, Hannah told me that when she was praying for James before "pray for James day", she prayed that lots of people would sign up. She said that even though all the slots weren't signed up for, '22 people is still a lot!'

Although I know that all of us are special to God, I believe that James is 'one of the least of these' that Jesus spoke about and that he has a special place in the Lord's heart. Sadly, people like James are easy to 'pass by' in this world. So for me, as his Momma, to see so many folks so willing to pray fervently for my little boy touches me deeply in a very special place in my heart and I am SO VERY grateful!

THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart and very depths of my soul!!! May our awesome and mighty Lord bless you 'real good'!

I guess I can't finish without telling you how James did yesterday and is doing today. In a word, GREAT!

We did have some normal doctor's office delays and there wasn't enough blood for his chemistries, so we had to get more and rerun the test. This delayed his spinal tap and chemo, which he ended up getting around 12:30. Everything related to the clinic went off with out a hitch and while we had to wait to do things, when we were done, it had all seemed 'too easy'. We were not able to see anyone from GI (some big miscommunication which we will need to work on for next time!), the Wound Ostomy Nurse came to see James and was pleased with his site, has a baseline for what it looked like on Thursday and said, 'call if ANY thing changes!'

Just before James got his spinal tap, he got versed (the happy juice) by g-tube. It wasn't too long before he was pretty relaxed and by the time Nurse Stacie was done with the spinal tap, James was sound asleep. Shortly after, Nurse Liz, who has been doing pediatric oncology nursing for 30-some years, came in to give James his vincristine with a butterfly needle. She was great and had no trouble getting the needle or the chemo in and we learned a lot about the history of treating pediatric cancer from our visit with her. While we don't look forward to more vincristine, we will appreciate the opportunity to learn more from Nurse Liz.

Dr. Keller said that his counts are TOO good (WBC 5.61; Hgb 11.2; Platelets 820K; ANC 4040). He is concerned that James may not be getting enough chemo to actually serve a purpose. So, Dr. Keller increased the dose of the same drug that he increased last time (mercaptopurine or 6 MP). If all continues to go well, Lord willing, we will do local counts and chemo at home in one week and three weeks and return to the clinic April 3rd!

Please do continue to keep James in your prayers. Funny thing about chemo is each kind has it's own purpose and wreaks it's own havoc in it's own time. Thanks for encouraging us and ministering to us by sharing this time of focused prayer for James!


Love, Stephanie