L I F E W I R E

by Kelly Moran

for 10 January 1996

Snow Bound

The blizzard of '96 is battering the Northeast this week. All week, we've been seeing stories of people stranded in their own homes, or in an airport, or a snowbank. One baby girl was nearly snowbound in her mother's womb.

You know what it's like when the sky is clear in Houston, but your flight is cancelled because the Boston airport is closed. Well, Nancy Fullmer was snowed in, but her baby would not wait for the roads to open.

When Nancy's labor pains started Sunday, she called her midwife. She and her husband John waited, probably timing contractions and breathing in and out together.

Then the midwife called from the gas station where she was stuck. The worst of the storm had hit Annapolis, Maryland, where they received nearly 20 inches of snow. She called to coach the birth over the phone.

John Fullmer was quoted in the Associated Press, talking about the birth of his daughter. "It came on really quick. By 8:00 p.m., I was saying, 'It'll wait.' My wife said, 'Nope. It's coming. You've got to catch it."

"It'll wait." You can tell a father who has been through this before. A new father would be ready to explode by this time. This guy has a three-year-old son. Birth? Been there. Done that. "Wait 'til half-time."

Instead of waiting for nicer weather, the baby daughter was coming, and John caught it. He cut the umbilical cord with a pair of kitchen shears.

So far, tonight (Tuesday) they still haven't named their new daughter. John said, "We're trying to come up with some kind of appropriate blizzard name. We're definitely going to remember she was born in the blizzard of '96."

I thought long and hard about this and I have two suggestions for the Fullmers. In memory of the blizzard of '96 they could name their daughter "Gayle" or "Wendy." I wish I had a phone number to call in my recommendations.

Sure beats "Snow White."

It'll Wait

Babies don't wait. When the labor pains start, you can't exactly "hold it." We do not pick the day of a child's birth, any more than we could choose the day of our own death.

When the time is right, babies are born. It is the order of life; predictably unpredictable. Although you can tell from the pregnancy that a baby is on the way, you cannot foresee the hour of birth.

The Future

Martha Snell Nicholson wrote some of the finest Christian poetry ever written. She once wrote about her hope of the coming of the Lord. This is what she says: "The best part is the blessed hope of his soon coming. How I ever lived before I grasped that wonderful truth, I do not know. How anyone lives without it these trying days I cannot imagine. Each morning I think, with a leap of the heart, 'He may come today.' And each evening, 'When I awake I may be in glory.' Each day must be lived as though it were to be my last, and there is so much to be done to purify myself and to set my house in order. I am on tiptoe with expectancy. There are no more grey days -- for they're all touched with color; no more dark days -- for the radiance of His coming is on the horizon; no more dull days, with glory just around the corner; and no more lonely days, with His footsteps coming ever nearer, and the thought that soon, soon, I shall see His face and be forever through with pain and tears."

The Apostle John wrote, "Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure." (1 John 3:2-3)

Imagine it: "when he appears, we shall be like him."

There'll be no delays. When Jesus is ready to enter the world for the second time, He'll come, regardless of the weather. If you have hope in this imminent second coming, you'll purify yourself because of the purity of Jesus.

What about it? Are you ready? The Apostle Paul wrote, "While people are saying, 'Peace and safety,' destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape." (1 Thessalonians 5:3)

God, Prepare me.

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