Happy Birthday Gideon!

"But Lord", asked Gideon "How can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manessah, and I am the least in my family. "

The Lord answered, "I will be with you and you will strike down all the Midianites together" Gideon 6:15&16

In about 4 minutes, my son will officially be six years old. On October 24, 2004 our son, Gideon Phillip Butler was born at 1:51pm. He was at  29 weeks, 2 days gestational age. The picture you see above is his first picture, taken minutes after he was born.

To be honest, it was a traumatizing day. They announced at about 10:30am that they would be delivering him early...at about 5:30pm (they wanted my stomach empty). My liver was starting to fail.  Percy had gone to church so I was by myself, and the doctor came into explain the procedure to me. While he was explaining, Gideon's heart rate tanked and the doctor told me if it did that again, they were going to deliver now. It did it again two minutes later and they started to prep me for the surgery immediately. They had me ready in about 30 minutes and were basically wheeling me out by the time Percy arrived. I asked the nurse if Gideon would be breathing when he was delivered and they said that if he wasn't, they would resuscitate him.

For those of you who have had a C-section, you know that it takes some time.  I have no idea how long it took to get me ready to deliver him. I was staring at the wall praying. The nurse told Percy to get the camera ready- and we heard this little cry- but there was a cry. I asked the doctor if that was the baby- and she said the words I will never forget- "He is scrawny but feisty!" Gideon weighed 2 pounds, 1.8 ounces and he was about 14 inches long. I had never seen a baby that small but of course I have since learned that babies smaller and earlier are born, survive and thrive.(Think of that when you are voting in 2 weeks)

He spent 58 days in the NICU- that time in my life is a blur. I was pumping at night, pumping during the day and driving back and forth between my house and Swedish 2 times per day. Gideon went home at 5.5 pounds on Christmas Eve eve.

Clearly I cannot blog about his birth every year but this year has been a little special. When a baby is born that tiny, there are many immediate worries that you have but you also worry about the future.

Is your child going to be normal ? 

(whatever that is)

We made it through many hurdles, and for me, Kindergarten has been the last "preemie" one. With his late speech I worried so much that he would not be able to keep up academically or that he would be somehow different from the other kids.

But that has not been the case.

He is an average little boy, which is exactly what we had hoped for him. We named him Gideon after Gideon in the book of Judges. Look it up in your Bible, but in essence God sent Gideon to fight a fierce people with only 300 men. It took a tremendous amount of faith for Gideon to step up and be a leader. He was the least of his clan, he was even the least of his family. Yet God chose him. The world saw something ordinary because they only looked externally. God could see Gideon's heart and knew His own plan. Together that was something extraordinary.

We chose Gideon's name as an act of faith. We believed that as dire as the situation seemed at the moment of his birth, that God was in the business of doing remarkable acts of healing and redemption. We also chose it to remind our son Gideon to have faith and courage even when the odds seem completely against him. For although I wrote that we wished for an average little boy, I should have explained further. Internally, we wish for our boy to grow to be strong and mighty in his love for God. We wish for him to defend the powerless, the weak, the poor, the orphan, and the oppressed.  We can already seen an inkling of his relationship with Jesus.  I love to watch his head bow and ask Jesus to forgive him for a sin he has committed. I loved it when he understood that Jesus had the power to raise our dead chickens from the grave. (Digression- We believe that Jesus does have the power to raise the chickens from dead and reattach their heads, but explained that He would not be doing so. And for some reason it always makes us chuckle a little about the reattaching of the heads) I love our conversations about what WE DO that shows Jesus that we love him. I love it that my son wants to show Jesus that he loves him.

Gideon, we are so proud of you. When I spoke with your teachers and they told me how polite you are,how hard you try and what a good work ethic you have, my heart almost burst. It is those moments that make all the other crazy days of the year worth it.

Happy Birthday, we love you.

** This picture is a self portrait. Gideon took it yesterday, October 23, 2010.