8 21 12 Dottie Mae, the result of an ultimate sacrifice.
Don’t forget to
pray.
Scripture: Romans 5:6-8 (NIV) 6 You see, at just the right time, when
we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone
die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to
die. 8 But God demonstrates his own
love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Yesterday's devotion was about living a sacrificial life. I received the
following illustration a month or so ago and wanted to share it with you today.
It deals with a sacrifice made in behalf of another and is a wonderful illustration
of love. The article has been edited and given the following title by me. david
Dottie Mae, the
result of an ultimate sacrifice.
Life’s message is often, “I've got good news and bad news.” Although
that expression is often a fact of life for many of us, for Stacie Crimm it was
a definite reality. Stacie Crimm didn’t get to share much time with her infant
daughter, Dottie Mae — she’d made the ultimate sacrifice to give the little girl
life.
Crimm, a 41-year-old single mother, received the grim
diagnosis of terminal head and neck cancer just months after her little girl
was conceived. Jubilation, then heartbreak: Crimm never thought she’d have a
child. Doctors had told her she wouldn’t be able to conceive. So it was a
glorious shock when she discovered she was pregnant. But the jubilation was
short-lived. Crimm began to experience terrifying symptoms: crippling
headaches, tunnel vision and tremors that shook her entire body. She went to
the doctor and got the devastating diagnosis: head and neck cancer.
Crimm had a chance at survival — if she chose to undergo
chemotherapy. But that would have put her growing baby in danger. She called
her brother to let him know that she’d decided that the risk to her daughter
was too great. “She said, ‘If I have to make a decision, you know what that’s
going to be.”
Crimm did her best to hang on so her little girl would have
life. But the cancer was aggressive, and in August, Crimm collapsed in
her home. She was rushed to the hospital, where doctors performed a C-section
to deliver her little girl — 10 weeks premature and weighing just 2 pounds.
The baby was sent to the hospital’s neonatal intensive care
unit, in a different building from where Crimm was. NICU nurses couldn’t
imagine that a mother who had given so much would never have a chance to see
and hold her baby. They put little Dottie Mae in an incubator and wheeled her
over to the unit where her mother lay dying.
They placed the little girl on her mother’s chest. Crimm
watched her daughter for a few seconds and then she “lifted up her hands and
just held her and just looked at her and smiled.” Crimm’s brother remembers the
bittersweet moment when his sister held her child. “I felt like it was probably
the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in my life,” Ray Phillips told Matt
Lauer on the TODAY Show. “I don’t think I’ll ever see anything that beautiful
again.”
Cancer took Stacie Crimm’s life three days after she gave birth
to her daughter, Dottie Mae.
Dottie Mae is now living with Ray Phillips, his wife
Jennifer, and their six children, just as Crimm requested. She didn’t have many
special instructions on how she wanted her daughter to be raised, but she did
have big plans for her little girl. (Linda Carroll is a
regular contributor to msnbc.com and TODAY.com. She is co-author of the new
book "The Concussion Crisis: Anatomy of a Silent Epidemic” © 2012
NBCNews.com)
Note: Stacie Crimm is a
wonderful example of an individual who joins thousands of others who over the
centuries have done the same thing; unselfishly giving their lives in order to
protect or to save another person. Without any question Stacie's act of love
was a great sacrifice, but every human sacrifice falls short of the sacrifice Jesus
Christ made in behalf of sinful man. Stacie Crimm loved her unborn child and
was willing to die so her baby would have a chance at life. Jesus loves all of
mankind so much He was willing to die so that each one would have a chance for true
life, both here on earth and for eternity. Without the death of Christ there
would be no second chance. His willingness to die for each one of us
demonstrated the great depth of his love.
Word from the Lord: Beloved,
the death of my son resulted in your redemption. You were redeemed from out of
a wicked and evil people and washed clean by the blood of his sacrifice. His
blood was able to purify a people for himself, a people eager to live a life of
doing good and being a blessing in the lives of others. He has called you for
such a time as this; go in his power, resting in his strength, and seek his
face in all you do and he will be with you. He will never leave you nor forsake
you, do not be afraid and do not be discourage.
Did the Lord speak to you today?
Why not write it down and claim it for His Glory.
Prayer: What do you need to pray to the Lord today?
Listen to your heart. He loves you!
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