God met me in Walmart

Liam woke up this morning, crying and crying. We shortly knew why... he had patches of this funky rash that was very swollen (very, very, very). Our pediatrician is on vacation of course, but fortunately there are always doctors available 7 days a week at the practice should you have an emergency.

Anyway, as soon as we walk in the door all the kids run to find a little seat in the waiting room except for Liam. He scans the waiting room, recalling the data of "why is it familiar here?," has the lightbulb moment, then enthusiastically waves and shouts "BYE BYE!!!" And tries to get the door back open ASAP.

Poor kid. We were there for him, too!

It was a nice slow afternoon there and we were brought right in. As soon as the nurse tried to weigh him the tears began. Oh my.

The doctor came in, and probably because I'm holding a baby and can't get Liam to stop crying, looks at me and says "Do you run an in home daycare or babysit?"

"No, these are my children." I say. "Ah." was his reply.

Ah, indeed. I looked at crying Liam and thought "That's how I feel too, I don't want to be in here anymore!" I was too tired for criticism.

So he has a bacterial skin infection, poor baby. We iced the cake by all waiting for the prescription at not so Super Walmart. Maybe they should call it "Super slow Walmart" since it took three times as long to fill as they said. I would have never intentionally waited over an hour with all the kids. Past nap time, past snack time, past mommy-needs-a-cup-of-afternoon-coffee-time, it was starting to get difficult to wait and only the image burned into my memory of what Liam's skin looked like kept me hanging in there to wait. In the homestretch of waiting, a wonderful man from our church walked in the door and said "Hey Katie! How's it going?"

I don't think I had to say anything for him to really know. He took the baby from me so he could walk her while I held Liam, who was next to hysterical at that point (after all, his skin HURTS!). And I just had to whisper a prayer of thanks to God for church family. Which also reminded me, at that moment of being very tired and stressed out God met me in Walmart, sending that extra pair of arms and help in that home stretch of waiting, that last 5 minutes when I was about to say "forget it, we're going home and we'll start the medicine tomorrow."

He knew that I needed reinforcements or I wouldn't make it and I get all choked up thinking that with all that goes on in the world, the Lord remembers me in those moments. As Jacob says in reply to the question of "How can you afford to have so many kids?" How can we afford not to? I would not otherwise have the humbling opportunities to put myself out there and trust that when I need him, God will meet me in Walmart.