My daughter Emily’s journey started Wednesday, January 21, 1998. Emily was born at 24 weeks gestation. She weighed 1 lb. 9 oz. at birth and was 12 inches long.

My artwork captures the moment Emily grasped her grandfather’s finger in her isolette incubator at the hospital. She was only a few days old. Emily has titled this artwork, “My beginning.”

Emily struggles with cerebral palsy, but she never complains—she keeps pushing forward. She loves the Lord and depends on His strength and love everyday.

“I can do all things through Him who gives me strength.” Philippians 4:13

Lord, I know you made me.

“For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from You when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in Your book before one of them came to be.” Psalm 139:13-16

Lord, I struggle with the disability I was born with, but I trust you.

“The Lord said to him, ‘Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord?’” Exodus 4:11

Lord, I know you have a plan for me.

“‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’” Jeremiah 29:11

Lord, thank you for the forgiveness of my sins.

In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.” Ephesians 1:7

Lord, I know you love me.

“For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16

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