It’s an interesting story, one I haven’t shared with the world quite yet. Just recently David was given the book Nine Innings: Baseball and Spirituality by a fan in the Arizona Fall League. With it came a note from the lady who so graciously gave it to him explaining how she was compelled by the Lord to share it with David, specifically. Without ever even meeting my husband, this fan was drawn to him by a greater power. This is one of many experiences that David and I have had as of late, and I think it is time, for those of you who care to know, how David and I were finally saved.
I have touched on my faith just a bit throughout this blog, but I haven’t wanted to delve into it too much in fear of offending my readers. I’m not one to push my values and beliefs on anyone so feel free to stop reading here if you are not interested in what I am about to share.
Let me begin by giving you some background information. I was raised Roman Catholic. Although much of my family and many of my friends attended church every Sunday growing up, I did not. My parents have never been strict Catholics, although they do have strong Christian faith and many of their values are driven by their Christian beliefs. I was baptized as an infant and had my first communion in first grade. I never did my confirmation, mainly because I left the Catholic school system when I was ten. If it weren’t for that, I would’ve continued the status quo.
My entire life I professed I was a Catholic with little validity to substantiate my claim. It was all I really knew growing up. When my father was diagnosed with stage-4 non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in my teens, I never considered seeking consolation in my faith. At such a young age I couldn’t see the severity of the situation that confronted my family; my father was given a life-sentence. After months of Chemotherapy and hospitalizations, my father went into remission. This was a miracle. It wasn’t long after his first bout of treatment that the cancer came back, and stronger than before – if that’s even possible. Again my father sought treatment and again went into remission. This was the second miracle I experienced before me.
As all this was taking place, my maternal grandmother was busy praying every day for my father’s recovery. This was something I very much took for granted at my age. I knew what she was doing, but I didn’t accept it as having worked. My grandmother was a woman of incredible faith. She lost her husband back in Cuba to a massive heart attack at age 42 as the Castro régime was underway. Having come from great financial wealth, she never worked a day in her life. Suddenly, she was on a plane out of Cuba with her three daughters in hand and no money to get by. Despite all her struggles, she never lost her faith. Unfortunately, we lost my grandmother my sophomore year in college quite tragically and I never had the chance to say goodbye, need not mention, appreciate her strength as a woman who loved the Lord Jesus Christ.
Before my grandmother’s passing, my father had managed to come in and out of remission a total of four times. In a matter of 10 years, he had Chemotherapy trice and radiation once. I always took for granted my father’s strength for having endured such brutal trials, but I had also failed to see the strength my mother had for not crumbling after years of standing by her husband’s side as he suffered terribly.
One day, not too long ago, I was on the phone with my father as he was describing the chest pain he was experiencing. I told him it was probably heartburn – as if in his 65+ years he had never experienced heartburn before. After days of waiting to go to the hospital, he finally went. After two days of tests, they couldn’t find anything conclusive. My mother, being the pillar of strength that she is, insisted on a stress test. The day the stress test was to take place, my father didn’t have sneakers to walk on the treadmill. Instead, they decided to run the test using an IV-dye. Let me tell you what a miracle that was. The test discovered that my father was on the brink of a massive and deadly heart attack. The doctors told us that had he walked on the treadmill he would have likely died on the spot and had he ignored his symptoms he would’ve surely suffered the same fate at home on the couch.
I can go on and on with stories of how my father has defied odds, because what I have written doesn’t even begin to sum up what he has gone through and the amount of times he has been rushed to the hospital in an ambulance. What I can tell you with certainty is that he is a miracle. Even more remarkable, is the fact that his own oncologist, who is a world-renowned researcher for Lymphoma, admittedly told my parents that he was speechless and that my father was indeed a miracle. The fact that a scientist who does not believe in God trumping Science could admit this, is reason enough to contemplate the mercy my father received.
Due to all that I had witnessed in my 24 years of existence, I was certain there was a God, but I failed to identify with one God. Here is where baseball has played a substantial role in my development as a Christian. Last Spring Training, fellow baseball wife, Breanna Maruzsak, invited me to the Professional Athletes Outreach Baseball Chapel event for baseball wives. I was happy to go, but I was a bit reluctant to talk about the Bible and pray to the Lord with a room full of women I didn’t know. After that experience, however, I felt so much better about my faith and I wanted to encourage David to attend Baseball Chapel moving forward.
David’s story is rather different than mine, and I can’t really give his testimonial, but I can tell you that he has always had far more reservations about his faith than I have. He is one person that absolutely needed to discover God in his own way and at just the right time. As if God hadn’t placed enough signs in front of me my entire life that I failed to follow, I took a leap of faith when I decided to move with David for the first time this past season. Ultimately, it was during the 2012 baseball season that David’s and my life completely changed.
The Trenton Thunder team came together to defy odds this year. We were divinely placed to share this year with a core group of baseball players and their wives that had strong faith and were life long Christians. These men and women, with the help of the local Baseball Chaplain and his wife, helped David and I rediscover our faith. At some point mid-way through the season, David and I accepted Jesus Christ as our savior and we haven’t looked back.
I can now recognize that I was given a second chance and so was my family with the miracle of my father’s survival, and I will never take another day for granted. I truly appreciate the time that I have with my parents more than ever and I know how blessed we are to have the opportunity to spend another day as a family unit that is still whole.
P.S. I’m sorry if I have typos. I wrote this rather quickly and under overwhelming emotion. Thank you.
