Jonathan Cooper Update

After 14 weeks of being away from home, God has answered yet another prayer - On Friday morning, April 8, WE ARE FINALLY GOING HOME! I can't even begin to express the joy we have felt today after receiving that word. For a couple of weeks now, we have felt very strongly that it was time for Jonathan to come home. However, we did not know what the doctors would say until our conference today. We have been praying, as we know all of you have been as well, that God would make His will known to us very clearly and that it would be confirmed by everyone being in agreement with the same decision. We prayed last night with Jonathan that God would allow him to come home on Friday and we were prepared to ask for that in the conference today. As we walked into the room and sat down, we breathed one last prayer to God for this request before the doctor began to talk. Before we could say anything, he said that everyone was in agreement, and they all felt like Jonathan should go home on Friday. Isn't God awesome! When you get to the point where you must trust God for every detail, He will never fail to show Himself strong on your behalf. After we told him, there were huge smiles on Jonathan's face and excitement in his voice as he hugged us and said, "I can't believe I finally get to go home!" We have cried again today, but this time, tears of joy and we stand in awe and wonder of the mighty hand of God that has moved over our lives. All of the therapy classes went well today. Tomorrow we look forward to a day at the Dallas Zoo. He will get to hang out with all his therapist and have his therapy at the Zoo. Mom, Elizabeth and Sarah are going to go as well.
We hope that each of you realize what a significant part you have played in this experience in our family. God has heard every prayer that each of you has faithfully lifted up for us, and He has answered every one. All the emails, cards, phone calls, meals, house cleaning, money and everything else you have so graciously provided to us has completely overwhelmed us. There are so many of you that we don't even know and yet you reached out, encouraged us and held us up during the darkest hours of this experience. There are not adequate words to thank you enough.
Please don't stop praying for Jonathan and our family. There is much left to be done. Please continue to pray for Jonathan's walking and continued strengthening of his body. Continue to pray for complete healing of his brain, vision and diabetes. Pray for our family as we come home. We have been apart for a long time. Pray for our adjustment and that this would be a precious time of healing for all of us. Begin now to pray for our outpatient therapist. God was gracious to give us some wonderful therapist at Our Children's House. Pray that God will hand pick the therapist that Jonathan needs to continue in his recovery. Pray that Dad and Mom will have wisdom and patience as we care for him.
Although we may not update every day, we will continue to update Jonathan's progress for a while, so please continue to watch and pray. For those of you who are in the areas surrounding Lewisville, we would like to invite you to visit Lakeland Baptist Church on May 1, 2005 for Welcome Home Jonathan Day. We would love for you to meet our Jonathan in person, and it would give us the opportunity to hug you and thank you for your faithful support. For more information about Lakeland Baptist Church, you can visit their website at lakelandbaptist.org. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised!