The Little Messenger

With tears flowing down her cheeks, my youngest daughter said, "Mom, I'm pregnant." My first reaction was silence. My second was immobility. My third was crying and my last reaction was screaming, "I can't believe you did this!" I was raised in a Christian family and had morals and values that despised the words spoken from my daughter's lips. She was 15 years old. How was she ever going to take care of a baby? What about school? Her whole future was headed downhill as far as I was concerned. Quickly my mind flooded with thoughts of ways to rid her and our family of the situation she brought upon us. A single mom of two daughters, I struggled for 10 long years after my divorce. "How could you?" I asked her.

For the first several days, I was in shock. I then contacted my church and one of the pastors had a meeting with my daughter and I. He suggested strongly that we give the baby up for adoption. Again my daughter cried and cried. She said, "I can't give my baby up, I can feel it moving inside. I don't want to go around wondering if this child or that child is mine." I could understand her feelings having had two children of my own, but she didn't understand how drastically her life was about to change. She couldn't comprehend how she was also changing my life and her sister's life. I felt she got pregnant on purpose. I told the pastor to give us time to think about all that he had said and told him I would get back with him.

We went to the first doctor appointment to see how far along she was in her pregnancy. We thought she was about 8 weeks or so. She never gained weight, no signs of pregnancy at all. Once again, I felt as if someone hit me with a stun gun of 10,000 volts. The doctor told us she was 7 months pregnant and we had little time to prepare. The sonogram showed she was going to give birth to a baby girl. Somehow all the anger, all the hurt, all the emotions involved seemed to disappear. Adoption was now the farthest thing from our mind and I felt as if God had a purpose for this baby. I believed it was meant for us to raise this child, not another family, and that God would provide and He did.

There was a huge baby shower thrown at work for me as the Grandmother. Baby clothes, high chair, bed, stroller, bottles, everything you could possibly need to get started and more were received. We decided to come up with a name for this baby girl and struggled with several names. I've always loved the name Gabrielle. It is a derivative of Gabriel which means "messenger of God". My daughter wanted the name, Destini. She said, "Because she is destined to be." I thought about the full meaning, "Destined to be a messenger of God" and loved it. And so, Destini Gabrielle was born in January 2000.

Two years have passed and Destini was two years old this month. In the short time she has been with us some "strange" things have happened. When she first began to walk, she would go over to the angel figurines I have and just stare, almost as if in a trance. Then one day I was sitting at my desk and she was talking mostly baby talk. I turned to look at her, when her eyes were focused in the air as if she were talking to someone in the room. The chills swept over me as I watched in awe, then she shook her little head and said, "Yea!" and smiled. She stood staring for a few more seconds and then went about her way. There were several of these occurrences and I felt deep within my heart that she was really seeing something or someone. Time went on and she was learning more words, mostly puppy and mama, nothing out of the ordinary.

Then came the day when I was cleaning my living room. I have a picture of Jesus that hung on the wall in the back of the living room that hardly anyone noticed because it was in the corner. I had taken it down to wipe the walls down and Destini walked over to the picture and stared that trance-like stare and out of the blue said, "Jesus." I said, "What?" Again she said firmly, "Jesus." I said, "Yes, that's right, that's Jesus!" This child never spoke that name, no one has ever taught her that name, she could barely speak her own little words, yet she knew. How I don't know, but she knew. When I pondered all these things in my heart, the verse of Scripture came to me, "Suffer not the these little ones to come to me, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

I cannot explain how she knew what she knew, nor can I explain the conversations she had with someone I sincerely feel she saw. But I do know that these two years have brought so much laughter, peace and joy to our home, when there was nothing but arguing, lies, and deceit before she was born. I have to believe with all my heart that it was for this very purpose that we were suppose to keep her instead of giving her up. Through this child, God has restored my own child to me and He has restored our family. I thank God everyday for the wonderful gift He has given us and I pray He continues to use Destini Gabrielle to complete His purpose for the rest of her life for she is His little messenger.

[ Maria Urso, copyright © 2002 (mpu1@att.net) -- from '2THEHEART' ]