michelle, my friend, has risen today.

Today I had the awesome priveledge of spending 2 hours with my dear friend Michelle Kobosky.

And one reason I hate PC computers is because I am on one right now and am unable to drag a photo of happy michelle from her blog onto my own. My Mac would let me do this in a second.
Anyways, she's the happiest, smiliest, glowingist, most encouraging person I have ever known. And i really mean that. She speaks nothing but joy, even when in pain and isolation.

Today Michelle and I laid on her bed talking. This was the first time I have seen her with her jaws unwired, which happened on Tuesday. So, she's in lots of pain b/c the pain meds give her an allergic reaction, so she's only on Tylenol. But she's so glad to have freedom to move her mouth that she doesn't seem to mind the pain so much. She said the entire left side of her face is still numb, and watching her drink a "Boost" drink, I can testify to that!
Michelle would grab my hand and run it across the scars and bumps on her new face. "It's metal. All titanium.", she'd say as my hand timidly rubbed against her face. "Will they ever take it out?" I ask. Michelle's reply, with a hint of trauma unit attitude, "No, I have no face otherwise." Then she smiles and says "God gave me a new one."

We laughed about lots of things. We reminisced and we joked. We thought it was not coincidence that her sister was on the phone with someone in Africa while I was visiting today! She literally sat up in her bed and pumped her arms in excitement at my news about Cape Town. She said, "Finally, I have a reason to go to Africa. Marcie, I'm going to Africa!!!" Marcie, her twin sister, smiles and continues her own conversation.

As I laid there with Michelle, about a million thoughts raced through my head. At first I was afraid to say certain things, for this is definately the first conversation I have had with Michelle where I knew she was cognizant enough to really invest in our time together. And that intimadated me. What do you say to someone who has just had one of the closest brushes with death imaginable? All alone on that bike, in that Vandy life-flight helicopter, in those weeks of drugged incoherence and recovery, in those late night terrors and sweats, in the quiet of her mind as she begins to awaken from this horrid dream. What do you say? There was so much I wanted to ask, and looking into Michelle's wild eyes, I knew I could. I knew that no part of her story that she could remember would she keep to herself. It's too powerful to remain a secret. Michelle will speak this to the world, and God would have nothing less from her.

"It's been the scariest thing I've known, Ashley. Only recently do I remember things that happened since the accident. For weeks I have been like Lazarus. I've been dead. But God has been with me. Satan can only attack my mind now because my body is healing. And it's the scariest thing to battle him during my low points."

Michelle is learning many things again. Today she walked 100-feet, which might seem like nothing to a marathon runner like Michelle. Recently she came to the realization that her mind is not what it once was. Memory. Speech. Normal tasks and mental activities. She's relearning many things.

"It's the remaking of Michelle", she says. "The old sins and desires--they are gone. Like physically, they are gone. I don't even want them anymore. Watching TV, seeing sinful stuff around me, I cannot even handle watching it. I sit with the TV off most of the time. Just praising God instead."

Michelle is beginning to realize something I blogged a few weeks ago, when I had a nauseating encounter with Michelle during one of her lowest points. Today she articulated is like an old hymn being sung, with strong conviction, deep wisdom, and simple idea: "Why am I alive, Ashley? I should be dead. I should be dead but I'm not. Sitting here, meeting nurses and doctors and therapists, watching my family take care of me, I realize that God could take us out in a second, but he hasn't yet. I used to go to work, hang out, live my life--all the while thinking that we were just kinda hanging out until God did something with us. But now, now I realize fully that the only reason any of us are still here today is because God is determined to use us for a serious and specific purpose that no one else could fulfill.
"My lips are ready. Lips once used carelessly are unable to say anything except "God saved me". Hands and feet are ready to share him with the world. I sit in the down times of physical therapy, and I just start talking about God. I don't care anymore. I don't care what people think. I have a story and I have an audience. What else shoudld I do with these 2 things?
"Ashley, is God getting the glory he deserves."

Tears run down my face as it warms from the excessive heat being cranked in the hotel room. Tears drop onto her wrist, covered in a cast after suffering a fracture some months earlier. I look up at Michelle, I close my eyes and spread my arms out real wide, and I say "Like a ripple in a vast ocean. Everyone is different."

I open my eyes and Michelle's crooked smile is quivering. "Then I'd do it again in a second."

And another life changed for good. Another sinner brought to the feet of her savior. Another broken heart on the mend. Another life spared for a reason.
I don't get it. It doesn't make sense to me why some people die and others don't. Suffering is ever-present, and to accept this makes believing in Christ a whole lot more significant.

What would we do if we each realized we really had a purpose that irreplaceable? How differently might we treat our neighbors, handle hard situations or uncertainties, share love with those around us, if we saw in our own lives what Michelle has found in hers?

a few words from michelle
michelle's blog