By Mary DeRidder –

It was a cold January Sunday morning in 1972.  I was a minister’s wife at the time and two weeks overdue with my first baby. I decided not to sing in the choir as I was beginning to feel cramps.  A few hours later my water broke, so we raced toward the hospital. I thought an ambulance was following us but being Sunday, no driver was available.  About fifteen minutes from the hospital, I told my husband that I thought the baby was coming out but he didn’t believe me.  When the baby started to cry, I said “BELIEVE ME NOW?”

We decided to stop at a smaller hospital that was on the way.  A doctor came from ER and cut the baby’s cord.  I wanted to continue to the main hospital so a nurse came to our car and held our baby in her arms in the back seat. We never got a bill from that hospital!

When we arrived at the main hospital, I wondered how I was going to get into the hospital door.  A Red Cross worker had just brought someone to the hospital from a skiing accident. He heard about us and came over and asked me if I wanted to be lifted onto a gurney next to the car. I said, “Yes!.”

Praise God, my baby daughter was normal.

Jesus told us to love our neighbors as ourselves.  The nurse and the Red Cross worker were my neighbors that day as they went the second mile…..