Lifest and Jason's accident...two blessings from God

Well pretty soon it will come up onto a year since Jason's accident. Hard to believe it has been so long already. Seems like yesterday. I still have flashbacks and sometimes nightmares. But, in the end I know how very lucky and blessed we were. I will tell the story and what has happened since. One of these days I will start working on my testimony.But for now I think I need to wait until God gives me that extra nudge to go ahead and share all the personals that come with it. Anways.. on to the point.Last year was a good and bad year for Jason and I. There were a lot of ups and downs. But one thing we decided on together is that we really wanted to experience serving the Lord. At the time we felt God opened a door for us to do that. We were asked to be runners for our Church Community Church. Let me give you a little background on it...There is a festival here every year called Lifest. It is a wonderful Chrisitian festival that has so many awesome artists and speakers from all over to help lift us up spirtually. This was our fist experience at Lifest and what a treat! An artist runner is someone who drives the artists to where they need to go while they are in town here. That could be picking up the artist and the bands from the airport, taking them to the grounds, taking them to church to eat (our church has a fully operational cafe that serves food). We even got to go pick up food, take them to the movies etc. When the artists fly into town they are without transportation (unless they come in by bus) but then again, who wants to go to Walmart on a giant bus?? So we volunteer to serve the artists by being there for their needs. They are so gracious and thankful to us. It does take a certain person to be able to do this job. You can't be bothering the artists for autographs, pictures etc. They need their privacy as well and they are taking a huge amount of time out of their day to serve us with their wonderful music and messages so the last thing they need is the people that are running them to be bothering them. Alot of them are so busy talking to their families on the phone and thinking about their performance so they need people to not take it personally and understand what their job is as runners.Jason is so quiet and laid back I knew he would have no trouble doing this job. I on the other hand have a tendency to talk peoples ears off so I prayed all weekend for God to keep my heart and spirit meek and quiet and let these people do what God had them here for. I think Jason was a little worried about me bugging them but really, I did good!! :)Jason and I got to run a lot of really cool artists! He picked up the Newsboys (sorry, I couldn't help it I was jealous!) Todd Agnew, Hawk Nelson and a ton of others. I worked with Rebecca St. James, Micheal W. Smith and his crew and some others as well. Every one of the artists were so kind and gracious we couldn't have asked for a better job. Jason's company always shuts down the week of the 4th of July so he had the entire week off to help serve and I stay at home so we both switched off working and watching the kids. Well Thursday night I was driving Michael W. Smiths crew when the brakes on our van started grinding. I drove the van home and told Jason of the situation. He was not pleased because he was scheduled to pick someone up the next morning and knew that this would cause him to have to break his committment to picking this person up.As soon as he got up that morning he put the van up and started working on the brakes. The kids were outside playing while he was working. I ran over to the neighbors for something. As I was chatting with the neighbor I heard this desperate, horrible scream. "HELP HELP.... JODI HELP ME" This is very difficult because just sitting here remembering the horror of it all I am bawling because I can remember the exact sound. I have never ever heard that. I don't know if it was instinct because I knew what he was doing but the first thing I said was "Oh no, the van...he's working on the van"We ran out there and there he was screaming with his legs trapped under the van. My children were standing right next to him yelling "Daddy, Daddy. Mommy hurry and get him out" He was yelling for me to get the jack but obviously the jack was under the van. As the neighbor was calling 911 (I am not mentioning names for sake of privacy and not having their permission) I am screaming for someone, anyone to help get this off of him. Our other neighbor from the other side of the house heard us screaming and came running over. He and I actually lifted up the van (no i am not exaggerating) but Jason was in shock and couldn't pull himself out and I couldn't hold it any longer so we had to put it back down... on his foot. I was praying so hard I thought for sure he was either going to lose his legs or bleed to death. Now I am really feeling hysterical because I just set a van down on my husband for the second time on his foot. I happened to see a man walking down the street across the yards from us and screamed to him to please help and he came running over. Those two men, they just lifted that van right off of him. Praise the Lord!After the van was actually off of him, I lost it. I was absolutely hysterical. Don't ask me why it wasn't until he was actually out from under the van but thats what happened. When the paramedics got there they took me in the house because I was upsetting Jason even more with my crying because believe it or not, Jason was actually more worried about me???? They took me in the house and asked me to meet them at the hospital. WHAT?? The van has no brakes and no tire and I am hysterical and there was no way I was leaving Jason. I told them I was going with them. They made me ride in the front but that was fine with me.We get to the hospital and our Pastor came down and prayed with us and Jason finally got some pain relief and he was so upset and scared. We didn't know what the future held for us. The doctors took him back for x-rays and said that it probably isn't going to be good so be prepared. So we waited..The doctor came back and was absolutely floored. Jason had not broken a single bone. Not one. The doctor really had a hard time believing that he had a van on his legs and not one bone was broken. He told Jason right out he must have had an angel sitting on his shoulders. He would have to have surgery because he had a few puncture wounds and one very large open wound on the inside knee area and they would have to clean it out and see how bad the nerves and tendons were.The doctor had to come down from Green Bay so about two hours later, Jason was in surgery for the first time in his life. Ironically, we were just earlier talking that week about how I have had 8 surgeries and he has not had any. The surgery took 2 hours and when he came out, once again the doctor was suprised. He had missed every tendon and nerve. He cleaned it out and stitched it up. Jason was home a day later and did wonderful! He was back to work in a month. If course in that month, financially we had a hard time but I will tell you that the kindness and graciousness we received was unreal. I didn't have to cook for a couple of weeks and we were supported so much by our family, friends and our church family.After this happened the thoughts that ran through my head was why is this happening to me...why is this happening to our family. Now almost a year later I look at what has happened in the last year and I can honestly say I wouldn't change a thing. Jason's accidents was God's plan and I am glad he had that plan. I have been so blessed with the ability to internalize how much I love my husband. It is true that you don't know what you have until it is gone or in my case, almost gone. Jason and I have had a chance to really appreciate each other so much and I have fallen in love all over again with him. Our realationship with the Lord has grown so much because at that time, the Lord was all we had. We have been closer since his accident more than ever before. We just celebrated our 7th anniversary this weekend and it was the best year yet. God blessed us beyond measures. I can't ever explain how I feel about his accident being a blessing and having driven for Lifest. this was all a planned blessing by the Lord. And if we hopefully go to Lifest this year. It will be bitter sweet. My husband is still here. Miracles happen.

The holes in our driveway from the van.

Our van that fell on him

What Jason's leg looks like now.