Merryn's Miracle & The Gift of a Blackberry Bush by Pamela McCormick

by Pamela McCormick

October 2019 Our son and his family were heading out for a drive. Joseph went into the garage and placed their baby Charlotte in her car seat. His three-year-old daughter Merryn had come into the garage with him. When her daddy told her to get in her car seat, she walked the long way around her parents’ other car for some reason and accidentally walked into a metal shelf hanging low, gouging her right eye.

Merryn was taken immediately to the doctor, a pediatric optometrist. Frantic and yet hoping against all fear, that her eye had not sustained great damage. The optometrist offered no hope. Merryn’s cornea was partially lacerated and scarred up. Maybe when she was twenty, she would be able to have surgery and then have her vision restored. For now, the answer was that the scar tissue was too much; it covered her eye like a deep dark cloud. The answer was glasses and a patch to wear over her good eye to help make her injured eye stronger. There was a great sadness, but our son and his wife clung to the hope they had in Christ Jesus. It was an accident, and their praises did not stop. Their prayers continued for their daughter, and gratitude multiplied that she had not lost her eye.

Merryn and her daddy FaceTimed us when the glasses arrived. We told her how beautiful she looked in her new glasses. I commented, “I love your red glasses, Merryn.” She replied back, “Grandma, they’re not red. They’re raspberry.” Though her eye was impaired, Merryn was still able to see barely, but had blurred vision. The corrective lenses were to help, or so we thought. We would find out differently later.

I was teaching a children’s Bible study on Wednesday night with another friend. Aidan, Addie, Eli, John, David, Luke, Edy, Sarah, Tucker, and Nathan all prayed for Merryn. The children knew I was distraught and hugged me; they told me God was going to heal Merryn’s eye. As crazy as it sounded, I texted our son and told him what the children had said. Joseph and Sheila expressed gratitude for their prayers; they were always realistic that it was unlikely that her eye would be healed, but knew that God could and hoped that God would. Could the words of these children spoken in childlike faith really restore our granddaughter’s eye? Were these children at the Bible study telling the truth? Even as our hope began to fade, and we accepted this as it was, we would all see God in all His glory soon.

February 2020 Sheila takes Merryn back to the optometrist for a three-month follow-up after receiving the glasses. Merryn was not complaining about her eye but said that she didn’t like her glasses and couldn’t see well when she wore them. The same doctor that had examined Merryn in October was there testing her eyes. She checked her eye three times, turned on the light, and looked at Sheila. Her words: “I do not understand. I tested her eye three times, and her vision is normal for a three-year-old and no longer needs her glasses.” The doctor told Merryn you don’t have to wear your glasses anymore. She had been told to wear her glasses all the time, so she didn’t understand someone telling her she no longer needed to wear them.

Our son called us that evening and told us the good news. God had healed Merryn’s eye. No surgery, no need for glasses. God had done this. Our son added that the lens crafter had actually put in the wrong prescription and because of that mistake, the glasses they gave Merryn should have damaged her vision. Instead, the opposite happened.

I contacted the parents of the Bible study children and reported what God had done. The parents shared that their children’s faces were beaming. It was totally impossible, and God did it. How great is our God!!!

Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible.” Matthew 19:26

“but this happened, so that the works of God might be displayed in him.” John 9:3b

THE GIFT OF A

BLACKBERRY BUSH by Pamela McCormick

I didn’t taste its fruit. I just looked in amazement at this tiny bush growing by the road near my home. Looking got my curiosity up. I Googled blackberries, just to see what I would find. Did you know that the one big difference between a blackberry and a raspberry is that when a blackberry is picked, the stem stays with the fruit, but when a raspberry is picked, the stem tears away from the fruit and leaves a big hole in the raspberry?

I remembered taking my children when they were little to go pick blackberries. Although they are both grown now, they would turn their shirts up and make a pocket like a kangaroo, and fill their shirts with lots of yummy blackberries. It’s funny. We would get to the car, and their blackberries would be gone. No blackberry pie. No blackberry jellies. But the memories of picking blackberries with our children are ones I still cherish to this day. I talked to my husband about blackberries. Seems I don’t know as much about blackberries as he does. He grew up in the country, where I grew up in the city and didn’t go blackberry picking, I didn’t even know you could go and pick fresh fruit on a vine. George said he liked eating them, and except for the little seeds that got stuck between his teeth, he enjoyed them.

I started thinking about the importance of eating good fruit. There are plenty of things I have put in my mouth, like liver and onions, that weren’t tasty, but you give me a fruit salad with berries galore, I munch down.

God’s Word says, “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” Well, I’ve been eating on a lot of the wrong things, but when I choose to eat God’s blessings and not live in the past with its hurts and hang-ups, I am helped. I’ve gone through many a trial and tribulation, but today, I can say Hallelujah and thank You, Jesus, for helping me walk in the light of Your Goodness. Your grace is sufficient 100% of the time. Praises!!

And all of this came from seeing God’s favor and blessings in a gift of a blackberry bush.