Jack Van Acker
My wife & I were serving as missionaries in Trinidad, an island in the Caribbean. At the time, 35 years ago, it was somewhat third world. My wife was expecting at the time and had developed some difficulties in the 7th month. Her doctor in Trinidad thought she should return to the U.S. to deliver our daughter as of the expected difficulties she might have. Not positive we wanted to do that, as it was right before the holidays and weren’t sure what affect it would have on our other children, etc. Trinidad didn’t have all the fancy scanning machines available to really know what was going on, but the doctor there thought things didn’t seem right and the baby was in distress. Besides the fact that we didn’t have the money to fly the whole family home.
We hadn’t had a phone in our home (and long before cell phones) so it was not very easy to communicate with anyone. Right around that time the landline we had ordered a year and a half before came up to be installed in our home. We made a few phone calls to let family know we finally had a phone and just a few days later we received a call from a friend back in Michigan that was a successful business owner. He’d called to say he wanted to give us a very large financial gift – to use how we wanted. I told about the difficulties my wife was having and he said right away “so that’s why God told me to send you this gift, get her home to the U.S.”. This was the beginning of a series of miraculous events that led to the birth of our third child, Janelle (which means God’s Gracious Gift). Both my wife and the baby came very close to dying during the ordeal. Doctors told us the baby should not have survived the plane trip, they told us to expect her to be blind and have some degree of disability besides.
Because of all her issues the doctors here felt she would not have survived birth – or received the care she needed in Trinidad. God provided, protected and our girl was born whole and pretty healthy. Needed some surgery right away but all went well. Through the support of many, even the staggering hospital bills were completely covered, but we always felt it began with the generosity of one man, Jerry Horne. Even though it was so long ago, it is especially poignant to us that Jerry passed away recently – just before Christmas – right around the time he made that call to us in Trinidad because God led him to.
We know God was making a way for us and will always be thankful for His servant Jerry, who listened to the prompting of God. He will forever hold a special place in our hearts.
Jack & Donna Van Acker