Join Eliana's Journey of Healing

Our sweet Eliana Jones has leukemia. We invite you to join her journey of healing by helping to support Eliana and her family as they start down this long road of treatment and have to handle all of the many details that will be involved. Your prayers are coveted, your words of support and encouragement are treasured, and your financial support - now and in the days ongoing - is so very welcomed.

If you’ve been around Eliana for even mere moments, you’ve been touched by her delightful spirit and her exuberance and cheer. Already she is navigating her hospital stay with peace and joy, despite what must be a bothersome, painful, and sometimes downright annoying experience for an eight-year-old to put up with.

Eliana has been diagnosed with ALL-type leukemia (Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia), the simplest of the types to treat. She also has the B-cell subtype, which is the simplest subtype to treat. We praise God for this diagnosis as it could easily have been much worse. Eliana is in the hospital now and will be there for another 4-8 weeks. Then she'll need to go back to Cook's for continuing treatment, for up to 3 weeks per month for awhile.

Most of Eliana’s medical bills should be covered by insurance, but there will be numerous incidentals for her family to absorb - transportation, housing, meals, and supplies. Then factor in the loss of work that will be required and it can be a daunting picture. Your donations will greatly help ease that weight for Wesley, Renee, Wyatt, & Callista.

Even when this initial hospital stay is over Eliana will have several years of medical care until she can be joyfully declared in remission from the leukemia. We have faith and confidence that God has that date already picked out and we will celebrate each day between now and then as we journey along with Eliana and witness God’s love, tenderness, and provision at every step.

Why does God let injury and illness happen? We don’t know. But we know it is not outside of His plans and often brings about a learning, and faith, and depth of humanity that wouldn’t be possible to find under simpler, less-stretching circumstances. Scripture tells us, “Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.”

There is a movie in which Helen Mirren’s character, during a dreary and wearisome hospital scene, advises, “Just be sure to notice the collateral beauty.”

We are here to see that beauty, and to see God’s astounding power, and to love Eliana and her family in the spirit displayed by God (and encouraged by Bob Goff) - fearlessly, furiously, and unreasonably. Times like these are where community needs to become alive and be felt, and not just be a buzzword. So please give generously of your prayers, your words, and your financial means.

Eliana was born with Down Syndrome and some would call that a mistake. But being in her light for even a moment will make it clear how dim the world would have been without her. Her full name points to the wonder and fullness of God. Gabriella means, “God is my strength.” Eliana means, “God has answered (our prayers).” And scripture tells us again that Eliana, and all of us, were cherished by the Lord long before any of us arrived earth-side.

“For you created my inmost being;

you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.

My frame was not hidden from you

when I was made in the secret place,

when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.

Your eyes saw my unformed body;

all the days ordained for me were written in your book

before one of them came to be.”

Thank you for joining Eliana on this journey.

#SweetEliana

You can send letters to her here!

Cook Children’s Hospital

Attn: Gabriella “Eliana" Jones NT534

801 7th Avenue

Fort Worth, TX 76104

You can request to join Eliana's private Facebook group here:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/769314307542377

WHO AM I?

My name is Brandynn Stanford and my husband and I moved, with our four children, from the D/FW Metroplex to Dublin, Texas, almost thirteen years ago. We met Wesley & Renee soon after, at the church God had pointed out for us. Our two older children were close in age to Wyatt and Callista and we have enjoyed many years of friendship and connection. We’ve also gotten to enjoy some of Wesley’s amazing carpentry work!

A couple of years after we moved here I had our fifth child, at the old-lady age of 38. I didn’t think it was old at the time but when most strangers thought Meribee was my grandchild I began to realize some assumptions were being made. Renee had Eliana a couple of years after that … and she was in her 40’s! What crazy ladies we were. But both of us know the restorative honor of being gifted babies “late in life” and wouldn’t trade it for the world.

A bonus benefit of my children growing up with the Joneses was that our son, Robin, later discovered they had a cousin, Kaydee, and now we get the extra-special-delightful-joy of being Kaydee’s in-laws and getting to claim Jeremy, Ginger, & Calvin, too!

I have been talking with Debra Jones and April Jefferson, Eliana's grandmother and cousin, about this GoFundMe. They are in agreement about its creation and also covet your prayers and support. We will be opening a dedicated bank account for these funds to ensure they are used for things related to Eliana’s care.

Thank you again for your committed support!