Gift of God

Jonathan means gift of God and that is is exactly why he was given this name eight years ago today. After three miscarriages and plenty of heartache, I thought our family was complete - mom, dad, girl, boy.

Fortunately, I am not in total control and in the spring of 2000, I was surprised, excited and a bit frightened at the idea of being pregnant again. Besides, I had given all baby things away thinking it was better for other folks to use them than for them to just sit in the attic.

I remember having a conversation with Ken early on that March morning about his thoughts on our family increasing and something he said caused me to make a bee line to the drug store for a pregnancy test. I couldn't think about anything else, so with two little children in tow, I was off. I took the test as soon as I arrived home and let the little kids call Ken at work to tell him that his suspicions were correct - we were having another baby!

I won't lie - the pregnancy was long and emotional. There were many days I wondered if he would actually get here safely. I was very tired, but it was also a time of learning to trust in the God I said I believed in. It was so much easier to just talk about believing that God has a good plan even when things are hard than to actually walk through the hard stuff with a faith that says I believe. There were so many things to be worried about right down to the fact that my first two children arrived rather quickly when labor started, and now I lived thirty minutes from the hospital. I often wondered if we would make it there in time.

Jonathan arrived safely Thanksgiving weekend and we had plenty of time. All those items I had given away didn't matter as people loaned or gave us all that we needed. We did not have to purchase anything. Our friends and family brought so many meals, I didn't have to cook until after New Year's. It was amazing how every detail seemed to work out - God truly provided every thing we needed.

So today as I stand in amazement of God's handiwork, I will remind my little pretender with the vivid imagination what an incredible gift from God he is.