Praise the Lord

It's been a while since my last post that's because we were getting everything ready for little baby Jackie, soon to be born.  Now to catch up.  My wife left that tent meeting and she told God that if she never had a baby she would still serve Him.  God heard that prayer I believe(probably heard all the ones I prayed that week as well).  In July of 2011 we found out that she was pregnant again.  The first set of doctors appointments were nerve racking.  We kept trying to not get our hopes up on each and every visit.  We always thought of the worse but longed for the best news.  I just preached a sermon Sunday night about taking up your cross and following Jesus.  It means to lay down your life for him: all your desires, your dreams, and your ambitions.  You lay that down and pick up the cross and show it to the world.  The cross represents God's will for your life.  Jesus went to a cross because it was God's will.  If Jesus didn't go to that cross we could never get saved, through God's plan.  Jesus, even though he is God, could've turned from the cross since he has free will, just as we do.  He didn't though he turned to God's will, just like my wife did in Georgia.  God has blessed us in many ways since then.  The baby is due in a couple of weeks.  We've had two baby showers where we got a ton of stuff for our little one.  She's going to be dressed better than me.  When we had little hope of every reaching this point I just kept praying that God would give us a child.  I think he wanted to see which we wanted more him or a child.  Remember he told Abraham in Genesis to take Isaac up to the mountain and sacrifice him.  He didn't make Abraham go through with it since that wasn't what he wanted to see.  He wanted Abraham to know that his first love was still God and not the child that was promised him for all those years.  Since Abraham was 100 when they found out they were having their first child, he might be a little reluctant to give Isaac up.  He placed Isaac on that altar though and raised the knife only to have an angel stop him and show him a ram caught in the thicket.  Thank God he lets us sacrifice ourselves to him so we see our true first love.  Bless his Holy name.  I can't wait to meet my little girl, she might be a little spoiled.