Gifts of New Life

Jesus I praise you for the gift of life. I praise you for a sweet new baby, Ella Sawyer, to our family, to her family. I praise you that you give us the chance to experience parenting and sisterhood. I praise you for the gift of life we can have in YOU. I praise you that even as Ella is born my prayers are pouring out before the foot of the cross that Ella would know YOU personally. That Ella would be guided in love and Truth all of her life. I pray that she might be humbled to know what you`ve done for HER on the cross, and the gift of life she can experience and live through your sacrifice. Lord protect her and guide her. Holy Spirit lead her in the way she ought to go, direct her heart to the heart of the cross. Lord protect her parents and her siblings to be witnesses of your love and grace in her little life. Jesus may she know thepower and the blessing of eternal life, now, and forever!!

I am so grateful to have welcomed Ella Sawyer into my family, and visit her only two days old! She is teeny tiny, and extremely precious. A full head of black hair, just like I had. More than anything I am extremely blessed to see the woman of God my sister has become, and is becoming, especially through experiencing being a wife and a mother. I wrote this poem about her while she was college:

So now I sit here, after talking today

Contemplating all that you had to say

Reading your works, occupying my day

Remembering things, my mind is astray

Wise, youve become, over these years

Building off of your trials and fears

Embracing your laughter and dodging your tears

Your mind holds more than just the typical gears

Children we were, siblings are we

Dealing with things that shouldn't ever be,

Family and friends still pushed away by me,

Yet, you tell me that someday I will see

So, I listen and hear what leaves your mind

I never thought that my big sister could be so kind

But long ago, I knew I could find

That you are my sister and my love was never blind.

I remember there were many a days I wouldn`t even talk to her over the phone while she was away because I was embarrassed at how hard I would cry. I missed her desperately through those years. And it was bittersweet when she got married quickly after school, because I knew she would be far from home. And yet through her marriage and her girls the Lord has given her life in a way I could never have imagined. Each of her babies brings her joys I can see even when she doesn`t verbalize them. And her husband, he is her soulmate. I`m sure she has said she has seen the love of Christ through him

more than anyone in her life. I love reading this poem again so long after and realizing, wow. She is even more wise and cunning than she was back then...praise Jesus for growth and sanctification! Praise him for life abundantly. Praise him for blessing my sister, her family, my family, and my faith through experiencing his goodness.