Those of us that have Him in our house know how truly rich we are. It's such a far cry from how I was raised, how my childhood friends were raised it is literally impossible to describe the difference. When I consider how my children were shown Jesus from their earliest age I rejoice. My wife and I were engaged in a labor of love and we know that God is pleased with our work. Religion had nothing to do with any of this. Love of God had everything to do with it. Jesus saved me outside of church walls and denominational traditions. I had no one to list the things God couldn't do, wouldn't do or no longer did. I asked Jesus all kinds of things I wasn't "supposed" to ask Him and He'd do far and above what I dreamed.
All three of our heavenly gifts knew the Lord before they were even five and were filled with the Holy Spirit before they reached puberty. Their dear mother Martha and I are in our 51st year of marriage. Martha was 37 when our first olive plant of promise, Nathan was born. She was 39 when our second child Joanna was born.
Joanna was killed in an auto accident just after her 15th birthday but we'll just be separated for a short while. Laura, our last handful on purpose arrived when their mother was 45. We lost a baby when dear Martha was about 43. Nathan, the promised son, is a fine God fearing man now and his sister, Laura, is an upstanding young woman. Thanks be to Jesus they've never done drugs, alcohol or sex. It's a credit to the Lord for teaching us how to raise them up to His glory and their well being.
Seeing Jesus practiced rather than religion and some dead tradition made all the difference on their young lives. We de died there would be no television in our house. When they reached six or seven I got a monitor and a vcr player. We'd rent quality movies and were very selective. In the previous years I would assist my dear wife, their primary teacher, by reading to them. I remember reading the entire set of Laura Ingles "Little House" series of books to them. They would sit on my knees as I read and I thought my legs were going to be paralyzed forever!
We were Home schooling with the "Alpha-Omega" Christian curriculum. Occasional outings with other Christian children in our home school support group made a generally healthy impact on their home schooling. The lack of "socialization" the unsaved and religious crowd wails and tosses dust into the air about is entirely fictitious. That so called socialization is where your children are taught all the rotten habits of their peers. Sex, drugs, alcohol, temptations, filthy language. Treading good values and morals underfoot are part of the worldly so-called "socialization". That socialization from my own youth introduced me to evils and bad habits that only Jesus could heal me from. It's far better never to learn those behaviors that to have to be delivered and healed from them as I, and perhaps even you, have had to be.
Not having children for 14 years and learning that it is impossible according to medical science for my wife to conceive is more than sobering. We even tried artificial insemination using my seed. It was an attempt, multiple attempts to bypass the troublesome zone but
all of those were failures. The doctors said there's nothing more we can do.
We went forward at our church where the pastor and elders anointed us with oil and prayed with us that God would send us children - a child. After that the Holy Spirit began to speak to us through dreams, visions and prophetic messages. A visiting prophet spoke to my wife and the Lord told her that He'd seen her tears and had heard her prayers in the midnight hours. That because she dared believe Him He would do the thing that was so dear to her heart. Thus began a period of waiting and harsh trials that the Lord Jesus had to carry us through.
The entire story of all of this is long and very involved and I hope to complete a book that I've started which will account for many miracles we were honored to see as we awaited the promise that Jesus had made us.
After years of watching Jesus work in these things we cannot comprehend how women, potential mothers, abort and take the life of their own unborn miracles. It's like watching God plant a beautiful flower and then heartless people come and purposely cut it off at the stem. There are zero accidents of birth. No such thing. Not a sparrow falls without God being there. How much more the defenseless ones made in His very own image...
My good friend Dr. Ron Moseley
said something very simply one day that I remembered. "I've never seen anyone come to Jesus that didn't improve in every area of their life". I'm a living example. God has no grand children and every new generation must come to Him in the same way. On their knees with tears and prayers for forgiveness. Thank God for His unspeakable, indescribable gift! May your own children be blessed as they bloom and grow under the gentle hands of the good shepherd.
Isaiah 40:11 (NKJV) He will feed His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs with His arm, And carry them in His bosom, And gently lead those who are with young.
