The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord.

As difficult as it was to go through the experience of losing our first born baby, imagine our joy when one year later (and it was a very long year), I gave birth to our little daughter, Christy. February 11 is her birthday and what a day it was. Our mourning turned to gladness and God gave us comfort and joy instead of sorrow (Jeremiah 31:13) when we looked into that beautiful newborn face. We felt God's loving embrace as we held that sweet baby. Two years later, on February 3, God blessed us with another daughter, Dawn. And another 2 1/2 years after Dawn, Amy was born on August 24.

It's funny how expert a young couple can feel toward parenting before they actually have children. But that expertise quickly turns to feelings of inadequacy and total dependence on the Lord when reality hits. I remember many times crying out to God as King Jehoshophat did: "Oh Lord, we don't know what to do, but our eyes are on you" (2 Chronicles 20:12). And in desperation, I often reminded God of His promise to give wisdom to those who ask (James 1:5). Dealing with little people like us, with sin natures and selfish hearts, is more difficult in reality than all the parenting theories ever thought of or written about.

Our parenting years had ups and downs, joys and sorrows, hard times and good times. I feel so blessed that God was with us every step of the journey. He promised to never leave us and He kept that promise. All of our daughters are now in their 30's with beautiful families of their own, learning life's valuable lessons as they raise their children to know and love God. Raising children helps us grow and mature in our own walk with the Lord. When we teach our children to share, we realize how selfish we are. Or when we preach to them about having the right attitude toward others, we are convicted about how critical and self-righteous we are. But that's the beauty of parenting. We learn that we cannot live the Christian life. Only Jesus can and we need Him living through us in the power of the cross and resurrection in order to be like Him.

Even though our children are raised, we continue to parent. As long as we continue to live, our prayer is to be an encouragement and support to them. And we're in a very good spot right now because we don't just have children, we now have grandchildren! Our hearts are full and our house is, too, when they're all here with us.

Words that come to mind to describe each daughter are:
Christy: strong, in charge, capable, compassionate
Dawn: loyal, loving, focused, steady, talented
Amy: fun, flower-child, lover of nature and the outdoors

Each one unique and special in her God-given gifts and abilities

[We] have no greater joy than to hear that [our] children are walking in the truth. (3 John 4)