Numero Tres

*time is of the essence and in order to get a post, I don't proofread....at all*

Well, it's true.  It seems that the Lord is letting us have another go at the whole training up children thing, as we are expecting little boy #3 the beginning of October!

I'm 15 weeks along at this point, which is a little earlier than you normally are able to find out gender.  I had an appointment with the perinatologist this week just because they like to look at the little ones when there is a heart defect in the family, and they were able to spot very quickly that this little one was a fella.

We found out back at the end of February after I spent a week in Raleigh with my mom and felt like junk the whole time.  I was pretty sure I was pregnant and texted Jeff to have a test ready for when I got home!  After we went to the doctor to confirm, we brought home the first ultrasound picture and showed it to Jacob and Thomas.  Jacob was over the moon excited and instantly wanted a sister.  Thomas wanted to look at the ultrasound picture just like Jacob had, so he grabbed it, folded it in half and pretended to take a bite out of it.  Then he said, "taco baby!" !  He's got a pretty good grip on this whole big brother thing.

It was so different when we found out this time.  Our experience with Jacob was in a class all it's own.  But with Thomas, we were so desperate for another baby, we had sought medical help, as we weren't supposed to be able to conceive on our own (still shouldn't be able to), and then we had prayed with friends for the Lord to direct us in the way we should go.  We were able to see the Lord actively working when we did get pregnant so quickly after we finally submitted to His plan for us.  There's a lovely, LONG blog post all about it here.

But here's the funny thing.  Even after witnessing that, and being caught up in the power of God, and the power of the prayers of His saints, and really aknowledging that it was HE who created the baby, after a little while, my mind had kind of managed to turn that whole experience into one where I had myself believing that the Lord chose good for us because we had acted in obedience.  We did something to merit the blessing of a baby.

Well, the one thing that the Lord has really shown me so far this go-round is that I have nothing to do with this.  He loves me because I love His Son.  Not because He's so proud of me.  Because in and of myself, He's really not!  It's humbling to see that we were just living our lives, which have been quite anticlimactic over the past year or so, not walking through tremendous trials or experiencing moments of total awe-inspiring provision (not that they weren't there, surely this is just another tell tale sign of the sin in my flesh!)...and even when we weren't sensing or feeling that the Lord was in the midst of doing something awesome, He was.

As Jeff and I have had our two lives become one over the past years, our relationship has really been characterized by extreme highs and extreme lows.  There are not a lot of people that I know who have walked through so much intensity with the Lord is such a few years.  But like I said, this past year hasn't been the same.  We've not had any really high highs or low lows.  We've just been learning to walk by faith.  And I think that's the really beautiful and amazing and humbling thing here.  God only requires the tiniest, mustard seed of faith and He will do amazing and great things with that.  I feel on most days that that's all that I have-a mustard seed, but by the grace of God, that is enough.  It is sufficient for the day.

We've done nothing amazing, we've just been stumbling along, trying to grasp a little more of what it means to "abide" in Christ, trying to learn how to train up two little people who will hopefully grow to love and serve Christ with all their heart, souls and minds, and trying to cling to our hope that we have in Jesus.  And in the midst of all of this praying and readying and trying, we haven't done great.  But God doesn't require perfect from me because He got perfection from His Son and that's who He sees when He looks at me, just fumbling around here.

So basically, there's nothing that I can point to with this third baby that would make me think that I have done something to earn God's favor.  I am learning more and more what grace is and how much God loves us, completely apart from what we do or don't do.  I hope that this little boy reminds me of that, that God is gracious and loving and so much greater than any of us could ever hope for.