Mother's Day

The kids gave me my M-Day gifts a day early today. They helped clean the house, drew pictures and each gave me a card they had picked out at Target. Brandon even stuck a dollar bill in his card for me. :-) And Abby hasn't stopped showering me with words of love and kindness all day long. See? Some of our moments are tender. Here are the best of the best:

* We talked with Abby a lot last year about what it means/takes to be a Christian. One night after she'd asked some questions and I'd explained it, including the fact that it involved making Jesus her boss, she thought for a moment then said, "Maybe I'll do that tomorrow." She then rolled over and went to sleep.

But then, on Dec. 8, all on her own, Abby prayed to make Jesus her Lord and Savior during her bedtime prayer. When she was finished she looked up at me and smiled that great big smile of hers and said, "I did it, Mom." We're waiting a little bit on baptism, but know that the choice was her own. Since then, we've watched with great pleasure as she has sought to grow, even at her young age, through reading the Bible and having "quiet times."

*July 2001 - Brandon had been asking about getting baptized for awhile, but had not yet understood about grace up until this point. Then, one night during his bedtime prayer he said all on his own that he wanted Jesus to be his Lord and Savior and the boss of his life. We talked about it a lot the next few weeks and felt confident that Brandon understood what he was doing. He prayed again with Clay and was baptized a couple of weeks later.
August 2001 After Brandon's baptism, we were looking at the pictures I had taken of the event. Brandon saw the one where he's looking seriously down into the water, seemingly prayerful. He laughed and said to mom, "Nana, you know what I was thinking right there? I was thinking, 'I sure do wish I was swimming in this water right now, because it is so warm.'"

It's funny to me how both kids came to Christ in similar ways. I guess I had this picture of leading them to a point of decision, and in a sense we did. But mostly, both kids just took the lead when they were ready. When I was trying to hold Brandon back a little bit, concerned about how young he was, a friend reminded me that salvation is between them and God, not them, MOM, and God. Guess I'll probably have to learn that lesson about some other things along the way as well.

It's a very, very good thing to be a mom.