1) we are expecting our son, jude william, to arrive in the next 4 weeks or so. BIG NEWS - but hopefully all of you who read this blog already knew that! we will make a better effort at posting pics of him (and ani, of course) after we meet him. can't wait to see his face!!!
2) will and i were baptized this past easter sunday (yes, that was in april). we need to record that here. it was a BIG day for both of us, many years in the making. for will, it had long been a desire to have his dad baptize him. and as steve and suzanne had just moved to the area (yea!) in the weeks before, the timing was perfect. for me, it has been a slow road of processing.
we were "baptized" as children who professed Jesus as God's son. will is confident that he did not actually encounter the Living God until he was 16 years old on a men's retreat with his dad. then he was intentionally discipled by a mature believer beginning his freshmen year of college.
i did not come to know my great need of Lord Jesus until i was 25, while living with a grieving widow. it was in those days i submitted my life to Christ and began to walk by His Spirit. i have wrestled for the past 6 years with how to explain the 18 years that passed between my childhood confession and adult conversion, but the fruit of repentance and obedience has been so different from my fleshly pattern of pride and self-sufficiency that i am now glad to be obedient in baptism.
it is significant to us that this is seen as our authentic baptism and not a "re-baptism" or "re-dedication." it is not as if the power of the Spirit was not sufficient on the first try! we are walking this way for the first time.
3) my uncle, lloyd legg, has battled a terminal diagnosis of cancer for the past 7 years (renal cell carcinoma). he has walked in perseverance and trust for all this time and was perfectly healed by the Lord on june 12. we gratefully stand as witnesses to his days on this earth and to the LIFE he now lives - "for that which was mortal has been swallowed up by Life." (2Cor 5:4) in his devotional book on july 26, 2007 he wrote, "the Lord has filled my cup, i'll drink it. the Lord has set the distance of my race, i'll run it." please Lord, may we be found faithful in this day and trust You in all things. saints who read this, remember his wife, Janet and children, Jeff, Allison and Hannah and approach the mercy seat for them.
jeff, allison, hannah, aunt janet & uncle lloyd - thanksgiving 09
