It all started before that.

As she talked, I sat there amazed.  Not at what she was saying, but at who she had become.  Confident.  Godly.  Faithful.   Respected.  It just hit me that she is now a leader in our church.   A true leader.  The next generation of leaders, in fact.

But wait -- is this the same young woman who God brought into our lives a little over 10 years ago?  The anxious, nervous, only-just-started-going-to-church- wanting-to-please-everyone young woman my son introduced us to?  Watching her confidently taking her seat, I started thinking of those first days . . .  and seriously, my breath caught in my throat.  How amazing God is!  He molds, He holds.  He shapes and He grows.  And He does this over and over – and it still amazes me. 

That got me to thinking.  God’s amazing work in my life didn’t start with my daughter-in-love.  It started before that.  It started when, as a young wife, pregnant, I yearned for a daughter and instead, ended up with three sons.  There’s something about not getting what you want that brings you to your knees.  In a dream one night, He gave me a clear picture of who my daughter would be.  Not a picture of a baby, but a little girl, sitting on a step, with wild hair.  For a while, I was a little (!) obsessed with finding that little girl.

But as I left the whole matter in God’s Hand, I knew He would bring her to me.  To be honest, I sort of forgot about it.  The picture faded in my mind, just as the desire faded in my heart.  Well, that is until one day, after my oldest son got married, her mother came over and showed me some pictures.  Her daughter, my son’s wife, was that little girl, wild hair and all, sitting on the step.

I sat there, dumb-founded.  Speechless, tears in my eyes, I remembered all those years and God knowing this day would happen.  Knowing all my desires and molding me for them.  Knowing what was needed and what wasn’t and loving me through it all.  He so works in amazing ways, it just slays me sometimes!   But really, the truth is, it really started before that.

It started when God took a divorce and brought my stepmother into my life.   Her love for the Lord and His Word introduced me to Jesus Christ, my Savior. Let’s just stop and saver that moment.  (SIGH)

Before that, it was the prayers of a grandmother for three little girls.  On and on and on, God has proven Himself amazing in my life.  And I bet you can say the same thing.

For in the beginning, God.  Whether it's your beginning or THE beginning, it doesn't matter.  He knows.  He loves.  He is.

My prayer for you comes from Ephesians 3: 

I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints (that's us!), to grasp how wide and how long, how high and how deep is the love of Christ, and to know that love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Filled to the measure – amazement.  To Him be the glory for generations upon generations.  Amen.