Worship and Consecration

We had an especially worshipful weekend. Eliza, Moriah and Lenea, 3 of our girls, have been taking worship dance and ballet this last semester. It is a wonderful dance school, that we had been a part of years ago for about 5 years. But due to the drive (it takes us about 40 min one way) and the busyness in our lives we had to stop for a time. However, Lenea has been begging me to take dance and I knew Eliza loved it when she took classes before, so we made the weekly sacrifice of driving and spending 4 hours while they each took their lessons every Friday. We plan to do it again this next semester and I hope it works out for the next year. I do know that with Elliana and Isaiah, it might be too hard to manage for some time, so we will see.

This last Friday was the Worship performance. It is always a huge blessing, and a time of sharing testimonies and giving God all the glory. I think I have watched about 8 of these performances and each time I am moved to tears of joy for God's glory. It really is an amazing time.

Here are some of my beautiful daughters worshiping Jesus.

 This was Dress Rehearsal and Lenea is our 4 year old, 2nd from the left.

 This was the actual performance and Lenea is the 3rd from the left. This group was so, so cute.There song was "God Is Good" by Marantha.

Here she is with the red rose her Daddy gave her. She was so excited to be a "real" dancer tonight and not just playing at home.

 Again, dress rehearsal for our 9 year old, Moriah. She is the left in the maroon skirt.

 Moriah, waiting for her turn to go at the performance with her other dancemates.
She is in the middle with the maroon skirt.

 Here they are worshiping to a full house, Moriah is the middle girl, standing a bit forward. Their song was, "So Good To Me", by Shout to the Lord Kids.

 Eliza, our 14 year old, she is doing her dress rehearsal here. She is the brunette in the front with hands stretched out.

 Here is the performance and Eliza is 3rd from the left. This group was large, with 15 girls and their dance was to "Never Underestimate My Jesus", by Relient K.

After LOTS of shopping yesterday grocery and Christmas, we had my mom over for her birthday dinner. Then today at church we had s special service dedicated to children and families. Our church is fairly young and evolving so they had never had a "dedication" of sorts for children. Today we got "caught" up. It will become a more regular event now, but today we had 17 families consecrating a total of 40 children to the Lord. Some of the children are in the home, some in the womb, some in other countries waiting to come home by adoption and some haven't even been revealed yet (families that are starting the adoption process but don't know whom their child will be).

It was a precious time. Our pastor gave a sermon on children and then the Consecration Service began.

We dedicated Lenea and Asher, whom we have not done publicly before now. And we also dedicated Elliana and Isaiah, even though they are yet to legally become our children and are still in China, we want to make known we think of them as our children today and promise to raise them in the admonition of the Lord, for His service and kingdom.

Here we are, with Elliana in the background while we Consecrate her to the Lord.

Lenea

Lenea's name is a version of a family name.. April and her mother both have the middle name "Lenee" (pronounced like Renee with a L beginning) which was derived from April's French Great-Great Grandmother with the last name Mar-Lenee. The meaning of  Lenee is "Light" or "beautiful Light"

Her defining attribute is: Prayerful Advocate
  
Her defining purpose: Lenea's defining purpose to be a light for the weak and helpless . 

Asher

Asher's name means joyful, happy. 

His defining attribute is: Joyful Strength

His defining purpose: Asher's defining purpose it to count it all Joy in the Strength the Lord has given him and be strength for the hopeless.


Elliana


Elliana's name means "God has answered".


Her defining purpose: Elliana's defining purpose is to Be God's Voice for the needy.


Isaiah

Isaiah's name means "God is salvation".

His defining purpose: Isaiah's defining purpose is to share the Good News of God's salvation.

His Light and the Truth

Some interesting things that spoke to me in today's sermon:

Satan, the Enemy, is the Deceiver and wants me to believe things that aren't true. Some of them I have fallen for.

The biggest lie I have believed is that when things are difficult, painful and down right scary that I should look inward to myself for the answers. This can lead to a Pity Party, depression, anger, hurtful actions or words toward others, blaming others, and sometimes taking things in "my" own control and making it worse. 

But God's Truth and Light is that I should look upward, toward Christ, the Prize. That God is not a God of darkness, fear, doubt, condemnation and confusion. He keeps his promises, He finishes the work he began, He is always with me,  He is my Healer, my Provider, my Comforter, He loved Me first-while I was a sinner (so why do I worry that He will stop loving me when I do wrong things?), and that He has, through a covenant, given me His name (as in a marriage) that I will always have. He is my husband and I, His bride. Just like a good earthly husband would fight and protect for his bride, and not make her do certain things to keep his name, God is the perfect husband. He always has my best interest in mind, even when I fail. In fact scriptures tell me that it was He gives grace and extra help to the humble and lowly. James 4:6 "But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble."

When my heart tells me I am a failure, that is the Enemy's tactic to get me looking away from Jesus. If we are feeling there is no other way but to believe the lie that we can't do it anymore, whatever that might be, then that is blindness (from the Deceiver) and not from God. God has a different opinion about my weakness and where my hope should be.

1 John 3:19-21 "And hereby we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before him. For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, [then] have we confidence toward God."

This means that the truth is that even when our hearts condemn us (we know we failed or we are too feeble and incapable of doing some "impossible" task) that God is greater than our heart, and deeply knows all things intimately about us. He is a God of hope, forgiveness, redemption, healing, and Light.

Create In Me

Tonight, as I was rocking Asher before I put him to bed, I was signing him a Mary Rice Hopkins song that I used to sing Tyler when he was little. It was when Jay came to know the Lord, I rededicated my life to the Lord after living many years for myself instead of Him alone. So we began our faith walk of truly learning what it means to live for Christ. That was almost 19 years ago and what an amazing walk it has been. I truly thank the Lord from the bottom of my heart, for where he has brought us from. I know He is not finished with me yet. He still have much refining to do I can be very stubborn still, and some days it is just plain tiresome and painful. However, I am so thankful and full of joy that He does complete the work He begins in each of us. What a gracious, merciful, loving and gentle God we have. And yet at the same time all knowing, powerful, just and fearful. He does have a righteous wrath and we should not forget His holiness demands us to be righteous and clean before Him.

Lord, today I sing this for all my children from the oldest to the baby, even the ones I haven't met yet. Today, I sing this for myself.

Create In Me  
by Mary Rice Hopkins

Create in me a clean heart, oh God
So, I might serve you.
Create in me a clean heart, oh God
That I might be renewed .
So fill me, and heal me, and bring me back to you..
Create in me a clean heart, oh God that I might serve you.

What An Amazing Concert~~

Have you heard of His Little Feet ? Our family had the privilege of seeing this latest group from this ministry, sing at their last performance before they head home this coming weekend.

These 14 children, are from Ethiopia and Honduras. They are ages 6-14. They are precious, beautiful children! The even sweeter part is that yesterday all 14 of them were baptized. We got to see the video of it and hear their testimonies. Many of them have been Christians for several years and some are new Christians since coming to the states with His Little Feet, these last 10 months.

They sang their little hearts out to Jesus, in a hot, packed out church with huge smiles and hugs to offer at the end. All of these children are orphans as well and are up for adoption with America World Adoption.

Here are some precious photos. I was so blessed by these children.

"I Keep Surrendering": Another Blog?

Since our adoption with Asher is complete, I just don't have time to keep up with adoption posts and family posts. I decided to make a new family blog and this one is not private, at least not for now.


 My theme this last year has been "Surrendering To God". That is the reason I picked that for my email and now the title of this blog.


 For me however, it is not a concept I am learning easily or quickly. Some days are much harder than others . Some circumstances are much harder than others. I find that my natural bent is to take it into my own hands. I remember times in my growing years when my dad would tell me, "You are the only person you can count on."

My dad taught me a lot of good, and I respect him for who he was in my life. But today I would disagree with that statement. I have come to realize that the Lord God is the only person I can count on. Each meaningful person in my life, aside from my little children, has done at least one thing to let me down, including myself. I have messed many things up in my life and unfortunately those times and situations I do take into my own hands, I sorely damaged things.  I know I have let others down. We often put expectations on people that should not be there. And sometimes people who should be doing more in your life just can't or won't.

This also doesn't mean that the Lord will not allow pain in our lives or use hard situations to His glory. But in the end there is freedom. I am finding freedom from pride and control is very peaceful. I have days where I doubt and situations where I have little hope, but the Lord is so gracious to gently force me to let go and surrender those to Him.   

So today, again Lord God, I surrender my life to you. I surrender my family to you and all the circumstances that surround us.