Congratulations, FINALLY! Edited

"We have no greater joy than to hear that our children are walking in the truth." III John 4

I really have tried to post all this before now, but without pictures, I knew it would be super boring. So here goes today. I have so many things to be thankful for, and I am proud mother of wonderful children; I am so blessed, and I am not just being cliche. I want to congratulate them for all their hard work and to thank God for His faithfulness to each one and to me and Tim. We are truly humbled by His grace in their lives and our own. God definitely completes His work in our children IN SPITE of my weaknesses and sins. Thank you, thank you, dear Jesus! Now--in what order do I do this? Most recent? Least recent? Age? Random? So many decisions! Well, let's see how the pictures upload and go from there.

Ok. so the picture of Faith and Jared appeared first, up above what I wrote. How do I get them below what I wrote? Oh well. So here is our oldest child Faith and our dear son-in-law, Jared. We congratulate them for almost one year of marriage. They say they love being married (something I always have said about my marriage!) and that their first year has gone incredibly fast! Praise God for His goodness! May He continue to grow them in their love for each other and for God. We love you two so much! Thanks for all the visits and for loving us, too, in actions and deeds. You are very special to us and your siblings and siblings-in-law. So who is next?

Anna! (she showed me how to move the pictures--yay!) This picture was taken the night of her awards ceremony. Anna thought she could not do anything, and now, not only is a graduate of Delaware Tech as a paralegal and has worked for a lawyer for a year, but she is also pursuing her nursing degree. Congratulations, Anna! You have worked incredibly hard and faithfully, giving up social occasions to study and do well on your academic endeavors. We are very proud of you as we see you maturing in "wisdom, stature, and in favor with God and man." (Luke 2:52). We love you! (I would have included a graduation picture, but they are unobtainable at the moment.) Thanks, Andrew, too, for supporting our kids in these various commencements and ceremonies! You're a real trooper!)

Next--Sarah! (this is not the exact pic I meant but it is what came up and now I can't get rid of it; I am so inept at this computer stuff) Congratulations to Sarah for graduating with honors in accounting from SU! She has been accepted in the McLean, VA, PCA church's Fellows Program, a 9-month program which seeks to teach recent college grads how to integrate their faith into their professional lives and to live lives worthy of Christ's calling. She will live with a church family, have an adult mentor, mentor younger people, do missions in the church and community, work 3 days a week at an accounting firm, take theology courses, and probably more things I don't even know of. She will be part of a group of about 14 young men and women from across the nation. (Hayley Taylor and Jamie Sherwell are both graduates of the sister program in Charlottesville. Thanks, girls, for your information and support!) Please be praying for Sarah as she prepares for this program and is also taking an intense CPA review course right now. We love you!

Yes, and here is my "baby." Hope is 14 now, and you can see she is a young woman, not a little girl anymore. Where does time go? It is fleeting as the Bible teaches. Oh, Lord, as Jason often says of a missionary or preacher whose name I cannot recall at the moment, "Stamp eternity on my eyelids." Oh, that I could live each day with that knowledge: make the most of every day, big and small, FOR the LORD.) Congratulations, Hope (and Allie)! You are so beautiful. And we are proud of the way you have persevered and grown in your dancing abilities. Five years! That's a lot of dancing. We are also thankful for your growth in helping out your family and your perseverance in your academics. We look forward to seeing what God will do in your future as you seek His will and ways for your life! We love you.

I love this picture of our son. Congratulations, Luke, for graduating from high school. Luke is right now in Africa with Launch Out Missions (taken from Luke 5:4, KJV) until July 7. He left Sunday, May 30, and will be traveling to at least 6 different countries. Obviously, we are on our knees praying for his safety. Our prayers also ask that he glorify God in his travels, that he grow in His walk and relationship with Christ, that he gets along with and ministers well with his team (and that all of them are safe, too), that the people he ministers to will be open to the Gospel, that everyone will be healthy and strong as the Israelite captives in Daniel's day were as they followed the Lord, that the angels of the LORD will go before them and be around them, protecting them against hostile forces, seen and unseen, that God would be Luke's God, real to him like He was to David, Charles Spurgeon, Amy Carmichael, David Brainerd, Martin Luther, Jonathan Goforth, David Livingston, and so many others, that God may give Luke some direction and wisdom as to what He wants him to do with his life, and of course, that he return safely to us (and hopefully have an impact for Jesus on all of us at home). Tall prayers? Well, God is able to do exceedingly abundantly more than we ask or think! We love you, Luke, and miss you. (We would be very glad to have you pray, too! Thanks.)




And, no thankful blogpost would be complete without tribute to my dear husband, Tim, the anchor of our family. He works so terribly hard to provide for us and encourage us and lead us to Jesus and help others and to serve God. I love him so and our children do, too. I really like this picture of him at Sarah's graduation. (You grow more handsome each year, honey!) I thank God for you; what a wonderful life we have been given together. Thanks for always being there; you are faithful and true. May God give us many more years together and may they be even better than the first 26! I love you.

And why do I not blog more than every 5 months or so? because it takes me so long to do. I would be embarassed to tell you how long I have been doing this. Oh well. Before I sign off, though, I want to thank God for all of you--I have the greatest family of friends! I love you, too!