Sometimes God answers our prayers exactly how we ask… and sometimes He answers differently.

Last October, my family was dealt a harsh blow when my father-in-law was called home to be with Jesus. We lost not only a family member, but a business partner and a preacher. Every area of our life was about to change. Little did we know how much truth that small statement held…

To tell the story of my son I have to go back farther…

August 3rd 2019… I walked down the isle to my future husband, scared but confident this was God’s will. This man was kind, wise, attractive, loving, thoughtful, funny and most of all loved the Lord. Joshua Griffith became my groom on that day and it was the best decision I ever made besides Jesus.

Now we all know the song, “First comes love… then comes marriage… then comes baby in a baby carriage…”

Baby…

We tried. For a whole year. Nothing.

It seemed that our dreams of having a family were not to be.

But God.

Clifton, my father-in-law, came to us, “I believe I have the gift of praying over those that can’t have children. I can pray over you if you want.”

No thanks… I thought.

Funny how we treat the altar as the last option.

But like I said, a year and nothing.

So we went to the altar. We were anointed with oil, and we prayed- Susan, Josh, Clifton and I. We gathered together and prayed for a miracle.

Fast forward three months later we were sitting in front of a casket that held my father-in-law’s body asking ourselves what his past ten days in ICU meant for our family.

I had an appointment at the infertility doctor scheduled so we went ahead and went and found out the problem- PCOS- Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. I was told I would probably be a harder case to get pregnant and I probably wouldn’t be able to carry to term on my own. My progesterone was a 4, which is very low. Little did I know when they told me this… I was pregnant.

Hormones helped and the first round proved a success as we learned we were expecting two days before Christmas Eve.

I wrapped up the pregnancy test, stuck it in a present box from Dollar Tree and presented it to my husband.

“I got you an early Christmas present…” I smiled and held out the silver box with gold swirls and a silver bow.

“I don’t want an early Christmas present. You know I don’t like opening my presents early.” His face was thankful, and I knew he truly had no idea what kind of present this was.

“Just open it…”

“No…”

After some convincing he finally did.

“What does this mean?…” He asked, unsure of the reality.

“It means you are gonna be a daddy…”

The next nine months held progesterone shots for weeks, throwing up, mood swings and other hard aspects of pregnancy and at the end of that hard road was a hard labor and delivery. Twenty-one hours of labor ended with an emergency C-section and our little Judah Clifton was born into the world. They shot oxygen into his lungs as the umbilical cord had been wrapped around his neck. He was a miracle baby… even up until birth.

Recovery and raising a newborn has not been easy. After the trauma of my birth and the painful C-section, post partum depression plagued my mind for weeks. After two weeks I knew something had to give. So up on my medicine and back into therapy I went. I am thankful God provides His Word and tools to press us back into Him.

We have so much support and love and are so thankful for it truly takes a village to raise a child.

Our miracle baby is growing by leaps and bounds and we are thankful and confident God has a wonderful plan for our Judah Clifton Griffith.

Thank you Lord for this blessing and thank you to all who prayed for us.

My last blog was about a death and a year later… I write about a birth.

Praise God from Whom all blessings flow.