daddy loved you before he'd even met you:)

August 1, 2010

Carson,

After more than nine months, we’re in the last several hours of preparing for your arrival. It’s hard to believe the time has finally come. Your mom and I have enjoyed so much our time together as a couple, but now we are so excited for you to join us in the adventure of life.

When I think about your joining us soon, I think about how much I am anxious to share with you. I’m excited to be able to read to you. I’m excited to share my love of music with you. I’m excited to share my life’s work as a minister with you. I have so many wonderful memories of time I spent with my dad growing up, and I hope that when you are my age, you’ll have equally wonderful memories of the time you and I spend together.

I want you to know how thankful I am for your mom. You do not realize how wonderfully blessed you are to have her as your mom. She is unconditionally loving, faithfully supportive, infinitely caring, and incredibly kind. She has prayed for you since before you were even conceived and has done everything she can to take care of herself and take care of you while she’s been pregnant with you. I hope I will demonstrate for you clearly just how much I love her.

It’s often tempting for parents to dream dreams for their children, and I suppose there is a time and place for that. But rather than dream all kinds of dreams for you, I simply hope to teach you to dream for yourself and to equip you to pursue those dreams with all of your being. But there is one dream I dream for you, one which will serve as a paradigm for all your other dreams: I hope that you will choose to follow Jesus, that you will live your life in selfless service to others, that you will commit yourself wholeheartedly to what you will come to realize is the upside-down ethic of the kingdom of God, and that you will dedicate yourself to loving God and all of God’s children, both those like you and those different from you. I pray I will be a faithful example of such a commitment to you. I promise you I will do everything I can to equip and empower and support you, whether that means cheering you on or offering constructive criticism. I want you to know it doesn’t matter whether you feel like you’ve done great things or insignificant things, what matters is that you have been faithful.

As we welcome you into this world we call home, we do so with eyes wide open. We have seen both some of the best this world God called “good” has to offer and we have seen some of the worst this world has to offer. Sometimes it seems as though the evil outweighs the good. But we believe God is still at work seeking to make right all that has been gone wrong in the world, and we are convinced God desires us, including you, to participate, in whatever ways possible, in the pursuit of that mission. So we welcome you boldly. We long to model for you a way of living that is captive not to fear but to the hope with which this mission of God has filled us and we pray humbly, therefore, that you will imitate us as we imitate Christ.

Carson, may the Lord bless you and keep you, may the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and give you peace. And may you live your life in gratitude to the God who has so graciously blessed our lives with your presence and company and called you to be a Son of God.

I love you so much and can’t wait to share life with you!

Dad

your first picture with daddy

It was very special to see the two of you together!

You looked so comfortable together from the very beginning!

You have the very best daddy in the world!

since daddy met you, he loves you even more:)