This pregnancy was such a troubling time in our life, especially as a newly married, young couple, but it was also a time that produced such faith, trust, and growth in our own personal walks with God. When doctors are telling you left and right that your baby may not make it, deciding to name the baby is difficult enough, but it is truly an act of faith. It says that we are trusting God no matter the outcome.

In previous posts, I’ve been telling you the story of our firstborn son. This is just another piece of that puzzle where we finally, allowed God to give us a name for our baby. This part may be seemingly insignificant at this point in the story, but believe me when I say it has great significance in the end. But I’ll come back to that in a later post.

If this is your first time reading one of my posts, find the other parts of this story here and catch up. Now it’s time to tell you about the day when Naming Our Son Was an Act of Faith.

In our 24 years of marriage, we have now had the blessing and opportunity to name 4 kids. Each and every single time we considered what each name meant and we took that task very seriously. The Bible says that our words are powerful and we knew that every time their name was uttered, someone was speaking that meaning over them. We prayed over our babies from the beginning, and wanted their names to be relevant to who they were as people throughout their lives. As we know now, this requires us to seek God in the process and trust Him, when we hear His voice.

However, the very first opportunity we had to name a child, we didn’t hold to those ideas. There were only 2 rules. The first rule was we wanted it to be something different, something that wasn’t heard every day; and the second rule was we both had to like and agree to the names on the list. If we both didn’t like a name, it didn’t make it on the list. Initially, we chose 5 name combinations from the list of liked names and put them into a hat and drew the name out. Haha! We drew the name, Alec Dempsey.

We lived with it for about a week and then concluded that it wasn’t the right name. That went well. Right? Back to square one. This is the point that we decided we needed to pray about the name and take it more seriously, so we did. About 2 weeks passed, and as I was brushing my teeth, a name came across my mind and I just knew that was it! I had to tell Joe, but he was at work so I had to sit on the excitement for a few hours.

Ex-cru-ci-at-ing!!!

The Name

I heard him pull in the driveway so I met him at the door and exclaimed, “I have a name!!” He responded immediately, “Great! But I have a name too!” Uh-oh. We decided to count to 3 and say it at the same time.

1-

2-

3-  …

“Joshua Caleb” … in unison!!!!

We had the same name, at the same time! Just God. Here’s the thing about this name. Joshua was on his list, but not mine. Caleb was on my list, but not his. In other words, neither of these names had made our final list of names to choose from. We realized that this was no longer our choice… but God’s. So since meaning was so important to us, what does his name mean? Joshua means Jehovah is generous or Jehovah saves. Good enough for me! Haha! Caleb means dog, which is a symbol for devotion to God, and it means faithful. Fine by me! At that moment, to us, it was perfect symbolism for this pregnancy. God is faithful, and we chose to trust Him and entrust Joshua Caleb in His hands.

A little something to ponder …

I know there are lots of times in my life where I make decisions and find myself in my own mess. Sometimes, I even look to God and ask Him why am I sitting in this situation? Of course, He lovingly reminds me I got to choose. Swell. My choices impact my outcome. Yes. I know this. But can you believe I still choose to do things without consulting the maker of the universe? He wants me, and He wants me to choose Him. Choosing Him shouldn’t come after I get myself into a mess, but before. I know that ultimately, He wants me to choose His will for my life, first and foremost.

There are all kinds of reasons that I make choices without consulting Him or His word. Maybe I think whatever the decision is probably isn’t that important or He’s got bigger issues to deal with…I mean, after all, He is in demand! Or maybe I’m anxious, fearful, determined to do things on my own, strong-willed and headstrong, selfish, impatient, and the list could go on. Sometimes I get blessed that my choice lines up with His will, but there are lots of times it doesn’t.

Matthew 10:30-31 says “And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”

I like to think about God knowing all the hairs on my head, and subtracting those that I lost. And multiply that by all the people on the planet! That’s commitment! Do you know how many hairs your kids have at any given moment? I sure don’t! However, there was a time that I counted freckles on one of my kids. Haha! We had a contest to see who could guess the closest number. I know. That’s silly. As a side note…I won! Haha! But really. God loves us that much! Is there some decision that you are struggling with right now that you need to trust His answer for you? Is there a situation that you are in because you couldn’t wait for His answer? Or maybe you were confused. Look for peace. Where you find peace, you find Him. Trust Him. I hope you will sign-up for my email list and come back to get the rest of my story as it unfolds.

Sincerely, Christi