Elise is Set Apart for God

Ok, I know that most parents will probably say the same things about their children but I am going to say it anyway.



Let me start at the very beginning....Joel and I had been married for five years and one day while traveling from my parents home in Louisville to my Kentucky home in Lawrenceburg it was as if God spoke to me. He told me it was time to have a child. The wierd thing is it was as if He said have a child now because your family will not be around to enjoy him/her. I was thinking about my dad, at this time he had had several heart attacks and open heart surgery. I was beginning to think that something would happen to him. Thank the Lord he is still alive and well.



I can remember going home and waiting for Joel to get home...you have to know when ever Joel brought up having kids I would freak out. I didn't want children, atleast not then. Joel finally came in the back door where I quickly and loudly said to him that I wanted to have a baby. I never have been good at delivering news. Within two weeks I was pregnant.



When Elise was 13 months old, we moved to South Carolina. So part of the message God gave me that day was true. My family was not around to watch Elise grow up.



After we moved here and got involved in a church, of course, Elise went with us, had her church friends, loved her Sunday School teacher, all the stuff with going to church. I was staying at home with Elise then and basically our only outings were to church. So she literally grew up in and around church the second year of her life. As a two and three your old she would "pack" her bags, throw it over her shoulder, and tell me she was going to meet Jesus.



Needless to say, when elise asked Jesus to be her personal Savior at the age of 5 I was not surprised. She actually wanted to wait to be baptized by my father-in-law, so she waited. Thinking one day we would go home to Kentucky and she would be baptized in our home church's baptizmal.



The day that Elise walked down the aisle in church it was not at our home church. She looked at me and just left. On her own free will. She pushed passed me and her dad. We almost had
to run to catch up with her. She was baptized that day. The sky above the river were she was baptized had a rainbow. Leading up to that day I knew Elise was special but on that day I realized that God was setting her a part.



Today she is a leader at her school. She tries to uphold Christian character. Does she fall short of the mark? Yes. Does she always climb back up and live the life that God has intended for her. Yes. Is it hard for her? Yes. Does she risk losing it all? Yes. Does she still love the Lord with all of her heart? Yes.



So the other day I was listening to a podcast of Perry Noble the pastor at Newspring Church. His church can rock the roof off his church. This song is Elise's anthem. This is my Anthem. This should be The Anthem of every Jesus follower.