Israel's Baby Dedication

On Sunday, October 7th, since our family was in town anyway for Israel's birthday party, we had Israel's baby dedication at our church.

 

Our church does "baby dedication" where the parents commit to the church that we will do our best to raise Israel in a way that teaches him about Christ and salvation, and the church vows to support us in our ministry to our son. This tradition also says that we acknowledge that Israel is a gift and we thus give the Lord the glory and right to do what He wills in Israel's life. (Just because we did this, however, does not mean that Israel will definitely become a Christian- that is something the Lord must do in Israel's life. We just promise to teach Israel about the Lord and we pray that God will draw Israel to Himself.)

I've already written about how Israel's birth family has been heavy on my heart on the weeks surrounding his birth. The whole time we were getting ready to have Israel dedicated to the Lord, I couldn't help but think about his birth family and what an honor it is to dedicate Israel back to God. I felt like Hannah in 1 Samuel when she prays desperately for a child, and before she even gets pregnant, she acknowledges that if she ever does, that the child would be God's. That is how we feel about our son Israel. In fact, that is why we named him Israel! Naming our son Israel was our promise that we are committed to him, and we are going to be faithful to him just as God is faithful with us. I thought about Israel's name and his heritage so much as we led up to the dedication "ceremony."

Every night we pray that Israel will love the Lord and know God for himself. We trust God's faithfulness and pray that God will continue to be glorified through Israel's life.