A few months ago I was talking with a friend who mentioned that while pregnant she chose a hymn to sing and pray over her baby and has carried that through even after her little one was born.  I was instantly convicted.  I feel like I had been doing a great job thanking God for the gift of this baby after praying for her so much throughout our TTC journey, but I wasn’t currently praying over her and her future the way I felt like I should be. After that conversation I was inspired to pray and ask God to reveal a verse or hymn that I could specifically use for my baby.

A few weeks of praying about it goes by… I was in the car, stuck in traffic (not abnormal in the DFW area), and decided to turn on my playlist of hymns I have on my phone.  While the songs played I found myself thinking about the lyrics specifically for the purpose of praying these over my daughter and would ask God things like “How about this one?” “Is this one good?”

I never felt peace about any of the songs I was trying to select. In my silly human nature the lack of peace quickly turned into doubt.  “How will I know which verse/song God picks?” “How will I know it’s God’s voice telling me and not my own?” “Will He answer me?”

Some time after that I was spending some time catching up on my journaling… it had been a while and I had been putting off journaling after the death of my Grandmother back in April, who I was extremely close to. I had felt the nudge to process the last couple months in writing for a while but hadn’t brought myself to do it.  When I finally sat down to write it all out the epiphany happened.

I was writing specifically about my last moments in the hospital room with my grandmother and how my mom played Elvis’ version of In The Garden, her favorite hymn, and the joy and peace that washed over her in that moment was the most beautiful, tangible taste of heaven I’ve ever encountered. At the time of this journal entry baby girl didn’t have a name (actually still doesn’t) but what we did know is that she will have the name “Ann” incorporated into her name after my grandmother’s middle name.  We also knew that her nursery theme would be, you may have guessed it, a garden.  The lyrics to In The Garden jumped out at me and I was instantly a puddle of tears:

This is all I could ever want for my daughter… that she’ll walk closely with Him, talk with Him and know that she is His and as a result experience joy unexplainable.

That gentle nudge to journal was not my own – I have no doubt now that it was The Lord wanting me to slow down to hear from Him.  I felt so silly for ever even having my doubts about hearing from God and yet, I know that won’t be the last time. I am so thankful that regardless of how much my humanity gets in the way His grace and mercy is right there to embrace me.

My garden girl, we are so excited to meet you and introduce you to your creator who loves you even more than you can fathom!