JOSIAH LACHLAN SACHS~BORN DECEMBER 8,2009.
My sweet baby,
How hard it is to believe that a year has come and gone! Just the other day,I found the little Christmas cap the nurses placed on your newly birthed head. It was so tiny and so difficult to remember how it once swallowed you so. As the Mother of our Saviour "treasured up all these things in her heart", so also did I treasure all the jewels I could possibly hold in my mind from your first year. If I could bottle the scent of your tiny face fresh from your bath, I would be the wealthiest woman on earth...for it was sweeter than any incense or perfume on the market!
You were and are a priceless gift to our family. Chosen before the beginning of time, all of your days were numbered before one of them came to be (Psalm 139). Believing this truth led us on a great scavenger hunt to discover your name. The Father had named you long before we did...we only had to learn what He wanted us to call you.It was soon clear that you would be called Josiah Lachlan, meaning "God restores" and "warrior from the land of lakes". You, sweet boy, are named after the young king Josiah. The legacy of his reign and his life is found in 2 Kings. He took the throne at the age your oldest brother was when you were born-eight! The Bible says that "he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and walked in all the way of David his father, and he did not turn aside to the right or to the left." Perhaps he is best known for the restoration and reformation he brought to the land. Under King Josiah's reign the Book of the Law was discovered after being discarded for hundreds of years. He ordered all the inhabitants of the land to gather and he read to them all of the words of the Book. "And the king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the Lord, to walk after the Lord and to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his statutes with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book."-2 Kings 23:3 Josiah led his people in repentance, in a purging off all that was unholy and that which defiled the Lord and in restoration. In 2 Kings 23:25 we read that "neither before nor after Josiah was there a king like him, who turned to the Lord with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might...." And that, my son, is our prayer for you. May you be a warrior who rises up and turns to the Lord with all your strength and brings restoration to your people.
I know not the plans He has for you, but He who named you does. What I am sure of, however, is that I long to point you to Him for all the days that God gives me with you. During this short first year of life, you have brought more joy and more laughter and more delight to us- far more than I could have ever imagined. From the excitement the entire first and second grades had on the morning we would meet you-(our school Principal went to share the good news with your brother and sister's classrooms and I am told they erupted with cheers!!) To the pride your older 3 siblings had as they wore a button with your picture on it to school the next day. Oh what fun we have had with you, Josiah. Even Jud-Bud loves you with a fierce, rough and protective love! He wasn't even 2 when you came home from the hospital, but he loved to shower you with soft kisses. Some of the first words we heard him speak were "baby-hold baby"! Even still, his first act in the morning is to stop and give you a kiss. You are loved so, little one! From your first smile, first coo, first food-(not counting the cool ranch Doritos Jud shoved in your mouth when you were still toothless)-to your first crawl and first steps...we have cheered, laughed, and loved each second with you. I will treasure these moments, my son, savoring and storing each one in my heart. While you may not have many pictures to record your first year...nor do you have a baby book where all of your "firsts" were written down, I can assure you that they are forever carved in your Momma's heart. I am eternally grateful for the gift of you sweet baby. May it one day be said of Josiah Lachlan Sachs, that he is a man who loved the Lord with all his heart, all his soul and all his might.
Happy first birthday!
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