On the birth of Felix Luther

Last night at 9.30pm (GMT) our second son, Felix Luther, was born. He is perfect in every way and the most undeserved gift of God to us for however long God gifts him.

The birth of a child is a cause to celebrate, a reason to marvel and produces in the life of any believer a reason to worship. The words of Psalm 139 immediately come to mind:

Psalm 139:13-17

¹³ For you created his inmost being;
you knit him together in his mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because he is fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
¹⁵ His frame was not hidden from you
when he was made in the secret place,
when he was woven together in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw his unformed body;
all the days ordained for him were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts, God!
How vast is the sum of them!

It is too much that God should be so kind.

A second birth

And yet as I look at this new life and thank God I also pray that God would work a second miracle and bring about a second new birth no less miraculous and no less a divine gift than the first.

A Puritan prayer taken from ‘The Valley of Vision‘

O God, I cannot endure to see the destruction

of my kindred.

Let those that are united to me in tender ties

be precious in thy sight and devoted to thy glory.

Sanctify and prosper my domestic devotion,

instruction, discipline, example,

that  my house may be a nursery for heaven,

my church the garden of the Lord,

enriched with trees of righteousness of

thy planting, for thy glory;

Let not those of my family who are amiable, moral

attractive,

fall short of heaven at last;

Grant that the promising appearances of a

tender conscience,

soft heart, the alarms and delights of thy Word,

be not finally blotted out,

but bring forth judgement unto victory

in all whom I love.

Born to give them second birth

My favourite Christmas carol, ‘Hark! The Herald Angel sing‘, offers great hope to all who pray for their children. As we celebrate the birth of God’s son we do so remembering that he was born to bring new life, a second birth.

Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
Hark! The herald angels sing
“Glory to the newborn King!”