God knows my name

How times change…

I can’t believe the last blog I posted was the due date of my first pregnancy and here I am, now over halfway through my second pregnancy, living in a completely different part of the country, with SUCH a different life.

I couldn’t have begun to imagine what the last 18-19 months have held, and if someone had told me I’d be where I am now on Ethan’s due date I wouldn’t have believed them.

Over the past year and a half, the following things have happened:

- Ethan was born by emergency c-section

- I left my city job

- Heavily involved with various ministries at PBC, especially a teenage girls group, adult small group, children’s worship, adult worship…

- Got an amazing part-time job with a local company, working for a Christian, where the pay was great, the responsibility was the most I’ve ever had

- Worked as an administrator for a local charity (Life & Soul)

- Got pregnant again

- Dan was appointed Student Pastor for St George’s in Leeds…

And so that’s where we are now. One week into living in Leeds, a week’s worth of unpacking, tidying and sorting, and Dan officially starts work in two days time. We’ve left family, friends, a homely church, jobs, our house, and so much more, behind in Pembury, and have moved to a new church, new home, new city.

I still don’t think I’ve quite got my head around it all. I am so excited by the role Dan has been appointed to do. I’m so amazed at how God has got us into working full-time for a church – I never expected it to be this scale, this soon, in this area of the country – and yet, I can’t wait to see how he will use Dan especially in this role.

I don’t know where I fit into all of this yet, and being pregnant does tend you make you more emotionally dependant on stability, security and ‘knowing your place’, but right now I have to keep coming back to the fact that “God knows my name”, he’s not forgotten me, and I am as much a part of this move to Leeds as Dan is.

At New Wine, suffice to say, God spoke to me exactly how I needed to hear his voice. The very very short version of what happened is that He singled me out (using the speaker) in a room full of 2,000+ people and said “Blessed is she who comes in the name of the Lord, Emily…” and then pointed at me.

God knows my name. He knows me. I am unique before him. I am not forgotten.

I don’t have all the answers for what being in Leeds will bring. I don’t know how exactly I will fit in at our new church, whether I will have an ‘official’ role or play my part in an unofficial manner. I don’t know how being Ethan (and baby boy #2)’s mummy will work out. There are many things I don’t know.

But God knows my name.
For that, I am so thankful.