My daughter...my precious angel girl...is now MY SISTER IN CHRIST! Woo Hoo!

Mary Clare has been very close for a while now in her understanding of salvation and her own personal lostness, as well as Christ's perfect atonement for her sin through the cross. She has watched the boys accept Christ and seen others in our corporate worship services accept Christ and follow our Lord in belivers' baptism and has taken it all in with wide open eyes.

Well, tonight her conversation turned toward my Uncle Tom, "Grandma's baby brother" (who happened to have been the only 6'5" man in this family of "you're lucky to have made it to 5'4"ness...)! He passed away about a year and a half ago, and we speak often of missing him and, since he had asked Jesus into his heart a long time ago, getting to see him again in Heaven. 

Well tonight, Miss Priss said, "I miss Uncle Tom." And we talked again about the joy we have in Christ in that Uncle Tom had Jesus in his heart, and if we have Jesus in our heart we will get to see Uncle Tom again in Heaven. To this, Mary Clare replied, "And have a big party, right?!?" That's my girl!

We went through the steps of salvation and just asked question after question, not pushing her but kind of guiding her conversation as she clarified to herself and to God what was going on in her heart and mind. She prayed her own sinner's prayer, telling God exactly what she was thinking and doing and why. Our eyes were open the whole time as she just talked to God like He was sitting right there at the table with us...and He was! How awesome is that?

Afterward, she wanted to call all of her friends to share the Good News! That's the best way to spread the Good News that I know of!

She is excited to go forward at church tomorrow to share her decision publicly with our church family. She is thrilled that Daddy will be baptizing her soon, and she is so excited to be able to participate in the Lord's Supper service ("I get to eat the bread and drink the juice now, right Mommy?")! Sweet.

Please pray for Mary Clare and her decision. Obviously, a four year old's understanding of salvation (albeit extremely accurate and on the money!) will grow as she gets older and understands more and more about Christ's sacrifice and our response, but she said it best in her prayer. "Jesus, I want you to come into my heart and take away all my sins and be my boss." It doesn't get any simpler than that!

I may not get any sleep tonight! :)