Charlotte Madison Finally Arrives!

Two weeks ago I wrote in my church newsletter (copied below) about how much I could relate to people in Scripture like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob who had to wait- wait a Long Time- for the birth of the child God had promised each of them. It’s so interesting to read Scripture through the lens of your own experiences that are similar to the events we read about in the Bible. While I wrote two weeks ago about how well I could relate to the idea of waiting (impatiently) for God’s promises, I write now as a man who knows the joy of a promise fulfilled. At 7:07 PM on May 3, I witnessed the love of my life bring the 9.1 lb, 20” love of our lives into this world. I’ve never seen true perfection before. I thought I had, but really what I saw was technical perfection; like a mint-condition baseball card or a perfectly new cell phone screen- you know, before it spends a lifetime in your pocket and get scratched beyond the point where you can actually read the screen. What I knew as perfection was really just the lack of blemish. Charlotte Madison was perfect from the very second she was born- not just in a “I have 10 toes and 10 fingers and a perfect rose-colored skin” kind of way- not just in a “I’m perfectly healthy and normal” kind of way. Hers was a created perfection- only achievable by the careful molding and shaping of the One Who created our universe. As the doctors worked diligently to heal Margaret, the only words that could come out of my mouth were “She’s perfect!” I paced back and forth between Mom and baby for the first 30 minutes of Charlotte’s life. I looked at Charlotte and made mental notes about everything I would tell Margaret. But by the time I got back to Margaret, the only thing I could say every time was “She’s perfect!” It was truly one of the most amazing- and deeply spiritual- moments of my life.