Tag: pastor

Let The Redeemed of The Lord Say So

Tomorrow is my firstborn’s birthday and I want to shout it on the mountain tops that Jonathan Esteban Greene es mi hijo. I labored very hard on March 5th, 33 years ago and out of me, imaginate, came this beautiful baby boy who captured my heart. In my really loud voice, I want the world to know that I love him so much. That handsome young man is a product of our marriage covenant, he is our blessing and I love to tell anyone that will listen who my children are. My pastor always quotes “Let the redeemed of the Lord say so” 

For 33 years I’ve watched and prayed for this son of mine, he is a man that doesn’t share his heart too much, too many words are just that, too many words. Acuerdense, he is Benjamin Greene’s son, my Cold blooded Englishman, man of few words. Pero as his mother, sometimes I just know when I must pray and pray.  I’ve held my breath as the pages of his life have turned. 

• His adolescent years were angry ones as he was fighting God. He wanted God in his world sometimes, only when necessary, and it ticked him off when God convicted him of his sin. Why was everything he liked a sin? God was boring, God’s ways were boring and God obviously didn’t care for him. 
• As a teenager, when he got out of that gawky weird stage and he turned into a fine young stud, the girls were looking his way and he tried to hide his “god” into a nice “Sunday only” religion. In high school he was considered a “nerdy white boy” He was determined that things were going to change.They did. He had to figure out adulthood, more schooling? Working? Girls? He went back and forth too afraid to go all the way into the dark alleys of the world but sick of “religion.” How uncomfortable it is to know the scripture in Mat 28:20 “…I am with you always, even unto the ends of the earth” when you crave things outside of God’s path.
• When sweet Denise captured his heart, he gave in to God for just a little while, maybe just maybe there was something good in God’s plan after all. He didn’t pay too much attention to God as he recited his marriage vows and made her his wife. Gracias a Dios that He was with them, marriage can be wearisome to put it nicely, pero sin Cristo? Hijole! 
• When he became a father and he didn’t know what to do with this fragile little bundle, he remembered God again and then again as the children came, pero aun asi, Jesus needed to be Lord of his life, all of it.
• Then came that life changing encounter with God that propelled him into his true destiny, the road to salvation, the road to peace and to his calling. 

In this manner, my first born has battled through a few things, tripping and falling on his face at times, but he is clinging to Jesus, he remembers what he’s been pulled out of, and with that knowledge I rest. This weekend I will celebrate his birthday with such pleasure. Mi hijo es, como dice el dicho “un hombre hecho y derecho” He is a man’ s man! A hardworking tradesman by day; go ahead and call the plumber. Mas importante, he’s God’s man. He has responded to his calling to preach the Gospel of Jesus and is a pioneer pastor, he’s out in the fields gathering the crops and then gleaning for the Lord of the Harvest. 

“Mi hijo, is a good man!” Feliz cumpleaños a mi Primogénito! I love its intensity in español. To my first born I say “Que Dios te Bendiga Jonathan Esteban” and your Tata would say “Echale ganas!”