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When I first saw those blue eyes staring at me, my eyes filled with tears. He was the most beautiful little human being I had ever seen in my life. His head was perfectly round; even his cry captured my heart. I was thirty-eight years old when he was born; my only son was born on Jan. 2, 2014.

You have to understand I thought I would never have children. I was married before, and my wife and I accepted that we would never be parents; my brother had two boys, which filled the need to have someone carry on the family name, so needless to say, I put all my time into spoiling my nephews.

As time went on, my wife and I drew apart as couples sometimes do, mainly because we were both young and immature when we were married. So I assumed I would never be a father and devoted all of my time to God and the small ministry I had.

I moved to Michigan many years later and was led by God to a church where I was ordained a minister. I proceeded to preach the word all over Michigan. God provided me a house I owned; however, after five years, I began to feel my time there was running out and that I would return home soon.

When the time came for me to leave, first, you must understand I had a specific mission to do in Michigan. It was done for which I will not detail here, but it can be found in a book I wrote called “A Life Worth Living.” Needless to say, coming home, I felt very lonely; I had made some extraordinary friends in Michigan and missed them dearly, but I also knew Tennessee was where I was meant to be; then, on Christmas 2012, I met a girl who had only her mother as family and she too felt lonely on that Christmas morning, so we decided to go see a movie together. Needless to say, later I would realize that was the best and worst time of my life up to that point.

Now I must say she had never had kids either, and she too felt the way I felt, that our time for that had passed; however, God had other plans. We found out that she was pregnant, and we both were in shock at first, but the strangest part of the story is she was five months before we realized it.

When I first saw him on the ultrasound machine, I couldn’t speak; my son was moving around alive in black and white! I was in awe of that little miracle of life that came from pure nothingness into life all his own, and then four months later, I saw him in the flesh; my wife was in so much pain from the c-section that she could not concentrate until she heard him cry for the first time. The only thing she could utter was “I want to see my baby,” in which the nurse immediately brought him around to see her. She gently kissed her son on the head, then the doctors injected some much stronger medication into my wife, and she fell asleep.

When I held him for the first time, my eyes filled with tears. I never wanted to put him down in the nursery; I sat with him, whispering little things in his little ear. He is my son, the greatest reward God has ever given me besides a faithful, loving wife. Like the one, I have now. My son’s mother was not meant to be a wife. Again, for reasons I cannot divulge here, my son and I, after eight years, found ourselves on our own alone. And then we met the woman that could truly change our lives.

I now know what a parent feels like. I want my son to grow and respect and be proud of me, so I will do everything in my power to be the role model, teacher, and father I can be. Elijah, I love you, son!

“Lo, children are a heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward…” Psalm 127:3