To blog about the birth of our fifth child, Justis, in March, I've copied parts of my husbands' newsletter and added some things from my own perspective.

"An On Time God!

As I sit here and think of all the things I want to say in this newsletter all I can think about is what an awesome God we serve! He is always on time and is always in control.

I wanted to tell you what he has done in The Bowen Family's lives.

Back in August of last year (2010) Becky came to me and told me she thought she might be pregnant. To be honest with you I really hoped she wasn't. We were traveling and ministering in churches as a family for the last three years and things were going really good for us. I started thinking, how will we travel? What will we travel in? It's going to be even more tough to travel with five kids.

After a pregnancy test that showed negative I was relieved. Then a month later Becky told me that something wasn't right. She said she felt like something was growing in her stomach and if it wasn't a baby then what could it be?

She took another test and again it showed negative. She began to get concerned even more because 9 1/2 years ago her mother died of cancer, so Becky thought it might be a cyst or a tumor that was growing inside of her.

I told her I was praying and believing that it wasn't cancer and nothing was going to harm her. I told her to go get an ultrasound just to see what was growing in her stomach. She made an appointment and took our son, Landis with her. She didn't tell him what she was going to get checked out for other than just a check up. She had him stay in the other room because she wanted to speak freely with the doctor and not worry Landis.

Becky told the doctor her concerns and he said 'well, let's just have a look.' Just like looking away from the needle going into your arm makes it hurt less, Becky looked away from the monitor so she wouldn't see the mass in her abdomen. But on second thought she decided that it was best to face her fears and deal with whatever it was that she was about to fight and just as she turned toward the monitor she saw an oval with what looked like a little backbone trailing away from it. At the same moment the doctor announced she was carrying a baby and the whole moment was so overwhelming she said she felt dizzy.

Becky said she just about fell off the table. She said "are you sure" and he said "yes can't you see the spine"? And right away he asked if I'd like to know the sex of the baby. Of course she wanted to know and was so excited to be told it was a BOY!

They called Landis back into the room and Becky asked him what it looked like on the monitor but Landis said he didn't know.

She said "take a closer look" and then, very cautiously he asked, "a baby?" After his suspicions were confirmed he pumped his fists and with a super wide grin he said, "YES!"

Landis was so excited to be getting a baby brother. He later said he had been praying for years to have a baby brother but then gave up because he thought it wasn't going to happen.

We actually found out she was going to have our baby boy when she was 17 1/2 weeks into it.

We are so thankful to God for his blessings of children. The Bible says blessed is the man who's quiver is full!

The Lord knew that I needed a bass player!

Getting close to the due date I was scheduled to be gone for 21 days ministering in West Texas, Western Oklahoma and New Mexico. I canceled a couple of the first churches thinking the baby would be born soon. He didn't show up so on Saturday, March 5th, Landis, Hope, Faith and I left for Snyder, Texas leaving a very pregnant, very tearful Becky standing in the driveway in the pouring rain to be gone for 17 days with the due date right in the middle of that trip. Now, you'd think (as we did) that the 5th baby would come a little early, especially after the 4th baby came 2 weeks early!

We spent a lot of time on Skype during that trip and every night when Becky went to bed she set her webcam up so that when she went into labor, it would be ready to go and she could give us a call (after she called the midwife) and tell me "it's time!"

Now, when I left in on the 5th, I told Becky that the baby would wait to come until after we'd returned home. However, we both knew the chances of that happening were pretty slim.

So on Monday morning, March 21 we headed out from Amarillo with 965 miles between us and home. We anved at home at 10:45 PM Monday night and at 12:45 AM the contractions began. At 2:52 AM Justis Loy Bowen was born! See what I mean about God's timing?

We want to say thank you for your prayers and support of our family and our ministry. We couldn't do what we do without your prayers and financial support.

A lot of people have asked me if we needed anything. The only thing we need is diapers!

We have had several people send us a gift card from Walmart and other stores that sell diapers so we can go and buy them here in town. That would be awesome if you wanted to do something like that. God bless you for it.

As I close I ask you to continue to pray for The Bowen Family. We realize that time is running short. Jesus is coming soon! We all need to go tell people about Him and his saving grace.

Also please check out our schedule and if we are within driving distance of you please come see us. We'd love to see you!

One more thing, We have a new look to our website http://www.bobbybowen.com/

Blessings,

Bobby Bowen & Family

Maternity Leave

January and February 2010

Although I've been very quiet on this site, I've been very busy at home. In January we began a new trend...Mama stays home. Mama liked it very much. I needed a break physically as well as emotionally and mentally. I was nearing the 30 week point of my pregnancy and my midwife recommended I get off the road. So every weekend Grace and I would say goodbye to Bobby and the other children and they'd leave us. A couple of those times they were gone for 4 days, usually it was 3 days, and occasionally it was only 1 day.

Since Grace and I were going to be regular church attenders again, I asked Mr. Pat Johnson when he'd like us to attend. I knew he and his wife went to church on Saturday nights and that would have been my first choice too but because I knew his wife, Mary, might not appreciate Mr. Pat leaving him for a younger woman (Grace, that is) I decided to let him tell me when he'd rather we'd come since he tended to Grace during church. Mr. Pat preferred that we come on Sunday morning and so that is what we did and I was happy to do so when I considered that it would put me back in touch with my Sunday School class.

Grace LOVED going to church again and instead of crying when Bobby and the kids hit the road every weekend, she was GLAD. I have to admit I was surprised, knowing how much she loves to go places. But thinking it through I realized she enjoyed the fact that I was speaking to her a WHOLE lot more since she was the only other person there to speak to. I gave her choices of two when it came to what to eat, what to do next, which clothes to wear, and which show to watch. She also enjoyed the fact that she got to watch a whole lot more television. So when we asked her if she was ready for Daddy and the kids to leave again she smiled and screamed her happy scream.

I got so much sewing done on those weekends. I loved it. I made progress. I also read to Grace quite a bit and...blogged? Not so much. I decided I couldn't sew and blog at the same time so I decided that sewing would be pre-baby and blogging would be done post-baby.

My due date was March 13. However, I'd asked God to call this baby out a couple of weeks early because Bobby and the kids were going to be gone a lot in March. I walked and walked and walked and walked but even walking 2 or 3 times a day didn't cause our baby to come...when we wanted him to.

In the meantime Bobby and the kids were going out and ministering and having a good time...most of the time. One of my main concerns about them going out without me was Faith's safety. She's not afraid of anything and is very curious, to put it nicely. Not only would the children be on their own the hour before the concert, helping Bobby with set-up and making sure their hair was combed, etc., but they had to be still on the front row without Mom during church and oh, what about after the service when Bobby was greeting people and then tearing down his stuff? Faith likes to run off and explore the church. I begged Bobby please find the pastor's wife or some lady that might keep Faith under a watchful eye until Bobby is ready to leave the church. I could see that wasn't going to work as I'd hoped and so I knew that I had to leave it with the Father and trust Him with my family. I felt bad for Bobby but had to laugh at him as he had more responsibility on him than ever with leading the service as well as looking after the children. When they returned home from their first weekend without Grace and he said, "It was mentally exhausting for me just to make sure everyone changed their underwear and brushed their teeth!" Classic.