The Nursery That Was Ready Before the First Breath

In 2019, Maria and Carlos Espinoza spent four months transforming a spare bedroom in their San Antonio home into a nursery. Carlos sanded and painted the crib himself — soft white, with their family name stenciled along the headboard. Maria chose the wallpaper: tiny yellow finches on pale blue. They hung wooden letters above the window spelling "Sofia." They folded impossibly small clothes into dresser drawers. They argued lovingly over which rocking chair would hold up through midnight feedings.

Sofia would not arrive for another five months.

She had no say in any of it. She could not request the finch wallpaper or lobby for the name. She had done nothing to earn that room, those clothes, that family. But everything was prepared — chosen, arranged, set in place — by two people whose love had already claimed her before she drew her first breath.

Paul writes to the Ephesians that God "chose us in Him before the foundation of the world" and "predestined us for adoption" according to the purpose of His will. Before you took your first step, before you whispered your first prayer, before you even knew there was a God to seek — the Almighty had already spoken your name. The room was ready. The family was chosen. You were wanted not because of anything you would do, but because of who He is. That is the staggering weight of grace: you were loved before you could love back.