The Story of Dawn & Rain’s Names

We’re on Day 7 of Pursuit Community’s Seek Devotional, and yesterday the reading was from a verse that’s very close to my heart, a promise that my husband and I remember every single day because they run around our home in the form of two energetic toddlers named Dawn & Rain.

Hosea 6:3—

“Oh, that we might know the LORD! Let us press on to know him.
He will respond to us as surely as the arrival of the dawn
or the coming of rain in early spring.”

The thing is, we already knew we would name them “Dawn” & “Rain” before we found this verse!

We knew RAIN’s name right from the beginning.

The morning we confirmed that I was pregnant, God gave me this verse, Leviticus 26:3-14, and the passage began with..

“If you follow my decrees and are careful to obey my commands,
I will send you RAIN in its season,
and the ground will yield its crops and the trees their fruit.” 

That passage is packed with so many promises, and as a married couple who’s adjusting to a new life, traversing new paths, and are about to be new parents, we claimed each promise in Leviticus 26 one by one. At that time we didn’t know if we were having a boy or a girl, we just knew that whatever the gender, there’s got to be “Rain” in her name.

And then we found out that we’re having twins, and few months later we learned we’re having two girls; but Dawn’s name was not revealed to us until later. The thing is, deciding on the second baby’s name was a bit more challenging because we wanted to be more specific. Since Rain already starts with an “R” following my name, we were praying for a name that starts with a “D” to follow my husband’s name.

One morning, at 7 months pregnant, while my husband was having his devotion, he excitedly shouted to me from across the living room, “I found her name!!”

God affirmed to him Psalm 37:6.

“He will make your righteous reward shine like the DAWN,
your vindication like the noonday sun.” 

& that’s when we knew her name would be DAWN.

Dawn and Rain. I remember how it felt like, finally knowing what their names were going to be. We loved calling them by name while they were still in my womb, we even knew that Rain was the twin on top of her sister, and Dawn was the one who always kicked me on the side. Not only do we love the sound of their names, we love the promises that their names represent.

As my due date came closer, we announced their names to our family and close friends. It was Paul, my husband’s cousin, who messaged us one morning and shared to us Hosea 6:3. “Did you know that both Dawn and Rain’s names are in Hosea 6:3?” he asked. And there it was, indeed, our ultimate affirmation that we got our daughters’ names right!

But more than their names literally being in this verse, my husband and I acknowledge that our daughters are God’s real-life representation of this very promise to us.. that He will respond to us as we press on to know Him. That as we seek Him, we will find him. That He will come forth as certain as the arrival of the dawn and the coming of rain. 

We’ve tested and proven this promise in our lives many times! Raising twins and becoming parents came with responsibilities that stretched us, broke us, tested our faith, and brought us to our knees desperate for God to respond. And every single time we call upon Him for comfort and help, He hears our cries and answers our prayers. Sometimes He changes our situation; often He changes us.

I hope that whatever you’re going through today you will find rest in the assurance that God is true to His promises. So when He says that He will respond to us, He most definitely will. You can trust Him.

---

Come join us!

Join us as we go through Seek, a 21-Day Prayer and Fasting Devotional put together by the Pursuit Community! We’re at Day 7, but you can begin anytime! You can find DAY ONE here.