Interests:Knowing and loving my risen Savior, rather than just knowing about Him, and more of the depths of His love; people, encouraging the saints; writing - especially short stories and analogies, reading. Intercession.
My Husband :) Occupation:Disciple of Jesus Christ Industry:The Narrow Road / Servanthood/
Yep it's true. I wrote the infertility article in March 2010, and Baby is due to make his/her arrival sometime mid March of 2011, about a year later. :) We are thrilled, and it's so totally a God-thing, we're praising Him for our precious gift.
This is about what our baby looks like right now, basically perfect and in need of a lot of growing to do. :) His heart is pumping 25 quarts of blood a day. He can squint and squirm and kick and swallow.
Okay so More Like Falling In Love, isn't exactly my normal style. I know there is some disagreement about this song. But I really like it because I can relate to it. I went from religion to Relationship. I think anyone who has been there and back again and found the saving Relationship with Jesus, will rejoice with this song, because you know that "falling in love feeling" that radically changed your life forever.
For me it was definitely a revolutionary love that has changed my entire life. Religion doesn't save us, the RELATIONSHIP with Jesus does. Salvation wasn't for the sake of saving us from hell, but to restore us to relationship with God our Father, and bring us into relationship with our Bridegroom Jesus Christ. I am called out because of that relationship, I am changed because of that relationship, I have allegiance because of that realtionship, I have loyalty because of that relationship.... So while some react - I think they are thinking of it backwards or really haven't experienced the revolutionary Love of God.
Many people have inquired as to when or whether or not we are going to have children - and my reply is simply "When God wills."
Warning - I deal with some very serious issues in this article (if that wasn't obvious by the title).
How big is your God? I mean really: How big is your God?
I'm amazed at the "solutions" to infertility people offer... "Don't drink coffee" "Don't drink city water." "Don't use laptops" "Have you tried...." And sometimes it gets um... a little personal. Um yeah.
I do what I can within my power to be healthy and a good steward of my body unto God. Whether or when God uses the union with my husband and I to create a new life, is absolutely and entirely in His hands. Period.
People go to great lengths to prevent getting pregnant yet become pregnant anyhow when they were sure it was impossible. People can go to great lengths to become pregnant yet have a miscarriage. We have a lot of medical advances to preserve life, yet every day people die. Life and death are both in the hand of God.
We had hoped God would give us a few months at least of time to adjust to married life before giving us kids. But we found out early on that having a child would be harder for us than most couples and that there was a physiological problem. I reserve the right to not disclose what this physical issue is. Frankly it's none of your business. I reject the notion that people are entitled to any such information. This condition was apparently preexisting but unknown to us before. Yes this has been VERY hard for me to come to peace with. I do want to do what I can to increase my chances within reason, but it is in the hand of God.
My God is big enough to overcome this hurdle if indeed it is His will for us to have children. We had hoped to have a large family, however we want what God wants. God is bigger than any obstacle.
When people suggest I shouldn't drink coffee, or that it's the water...etc It's frustrating. I know what's wrong, trust me that's not it. It's not a mystery, there is a physical cause. Pleeeenty of people get pregnant while drinking coffee... A small amount of coffee isn't a problem, excess is. Moderation is the key, as it is with most things (coffee in moderation is actually healthy, but I digress). I take my folic acid and vitamins. I want to be in good shape so I am taking good care of this body, this earthly vessel God gave me. And I want to be the best wife I can be for my husband so he can delight in me. I also want to be in good health to be a healthy support system should God grant a child grow within my womb. Just because I know the probability is low doesn't mean I want to trash my body just because odds are against me. It doesn't give me the right to trash my body, because I am still a steward.
In the past, God has allowed women to be "barren" (to use the old term for infertility), for His specific purpose and for His glory. God has made infertile women to have children after a lifetime of being barren. Absolutely nothing is impossible with God.
My God is not so small that I could accidentally mess up by drinking the wrong water. My God is a good Father who loves His children. My God is Omnipotent, He created life, gives life and takes life. My God is good, trustworthy and faithful in all things and areas of my life. My God is a relational God, not an malicious manipulator.
I do not want to be a woman who.... Mocks God. Nor do I want to be the woman who chooses to curse God, becomes bitter and angry. Nor do I want to be the woman who goes outside of God's ordained order and reacts out of fear. I am not against adoption and I'm not against foster care. Either of those could be something God leads us to at some point but has not yet. I think it has to be something God leads a couple to do. I have absolutely no issues with that. What is wrong is when any action is taken in our own will, out of fear or reaction rather than out love of, obedience to, and fear of God. It would be wrong to the child if I was to take a child out of my own selfishness and fear - rather than out of love. As a mother would I need to selflessly love as Christ loves.
Thankfully God doesn't just give life when everything is "perfect" because - we live in an imperfect world. And if He waited always until somebody had all their ducks in a row, or people got their act together, people just wouldn't have kids.
I'm saying this because for centuries it's been often thought that because children are a blessing - that not having kids is a curse or that God is holding out on you.
God allows unwed women to become mothers and to give life despite unwise choices. God chooses each life, not us. People sin, birth control fails, couples try thinking we have some sort of control. When you struggle with infertility - you come to realize that it is not something we control. It's not a punishment. Life is life. By that I mean life can only be given by God, it's not chance, desire, trying or not trying. God chooses to give life to an individual and chooses to do that through people as parents. It is a gift not as much to the mother or father as to the child himself. God gives life to an individual - a man and a woman are just conduits of God giving that life. This is why I am very pro-life. A woman who has been raped and becomes pregnant is not being punished. Rape is HORRIBLE, but if a life was created that human being now has every right to his own life, and to live that life out until the end of his days. No circumstance allows anyone to have the right to choose whether or not that child should die young because of the actions of another human being.
I don't think God was punishing or holding out on Hannah, Sarah or Elizabeth.
I love the story of Hannah, always have. Hannah was barren; she wept and prayed and asked the Lord for a son and vowed to give him to the Lord to serve Him. And that happened. The Bible says an interesting thing, "And in due time Hannah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Samuel, for she said, "I have asked for him from the LORD." When did God grant her prayer and give her the son? "in due time" - that is in God's own timing. Also in chapter 2 we see that she didn't just have only one son: "Indeed the LORD visited Hannah, and she conceived and bore three sons and two daughters." I don't know if that was five more in addition to Samuel or five total, but it wasn't just one child. God waited until His appointed time for both Samuel's conception and that of his siblings. God has a purpose in timing. God has a purpose in waiting. God has a purpose in each life and the time in history and future of that life. We see absolutely nothing in Scripture that says God was punishing Hannah and blessing Peninnah. It does say God closed Hannah's womb. "And her rival used to provoke her grievously to irritate her, because the LORD had closed her womb. So it went on year by year. As often as she went up to the house of the LORD, she used to provoke her." Scripture does not say why; just that God did. From everything we see Hannah was a righteous woman who feared God and was a woman of faith. God honored her faithfulness and answered her prayer and gave her children in His time, not only one child but opened her womb so that she bore several.
Sarah was 90 before she conceived Isaac. Many women don't even live that long anymore, I've only met a few people around the age of 90. Abraham was 75 when God first said that He would make of him a great nation. And the whole Hagar deal happened about 85 (he was 86 when Ishmael was born). And he was 99 and she was 90 when God told him that he would indeed bear a son by Sarah. Abraham begged God about Ishmael, because he didn't believe God would give them a son. 3 visitors, Sarah's laughter (I assume you know the story), then the Visitor said " Is anything too hard for the LORD? At the appointed time I will return to you about this time next year, and Sarah shall have a son." Abraham was 100 when Isaac was born.
Abraham and Sarah did many wrong things in their time of waiting. They feared they would have no heir and went outside of God's appointed order and had a child by another woman. They laughed and doubted God. (Abraham twice lied about Sarah being his wife and gave her to another man). But God was true to His promise. He waited many years before giving them a child, and tested their faith. And as Timothy says "if we believe not, yet He abideth faithful. He cannot deny Himself." I'm not sure this was the brightest spot on Abraham's faith record... but God proved always faithful despite Abraham and Sarah's lack of faith.
And now for Elizabeh my namesake. Elizabeth means Consecrated to God. I love that meaning. I believe that Elizabeth was consecrated to God. "And they were both [Elizabeth & Zechariah] righteous before God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and statutes of the Lord. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were advanced in years." Again, Elizabeth and Zechariah were righteous, blameless, but childless. Barrenness was neither a punishment, nor a withholding of blessing. It was part of God's purpose. The purpose was John, a prophet to be born in their old age, who would prepare the way for Christ as Isaiah the prophet had foretold.
I want to be a Hannah. I want to be another Elizabeth. I hope I don't become a Sarah. I want to trust that God has a purpose in this time, and in a child if that is His will. I have faith that my God is good, trustworthy and faithful and always will be. And that He is even in this difficult area. He knows the desires of our heart.
My favorite definition of peace is this: Peace is the inner rest within my soul when I realize God is in control.
How very very true. God is in control and thus I can be at peace. I can run to Him and cry and pray as Hannah did. I can trust Him. I can be at an inner peace that in every area of my life, because I can rest in the fact that God is in control. Peace isn't being happy with my circumstances, it is trusting that God is in control, and that He is good, trustworthy and faithful.
We are always in different stages in life. We pass from one stretch of the journey into another one. From childhood to adulthood, from singleness to marriage, from marriage into parenthood. Then there are different stages even yet. Life is full of stages - we are all at different places along the journey. Are we content with where God has us?
In singleness there was the waiting and the need to be content with where God had me. And now as a married woman I find the need to be content where I am as a wife and without a baby in my arms. No matter what part of the journey I am there will always be the need to wait, to be content with where God has me.
The best way to really truly be content is if our identity is not in who we are, not in our position, job, vocation, status - but if our identity is in Christ.
If my identity is in being a wife - then my identity is not in Christ. If my identity was in being a mother - then my identity would not be in Christ.
I cannot be satisfied in life with the way others see me, with my status in any area of my life. Even when there is man's approval it is only fleeting. If I was to live for my own selfish goals - the joy would be fleeting. One cannot be satisfied with these things. The only way to be really content is to be satisfied in Christ, in who He is, in who I am in Him and in what He is calling me to do this very moment. And this is true and will be true all through out my life. It doesn't get easier once you are married, and I'm sure it doesn't get easier when one has kids.
If Christ is at the center of our lives and if we are secure and satisfied with who we are in Him - we can be satisfied with where we are along the journey.
"...For I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content." Philippians 4:11
Satisfied when money is tight. Satisfied with our work Satisfied with our callings Satisfied with life Satisfied in Christ
Now this may surprise some - wouldn't I get tired of the rain in Oregon? Well yes. But you see normal Oregon rain is drizzly, gray, never-ending... just enough to be very annoying. That is mostly the winter months (extending into the Fall and Spring though). And it has been several days, (if not more than a week, which is a long time to us) since we've had rain at least that I can remember. This rain was different than our typical rain however. It was drenching, cooling the hills from what had been 79° humid day. Big cold droplets like mini water balloons soaking and cooling you off, falling rapidly and in great succession, with a blowing wind characteristic of a storm. This is the kind of rain I get childish about. It is to me like playing in God's own sprinkler. :) Yes this is the rain that brings my childish heart pure joy to dance in. It is one of the many facets of beauty that my Father has created for me to joy in as I rejoice in the Creator - the Sender of this spectacular thunder storm. And this one was especially perfect as most the day had been hot and muggy and the rain itself was so cold and drenching. Let me tell you of the beauty of this perfect thunderstorm.
It was a glorious thunderstorm, with big drenching rain drops, fast and furiously falling, and a wind, with a thundering accord, making this musical beauty called a "Thunder Storm". I ran out to enjoy the rain and my husband followed this crazy girl outside for a few minutes, as I just stretched out my arms lifted up my head and let the rain come pouring down on me. The cold felt so good. He eventually retreated to the back door, laughing at my enthusiasm to watch me as I proceeded to dance and do cartwheels in the rain, giddy with excitement. Dancing to the music of the rain. May I tell you of the beautiful music the rain made?
The rain hit the pine tree leaving a constant flow of drips from the end of pine needles, with beautiful beads of water at the end of each one as the music played on. The rain fell down on the truck splashing as it hit, made lots tin clatter on the shed roof, made a soft patter on the grass, a slightly louder pitter-patter on the gravel driveway, and a splish-splash on the road, making the most beautiful music. And I joined in the dance - of the trees and bushes and grass which were all moving with the wind from which swelled up a beautiful rushing sound as if they were all alive. Rumbling the very air and earth, echoing in the hills came the deep base of thunderclaps, like the cannons in Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture they joined the grand overture I heard all around me. And I listened and danced to the beauty around me soaking it all in - literally. :)
Eventually quite soaked I joined my husband just inside the door and watched and listened to the Overture, snuggling my wet head into his chest as he wrapped his arms around my wet frame to add some warmth. We watched the lightening light up the sky like fireworks, and the rain splash on the truck, and the droplets roll off the pine needles in quick succession - always leaving another drop hanging at the tip as if the droplets had never fallen. It was such a beautiful sight, and such beautiful music.
O Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder Consider all the works Thy hands have made, I see the stars, I hear the rolling/mighty thunder, Thy pow'r thru-out the universe displayed!
Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee: How great Thou art, how great Thou art! Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee: How great Thou art, how great Thou art!
Eyes of Faith A Prayer by thekingdomcomes
Father, I can't keep going on
I need You to give me strength cause I have none.
I don't have faith as a mustard seed
To see past this mountain in front of me.
Give me eyes to see that this mountain
Is not even a mole hill in Your eyes and plans.
Give me eyes of faith to walk,
And ears to hear You talk.
Give me faith to trust You now
Give me strength to journey on.
