Hello Friends,
This week was meant to be the third and final “Hot Take” post, but I am taking a short hiatus from that series in lieu of other important events. Namely, having a baby.
It looks like we will be bringing our sixth little wonder into the world sometime in the next few days. On Easter weekend no less. Another unexpected joy.
To know the sweetness of this arrival during this particular season is to know the story of how this came about in the first place. We shared it again with our kids last night. It feels strange for me to talk about how I heard a word from the Lord, but there you have it. That’s what happened, as far as I can tell.
Last summer I went through a dark time of fear and doubt and worry. Unlike anything I normally battle. Fear is not one of my particular vices. But go through it I did and as I read and prayed and waited and waded through the mire of fear and worry about the world and the particular place of my kids within it, slowly the clouds began to lift and I sensed the Lord saying something to me. Yes, the world is dark but it would not overcome the Light. That God was present in this world, indeed had made it for himself and incarnated himself into it in order to redeem it. That He was still about this business. And that though I was given no guarantees about my own kids and the paths they might one day take or the struggles they may face, what He wanted from me was to walk forward in faith. To trust.
And then I sensed somewhere, somehow, without any angelic visitation but in what felt like a no less clear word, In fact, I want you to act in faith by bringing another child into this world you fear.
When I shared this sense I had with Josh, he was surprisingly immediately on board. All he said was, YES. I told him I already had a name. When I said it, he laughed. He had just been thinking the very same one. One week later, we were pregnant.
I continued to wonder, to question if this was some fluke woman-over-forty-listening-to-her-ovaries thing. I read the novel, Jewel about a woman in her forties who has a sixth child with Down Syndrome and wondered if this was to be our story too. But the tests all showed normal results. I wondered if I’d gotten it wrong and read into things too much with the girl name on our minds, but the ultrasound confirmed we were on the right track.
All along the way, I have wondered why this strange way of combatting my fears. Every time I’ve had a baby, I’ve been walking alongside a friend or family member who has lost theirs, or who is just longing for one. I’ve struggled with the guilt of why I’ve been given this bounty, when others are given loss. I don’t have an answer for that. It humbles me in this place I have as a mother of (soon to be) six children; for whatever reason, my calling. And perhaps whether it’s trusting the Lord of Love when he withholds the things you long for, or trusting the Lord of Love when the thing you hold goes wayward, the truth is we are all led back to trusting in his love, in the dark, one way or another. But it won’t stay dark forever.
That’s why I love Easter. That’s why having this faith baby on Easter weekend is a beautiful symbol to me of come-what-may, the Dawn breaks on a dark world— it happened once and it will happen again. We can have hope because the Lord Jesus went to a hopeless place for us, and came back.
I’m a little sad to miss the sobering worship and highest of celebrations over the next few days. But how could I not be elated to bring new life into the world on the day we proclaim that the Light has come into the world and the darkness has not overcome it.
I’ll leave you an excerpt from a poem I love. It speaks to this truth: all that we have, because he gave all; the Great Exchange.
…he is curtailed
who overflowed all skies,
all years.
Older than eternity, now he
is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed
to my poor planet, caught that I might be free,
blind in my womb to know my darkness ended,
brought to this birth
for me to be new-born,
and for him to see me mended
I must see him torn.
(from Mary’s song by Luci Shaw)
Thank you for sharing. What a beautiful story and hope we have. ❤️
I send you lots of prayers and love. My this be a special Easter
For all of you. Some day I hope we meet.