Micah 7:7

I read something earlier today that captured the sentiment I was trying to get at in my previous two posts. I feel like I'm constantly quoting others, but I don't pretend to have words for all that I feel, and sometimes others say it so well that I couldn't say it better if I tried. This woman was writing about being in the hospital for 10 weeks while she was pregnant with her twins. This was her second pregnancy, and after losing the first to miscarriage, these were her feelings while in that hospital for all that time:

"I believed in Him. The whole story. I loved Him fully, but I learned to keep Him at arm's length in the event that He let me down. I hate that part of the story, and if I could do it over...well, I can't. I just have to know that He pursued me even when I acted like a jilted bride. He wanted me when I didn't want Him. He taught me about Himself, even as I resisted loving Him back. I am forever grateful for the tenderness He showed me during that time, and the grace He showed me when I came running back with remorse in my heart." (Here's her original post. Truly an amazing woman with a wonderful story of God's faithfulness in the midst of some unimaginable circumstances).

That's where the hope comes in. Belief is one step; trust is another, slightly more difficult step, and then hope is the ultimate in letting go and giving your life, your situation, your problems, your joys to God. I feel like I stand on the edge, believing and trusting, but only opening the door to hope a teeny bit. I don't mean that to say that I don't already love this baby or that I don't hope for good things for this child, for Caroline, or for Jeff and me, because "I certainly do!" is the answer to all of those. Maybe I'll find a quote someone else that puts words to it better than I can, but for now at least, it feels like my hope is a little garden with walls around it (I keep picturing The Secret Garden); it's not quite public and ready to open the hope up to the world, but in a small way it's there.

"But as for me, I watch in hope for the LORD, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me"

Grace and peace.

And more

This "trust" theme keeps popping up. Here's another quote from a not quite so famous person as John Piper, but wonderfully said all the same. She lost her first baby a year ago and her second child is due two days after the anniversary date of that loss. Oh, for clarity, this was not written to me.
"I am so thankful that God is going to take a terrible day and hopefully give me such joy. Like you, I am still grieving the loss of my first child, but your words were so helpful as I went through those dark days. . . . I have enjoyed every moment of this pregnancy, knowing that God could allow it to end at any time, but that He would also bring me through that as well...stronger than before. I must admit that we didn't paint the nursery or put furniture together or even complete a registry until well into the 3rd trimester, but it wasn't because I didn't trust God. He had just taught me that He is in control here, and that these babies are not mine, but His. And if I am not meant to take care of them here on earth, I can't imagine anyone better than their Heavenly Father."

In thinking more about trust over the past couple of days, my mind has gone to the "next step". What is next if I do trust? What does my life look like if I trust? One word has come to mind over and over: Hope. If I (or you) truly trust, do we now entrust our hopes and dreams to God? Do we now dare to hope?

More on trust

I was reading something online today and came across an article written by John Piper after the loss of his granddaughter at 39 weeks gestation. She apparently died because of an umbilical cord accident. I'll quote part of what he said here: "This seems so preventable. By God and by man. Yes. So easy. But neither man nor God prevented this. Man, because he did not know it was happening. God, because he has his wise and loving reasons that we wait to learn with tears and trust. "

I think that is a beautiful description of how this experience has felt to me: so incomprehensible and preventable and heart-wrenching. That is the place where my faith and trust are tested; in the midst of that which could truly break me, will I believe?

Trust

It is hard to know whether you truly trust someone or something unless that trust is put to a test. I say I trust God, but does my life really show that I do? I am examining myself to see whether it’s true and each day I think I have to reevaluate. Trusting God does not mean that all things in life go your way or that God is going to make only great and wonderful things happen to you. Bad things do happen to “good people.” People who love God and follow him are afflicted and pained and touched by tragedy all the time. Of course good things happen to them too, but until something unfathomable happens to you, those tragedies always happen to “other people.” As I walk around the LSU lakes each week, I am always struck by the groups of college girls walking or running together and I love their carefree and untouched smiles. Who knows how each of their lives will be touched with beauty and tragedy over the next ten years?

I thought that once the first trimester of this pregnancy came to an end, I would have some big weight lifted off of my shoulders and I would feel more able to trust God that whatever happens with this child, He is in control. I think I really meant that once the first trimester ended, I would feel more at ease that this pregnancy would end happily. While I am getting more excited about a new baby by the day, I am too aware that anything can happen at any time. The threat doesn’t end with a live birth of a healthy baby. I read a tragic story of a seven week old seemingly healthy boy who suddenly died in the night a couple of weeks ago. Toddlers are lost in accidents; children sometimes do not come home. I think God is opening my eyes to this reality that life can’t be controlled and it has helped me have a greater understanding of what trust means. Trusting God and especially trusting God with my children means that I relinquish my false sense of control; I lose those defense mechanisms that “protect” me from all the possibilities and allow myself to love and know that no matter the outcome of anything in my life, God is working these things together for good. How? I wish I knew, but for now, I just believe.

As I pondered how to trust God with this new life and with the life of our sweet Caroline, I was struck by the image of God putting his son in this world, letting his child go into a world that would hurt him and reject him and kill him. He had to let go of him to save us and all that he is asking of me is that I trust him, who loves me and my children more than even I do (which I can’t really fathom, because, well, I really, really love them), that I trust them to him. It isn’t even really a comparison when you look at it like that. He gave his son to the world that he knew would not accept him, and he’s asking me to entrust my children to him, the lover and creator of their precious lives.

Do I struggle each day with trust? Absolutely. Without question, it is a choice I have to make multiple times in a day. Each time I make it though, I think I love a little more, a little better, and fear a little less.