I spend most of my time these days staring at my computer screen then staring at words on a page then puzzling over assignment instructions wondering what on God’s-green-earth my professor is asking me to do.
I’m going to go out on a limb here, but does anyone else think that nothing is more daunting or taunting than a blinking cursor on a blank screen? All you writers out there- I know you’re sponging what I’m spilling…
I’m in the final weeks of my first semester of seminary and I should be writing a paper entitled “Identity and Ethics for the Pastoral Counselor.” But my soul has longed to write a lot of sentences that start with the word “and.”
And so here I am.
To be honest, there are times when I’ve wanted to isolate these past few months. With seminary, being a good foster mom for our bonus daughters, church events, and work, it’s… a lot. But I don’t have to tell you, because you know. We each have our list of things to do and roles to fill.
And if we are not intentionally seeking Jesus, we feel tired and vulnerable. But lately I’ve not only felt emotionally vulnerable but physically vulnerable as well. See, a few months ago the Pastor Husband and I decided to move forward with Invitro Fertilization and it just so happens that it’s this week when we have to do the shots. HAAAAAAAAPPY ADVEEEEEENT!
And it’s divinely fitting and orchestrated because Day One of shots was on Thanksgiving.
And every night since then, the Pastor Husband stands above me and gives me a series of injections into my stomach. We are in the middle of our first round of IVF and let me tell you, it hasn’t been as bad as the interwebs make it out to be. Seriously. My emotions aren’t any crazier than they usually are (actually, I’m perpetually in a good mood. It’s so weird. What are these miracle potions? Let this be a lesson to me to stay away from comments sections and chat rooms that are so gloomy and doomy.)
But last night I was like, “don’t stand above me so aggressively!” and he was like, “I have to because I’m imagining that I’m throwing darts.”
…alrighty then.
So every night my husband imagines he’s hurling darts of hormones into me and we mostly laugh because we are obsessed with each other and also because this situation is so absurd and one time I bled because he hit a blood vessel and I still have a large bruise that is the color of a beautiful and ripe eggplant.
And then I go to Fertility Doctor Rhee (FDR), and she comments that my follicles look “so nice” and that my eggs are “so abundant,” and that yes, my bruise is very dark and I thank her for the complements and the validation and I text some friends about my nice follicles and abundant eggs and they cheer me on and we laugh because this life? It’s absurd and wonderful and such an adventure.
And on my way home I thank God for the opportunity to do IVF and for FDR. I wouldn’t have planned it this way, but honestly, I wouldn’t change it either.
And here is why.
The two years of infertility is a mystery for the most part. FDR can’t explain it and neither can I, so I prayed to God, who didn’t plan it but certainly allowed it, “I know you’re up to something with this. Please don’t let me miss it.”
And since then I’ve felt so protected. So watched-over. In this moment I know He watches over me and is so obsessed with me and with you. Whether you know Him or not, when we embarrass Him or bring Him joy, He’s so smitten with us. There hasn’t been one moment of my time on earth that I haven’t been in His company. That’s simply not even a choice we can make when our God is in the very air we breathe.
And in His grace this is what He revealed: He is absolutely up to something. He is good and He is good to me. And sometimes these bad things happen because we are fallen people who inhabit fallen bodies in a fallen world. See, God commanded that we be fruitful and multiply before Eve and Adam ate the fruit. That was in Genesis 1.
God’s Command Numero Uno was to be fruitful and multiply, so He’s not going to curse some of us with infertility, thus making it impossible to obey Him. Just like I’m not going to “command” my bonus daughters to clean their room but then take away the vacuum and make it really hard for them to obey my command. And there is a power in this world that is contrary to God that seeks to frustrate, isolate, and destroy by any means necessary.
And the essence of Jesus of Nazareth is incompatible with infertility.
When Jesus traveled from town to town He restored and resurrected. He loves life. He loves it so much that He died and rose so that we could have life eternally.
When Peter cut off Malchus’s ear as he and the priests came to arrested Jesus, Jesus picked up the bloody ear and put it back on Malchus’s head.
“Hang on guys, first things first. Malchus, my son, come here.” and I imagine that He picked up the ear and looked into Malchus’s watery eyes and held his trembling head and kissed his sweaty forehead as His healing hands fastened the ear back in place, where He originally placed it when He knit him together in his mama’s womb. The hands that were a few hours from being nailed to a cross took every opportunity to restore.
Then maybe He turned to Peter and gave him a look that communicated, “get it together, man.”
Malchus would have been fine without it, but Jesus came to show His concern for our health and wholeness (and hates violence and assumably bloodied ears).
He cares about lopped off ears and infertile wombs and everything in between. Everything.
And I know this now, but I didn’t know this then. And because I know this, I have felt a closeness to Jesus that I can’t explain. And because of this I’m not heartbroken or worried or anxious about the IVF. It may work. It may not.
But in the end my identity doesn’t come from hearing a child call me mom because I have a Father King who calls me daughter.
Friend, our Father is victorious, so we don’t have to be victims, no matter what Satan throws our way.
My Father wrote my name on the palm of his hand. The same hands that crafted the mountains and pour out the rain. His hands put the waves in the ocean and drew the ocean’s boundaries. There you may go, but no further. Therefore, no failure is final and everything can reveal God’s grace if we have eyes to see. If we look for how God will move and if our eyes are on Him more than on our problems.
And the antidote to isolating and growing weary is doing the Father’s will.
1. Go courageously and boldly and stand next to the discouraged and lift them up- literally “to encourage” means to stand next to someone and place courage into them. And so that’s what we do.
2. Reveal the grace of God. Plainly, this means showing empathy. The grace of God sits with us in our pain and helps to carry it.
3. Allow our presence to be a present to those around us. Our relational warmth disarms and befriends. This is the work of the Holy Spirit, who comforts and gives wisdom.
4. Speak words that reveal our commitment to the well-being and wholeness of our friends, family, strangers, and acquaintances, those whom God has placed in our context. This is the very meaning of agape love. To work and speak for the well-being of others, no matter the cost.
And so that’s what we need from our friends as we enter Advent.
We need people who stand beside us to place their courage into us.
We need the grace of God in human form; that’s empathy.
We need relational warmth; that’s the Holy Spirit surrounding us.
We need agape love; that’s others working and speaking for our well-being.
When we have these things, we are better able to pray, “God, I don’t know what you are doing, but please don’t let me miss it.”