Patience and Trust

I think if I had to let all things settle and skim off the top two lessons learned from pregnancy I think the cream of the crop would be have to be patience and trust. You learn a lot while your pregnant - how to hold your bladder when you sneeze, how to keep from losing your cookies when you bend over (I told Steven that it often feels like you are giving yourself the Heimlich), how to find that "comfortable" sleeping position when you feel like a beached whale that needs a team of rescuers to come and help you to turn over...you know, all the important stuff like that.

Even though all of those above things are quite the experience, I think that, really, they don't hold a candle to the bottom line: while you are pregnant, you have no control over anything and basically your "job" is to incubate your baby while you wait for the time of delivery.

While I am pregnant I am certainly more attune to the other pregnancy experiences around me...there is definitely something to the phrase "ignorance is bliss" - I think I was stupid enough to the whole process when I was pregnant with Isaiah that the thought of something going wrong really didn't ever enter my mind, I was selfishly oblivious to the many struggles couples have not only in getting pregnant, but in keeping everyone healthy until delivery. Then my dear cousin lost her full term baby a few weeks before I delivered Isaiah and the first seeds of uncertainty were planted. Now with every pregnancy I have had a specific experience of knowing someone journeying down that pregnancy road along side of me that has been derailed by a major pregnancy complication: premature births, stillborn, miscarriage - or dear friends that have experienced years of infertility...the terrible list just makes me more aware of the harsh reality that nothing in life is certain. That's where the lesson of trust hits you straight on. Of course I continue to worry and stew about the health of the baby and being safe during the pregnancy/delivery, but really if something were to happen would I have enough trust in God's Sovereignty, no matter what road our family finds itself traveling, to worship Him even through the hard times? To believe His Word when He promises to work good in the lives of those who love Him? These are questions I try to ask myself now, so that when any terrible day comes in my future I will hopefully be a bit more ready to fall into His lap and trust Him to direct me to deal with what is brought before me.

Patience of course is an obvious pregnancy lesson - I have no idea when this baby will come - I have no control over the event (outside the medical science in place nowadays that allows you to choose the birth date!) But I sit and wait and continue to grow and become more and more uncomfortable and short of breath and unable to easily accomplish simple tasks that are required of a mom - all in all feeling exhausted while trying to get all of my responsibilities covered. Patience is part of that fruit that the Holy Spirit will grow within us when we allow Him...so do I sit and stew and pout because I am uncomfortable (yes, at times I do unfortunately)...but then I remember the dear stories I alluded to above and think of how those folks would long to feel what the "hum-drum" 9th month of pregnancy is like and see it end with a happy healthy delivery of their beautiful baby. Then I am reminded to stop and pray for more patience and to trust that the Lord's timing is perfect...and to also hope that others will see that through their life circumstances, God is hoping to teach them more about His character as well.