This
past week I have had more pregnancies announced to me than I have over the rest
of the year combined. I can honestly say
that (by the grace of God) my first thought is that I am so excited for them. But shortly after that comes the
self-pity. It’s not fair. We did everything right. Don’t we deserve to get what we want most;
something all of our friends seem to be getting? I am personally firm in the belief that we
would make great parents. (I know I will
eat these words when we actually are parents, but for now I feel like we could
do just as good as a job as anyone else!)
Surprisingly,
my self-pity has been at a minimum as I have learned of all of these dear women
in my life who are expecting. I haven’t
had crying outbursts (as I am sometimes prone to) and I have been able to be
excited for each of them. But in the
back of my mind, there is still that thought of the heart-wrenching question:
When will it be our turn? It is only
fair that it should be our turn! Some of our friends are even starting to think
of baby number 2 and we’re still here waiting on baby number 1. I see how
precious Will is with our god-daughter or the children at church or any of the
other children in our lives and my heart aches because I want him to have
that. I think both of us were made to be
parents. We have always defined
ourselves as being a good big brother and big sister to our younger siblings
and feel that we are more experienced than many of our friends who are having
babies. It’s not that I’m not excited for
them, it’s that I’m sad for us because I want that for us to.
When
one of these precious women in my life recently told me she was expecting, she
commented that it just wasn't fair of God to give her a baby before He gave me
one. I’ve been waiting longer and trying
everything we know to do and they weren’t even ready to start trying yet. She’s right.
It’s not fair. As we tell the
fifth graders every day, life’s not fair.
And I
am so grateful for that.
If life
was fair, we would be punished for our sins with eternal separation from our
creator. God can’t stand to be around
sin; it goes against who He is. And we
are sinners. The “fair” answer is we’re
sinners, we can be near God. We’re
separated from Him. Forever. Period.
But fortunately, we serve a God who is so much more than fair. He is merciful. He sees what is fair and what we deserve, but
instead gives us something so much better.
He sent His SON. His only son. To
die for us. I doubt that when God does
bless us with a son, I would be willing to give that precious son up for
anything. Or anyone. When Jesus died, he didn’t just die, He who
was without sin took on our sin.
Everyone
loves to quote the verse that “God works all things for the good of those who
love Him”. Yes, He does. But God’s good is not necessarily the same as
“good” as defined by the world. In Bible
class this week our lesson is about Egypt, Moses, and the Plagues. After each plague, God hardened Pharaoh’s
heart so Pharaoh said the Israelite slaves could not leave to worship their God. Why did He do this? These plagues were
certainly not “good” according to human terms.
Instead God did this for His good that He could be glorified over all
the earth for His great wonders. My
prayer with this blog is even though our infertility is not “good” by the world’s
standards and may seem “unfair”, that God can still use it for His greater good
that is so much better than ours. I truly
do want to worship while I’m waiting and bring Him glory in all
situations.
No, it’s
not fair, but God’s plans are so much better than fair. We just have to have faith and patience.
