Blessed Mum

I haven’t written at all about my faith yet. I’m not sure why, especially since it feels so intertwined with my role as a mother. By intertwined, I mean that I felt a different connection to God as early as the birth of my son.

I’m one of those weirdos who decided to give birth without the epidural. That decision was, in part, due to discussions I had as an undergrad in Women’s Studies classes, but I don’t know if I could have stuck to the decision once the contractions hit if it hadn’t been for the complete dismissal of the notion by one of the doctors during my regular visits during the last trimester. After pre-scheduling an inducement, he laughed when I told him I wouldn’t be getting an epidural, and while I quietly seethed inside of my head and looked down at his stupid cowboy boots, I vowed to myself that I definitely was going to have a natural birth.

When the s**t hit the fan, not literally (thank goodness), I stuck to the decision of forgoing the epidural, and it took an unexpected turn in my mind. When Jesus went through the crucifixion practiced by the Roman Empire, he underwent excruciating pain. And his pain would have lasted much longer than my surprisingly quick vaginal birthing experience. Giving birth, experiencing that pain, and doing it all FOR A BIGGER PURPOSE, made me have a different appreciation for the pain that Jesus endured for all of the people who would choose to acknowledge him as God’s Son.

Do other women think these things?!

When Christmas rolled around, Little Man was ten months. Unlike the typical Sunday, our church didn’t have childcare on the Christmas Eve service, and so once the music stopped I ended up taking him out of the sanctuary and walking with him out in the lobby for the rest of the service. He is a super busy boy, so he was actually walking, and pulling at decorations, and trying to unplug Christmas tree lights. It was a good time, and a wake-up call to how lucky we are to normally have Kids’ Church! The music that I was able to be a part of though, it really got me this year. Now, I love music. It is one of the times I feel closest to God. One of my best friends told me that she had been told singing is like praying twice, and I kind of agree. Anyways, the lyrics had me crying as I held a squirming baby – it felt different than other Christmas services.

Love incarnate, love divine. Star and angels gave the sign. Bow to babe on bended knee. The Savior of humanity. Unto us a child is born. He shall reign forevermore. Noel! Noel! Come and see what God has done! Noel! Noel! The story of amazing love. The Light of the world, given for us. Noel.

Son of God and Son of Man. There before the world began. Born to suffer, born to save. Born to raise us from the grave. Christ the everlasting Lord. He shall reign forevermore.
(Sang beautifully by Lauren Daigle and a young woman, on Christmas Eve, in our church.)

“Come and see what God has done!”

That line really got me. When my baby boy was born, and the midwife put him on my chest, it was amazing. He had been inside of me for so long, and I had waited so long to see him, and then there he was — in all of his glory. As I listened to these lyrics, and sang along, and cried, I was imagining how Mary must have felt when Jesus was born. She and Joseph knew who He was, and I can only imagine that knowing that made the moment of His arrival more amazing than anything they could or would ever experience on Earth.

Becoming a mother has changed my faith. It has made me see things differently. It wasn’t just in this moment or at Christmas either. I have been able to talk about God’s love for us in a way that I wouldn’t have thought of before, because now I can understand the love of a parent. God, our Father, loves us more (somehow) than we love our own children. That still blows my mind sometimes.

So why am I writing this? Why didn’t I write this months ago, or a year ago for that matter?

I started a new Bible study with a girlfriend today. She chose it, out of about a dozen possibilities, and reading the devotional this morning, while Little Man had his morning nap, had me crying. I usually read the scripture before I read the devotional content in the app’s plans.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

So, I read this, and immediately felt guilt. I know the verse is not about guilt – it’s about newness. Yet all I could think about was all of the messed up stuff from my past. Really. Messed. Up. I know those periods are kind of unnecessary, but I just need to put them in so you can hear my voice stop and start. I know that God forgives sins, but sometimes I wonder if he can really forgive mine.  Perhaps more so, I wonder how it is that I have been blessed with such an absolutely amazing child and beautiful life after the things that I have done.

So the crying came right about as I listened to the devotional say, “…there is acknowledgment of what came before the beginning to mark this moment. And in that place I was there too.” Today, and everyday, I need to appreciate the moments before I recognized God was with me. Seeing who I can be with God would be impossible if I could not also acknowledge who I was without him. If I did not see darkness, would I understand what light is? If I did not feel hunger, would I know when I was satiated?

Flash forward to tonight during our family devotional time – just the husband, 14 year old, and me. We read of the sinful woman who washed Christ’s feet with her tears and anointed his feet in perfume. Jesus shared a parable here, as he so often did, and asked his host this question:

“Two people owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?” (Luke 7: 41-42)

Here I think, ‘Big Mess – Big Appreciation’, right? So, I haven’t committed murder, but I still feel like my mistakes might fall into the 500 denarii category. And yet, and yet… God has blessed me with SUCH AN INCREDIBLE CHILD and a husband who loves me no matter what.

So not only has God graced us with love incarnate, a beautiful baby – who we celebrate at Christmas, but He has also blessed us with a forgiveness that I did not fully grasp until I had my own child, who also feels like love incarnate a lot of the time.

All of my silly worries: nap times, food choices, growth percentiles, ability to feed himself (at a year!), and time for weaning – are all put into perspective. I AM BLESSED. I am blessed to grow in my faith because of my role as a mother. I am slowly learning how to forgive my past through my present as I live out my blessed life as a mother to a beautiful child from God.