A Prophet to the Nations

"Children are the living messages we send to a time we will not see." 

John W. Whitehead, founder of Rutherford Institute

I don’t remember a time I felt more joy than when I discovered I was pregnant. I’d gotten to a point in my life where I had seen the gifts God had given me and I could see how they could be used as a mother. It was a purpose I longed for, to care and love for a child, to selflessly serve that child with all that I had. After two years of trying, I had prayed and prayed for this child and finally in the summer of 2011, he was here. I couldn't wait for our first doctor's appointment.

I was 11 weeks along, and I remember not being able to sleep because I couldn't wait to see the heartbeat, to see him on the screen. That smile my husband loved was lighting up my face as the doctor started the ultrasound. She applied the jelly and began moving the wand across my already slightly showing belly. I watched the screen with anticipation, but the more she moved the wand, the more my smile began to fade and the more the sparkle left Ryan’s eyes. The room was so quiet and I knew it wasn't good. The doctor began speaking, explaining something about my body thinking it was still pregnant when I’d actually lost the pregnancy weeks earlier, something about the placenta continuing to grow though the baby’s heart had stopped. I remember her saying she hoped she was wrong and saying I’d have to have a more detailed ultrasound. I remember having to sit in the waiting room for what seemed like hours waiting to be seen by the technician, crying; it took all I had not to just fall to the ground and weep in the waiting room. We’d have to wait more as they read the results of the second ultrasound but we already knew. I wasn't going to have my baby; the only thing we could do was wait for the inevitable. A week later I would have to go to the emergency room, experiencing the worst pain of my life as I finally began miscarrying. The next day I would have surgery to remove what my body was too weak to pass.

In the days and weeks to come, so much of me felt like when they removed my baby they removed a part of my soul. I lived in this darkness and bitterness toward God for giving me hope after two years of trying only to rip it away. It was such a dark time for me. I was so sad and hurt and angry. I prayed so many years for my husband to grow closer to God. I prayed that God would bless my marriage. I prayed that He would give us a child. None of that was happening and I felt so alone.

Despite that darkness, despite the distance I felt from God and my husband, we would get pregnant again in February. I felt that joy all over again, but on March 10, 2012 my world would come crashing down around me. That day I found out that less than a month after my first miscarriage my husband entered a physical relationship with another woman and it had continued all the way to this point. I was devastated. I didn't know what to do and I just rocked back and forth in my bed sobbing. All I kept saying was, “how can I have this baby, how can I have my baby?” It felt like my world was crashing down on me. Do I stay in a marriage where my husband despises me and risk it happening again when there was now a child involved? Would our child end up feeling exactly how I felt in this moment, hated and betrayed? Or did I leave and face life as a single mom, again with my child feeling everything I was feeling in that moment, like he wasn't enough for his dad to stay?

I don’t remember that next week. No matter how much I rack my brain and try to work through what happened in the days to come, I don’t know. But on a Sunday later that month, Ryan and I had just finished talking about our plan moving forward. He wanted to make it work and we had just picked out baby furniture. I had gotten up from the couch where we had been sitting and headed to the bathroom to get ready for bed. All the joy I had felt just seconds earlier rushed out of me as I discovered I was spotting. My heart sank because I knew, I just knew; God wasn't going to let us keep this child either. 

We went to the doctor and we got to see her heart beat. There was this glimmer of hope but the heartbeat wasn't as strong as it should be and every week I would have to go back and every week her heart rate was slower. I remember sitting in my office at work praying, God please save her and just saying over and over again through tears, “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” Saying it to God and saying it to her. It was my fault we were in this place. It was my fault she was never going to get to live in this world. To this day I can’t even write these words without crying, without telling her all over again how sorry I am. I felt so selfish. I don’t know which miscarriage was worse, going in with the joy and expectation of meeting my first child only to find out he was already gone or the pain of knowing your child is dying inside of you and there’s nothing you can do but wait for her heart to beat its last beat. When that day came, the doctor gave me medicine to help with the miscarriage and once again I felt a part of my soul be taken away with my child. This wasn't my perfect plan.

But for the first time I started to realize, maybe it was His.

I wasn't going to be holding a child in my arms as I had planned, but for the first time in so long, I was letting my Father hold me. Every night I would read Psalm 119. I don’t know why that chapter, I don’t remember what took me there but I found comfort in it; I heard God’s voice in it. Every night I would pray for healing in whatever way God wanted to bring that to me. I started seeing Him in my life again; the miscarriages weren't God’s way of punishing me. It was grace. It was Him saying, “I see things you don’t. I know things that are to come and I’m going to save you and your children from so much pain.” If there’s one thing I've learned through this journey it is this: God’s promises are true. Psalm 119:28 says, “My soul weeps because of grief; Strengthen me according to Thy word.” I read and prayed that verse every night. I grabbed onto those words with every ounce of my being and as time passed God did just that. He strengthened me, and how? By His Word.

In the Old Testament, God brought His message to His children through prophets. God did the same for this child. He gave me two amazing prophets: my children. My first child brought me God’s message of hope. During those two years of trying so much pain came with every month, with every negative pregnancy test. God knew I needed hope and so He sent it. Unfortunately, I responded like a child with bitterness and anger when it was taken away. Just as He’d done for Israel so many times, God gave me another chance though. He sent me my second child. This time He gave me a message of mercy. He kept me and my child from experiencing a lifetime of heartache due to my husband’s choices. He showed me I was forgiven and gave me the opportunity to respond this time with thankfulness. My children brought me the message I needed most: a message of God’s grace.

Like Israel though, there are days I forget that message. I forget that gift He’s given me. Other days, I remember it, but I forget to share it. I don’t want to make the mistake I made after my first miscarriage; I never want to return to that ungratefulness.

This week I got a tattoo as a reminder of that grace and as a memorial to my children.

I’m so grateful for the time God gave me with my children and I know through me their message from God can live on. God knew my children before he formed them in the womb. He knew me before I was born. And He's appointed all of us to be His messengers. I’m so excited for the opportunities I will have to hear other women’s stories and struggles with miscarriage or infertility. I know that pain and I know there’s a purpose for it. It’s such a silent struggle and it doesn't have to be. I hope my tattoo, my story, helps another woman find her voice and her message from God, just as my children did for me. 

What's your story? What's God's message for you? Never forget your purpose as His prophet; share it.

Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Before you were born, I set you apart. I appointed you as a prophet to the nations. Jeremiah 1:5