Monday, May 6, 2013

Fear and Trust, Part 2-What I DO Know


Now, 7 months later, as birth and the postpartum period become imminent, I realize that I still struggle with the fear and with trust. My thoughts reel. I become the double-minded man that James warns us of.

Un-Holy Self: "What if God makes me go through this again? Last time I prayed that she would turn from the breech position and she didn't. God didn't answer my prayer that time and I suffered emotionally from it for a year. I still suffer from it... What was the point?"
Becoming- Sanctified Self:"Ugh, what a hypocrite I am! I'm sure there were reasons. After all, now I know what it is and can maybe help others who have suffered with postpartum depression but who had some of the less common symptoms. And then there was the infection thing she had to deal with in the hospital. If I had been home, we may not have caught that and she could have gotten really sick!"
Un-Holy Self: "But couldn't God have kept her from getting the dumb infection in the first place?"
Becoming- Sanctified Self: Come now, you know that is just your limited understanding! God had a reason for the suffering, even if He didn't really author it.
Un-Holy Self: Oh, that is just a bunch of Christianese jargon. We just tell ourselves that to make ourselves feel better. Besides, it's silly to call it suffering. What about people who have really sick babies? Or preemies? You had the healthiest, strongest baby in the NICU! What do you know of suffering really?"

And so on it goes...

Last week, a conversation with a friend and then with my husband reminded me that I needed to just leave it in God's hands. Just leave it there. That's it. Don't try to understand. Is that a "crutch" of a faith? A silly, absurd, archaic religion that excuses inconsistency and pain and suffering as something that, ironically, and in a way we don't understand, just is something we...well, don't understand? I don't know, but what about what I DO know? I do know God is real. I do know He is full of beauty and creativity. I do know that He is Holy. I do know that He is personal. These things I know that I know that I know.

A sermon along the same lines this past weekend brought the same thoughts to mind. I need to surrender my fear. I just do. I don't have to work myself up to a certain feeling of faith. I just have to trust Him. I have to trust that God knows what is best. He knows what I desire, but He also knows what is best. Ah! But here comes the voice of that darned un-Holy ME, again. But I must squelch it. I must. I know what I do know. God DOES love me.That much is true. That much I must remember. I trust with my life and future and eternity a God who saved me from myself. I really do. God is bigger than me. He wouldn't be much of a God if I could comprehend Him, now would He? That would make me God, or Him human...it doesn't work that way. Besides, what is my alternative? Trust myself? Um...what do I think I, of all creatures, can do?

So...while I still struggle...I will try to trust. I will prepare and gain knowledge and decrease my risk factors, but then I must just trust. Who else is there to turn to? I fail. Doctors fail. God alone knows it all.

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