Control is An Illusion

I'm now a little over two weeks away from my due date, which is really hard to believe. I've never been this far along in a pregnancy before, so in a lot of ways it's all very new to me. We've never gotten a nursery ready before. The twins came so unexpectedly that my mom and sister-in-law set everything up for us while we were in the hospital. I've never bought diapers before delivery before. I've never had to count contractions or pay attention to my body because I was already in the hospital when I went into labor with the twins (and I didn't even know I was in labor anyway!). 

In a lot of ways the extra time has been nice. It's allowed for more rest and time to reflect on the changes coming our way. It's given me time with the boys before baby brother makes his grand entrance. It's given me time with Daniel before we are sleep-deprived and delirious. And while I am anxious to meet this sweet boy, I'm thankful that he's stayed put this long. 

But in another way the extra time has been hard for me. It's revealed to an even greater degree my ever present struggle with wanting to control every outcome of my life. The twins shattered that illusion pretty quickly when they arrived eight weeks early. Our lives were turned upside down by premature infants and twice daily NICU visits. It was good for us, me especially. Now that I am in a more normal pregnancy situation I can start to believe that I am in control of this whole having a baby thing. Having some form of readiness for his arrival (a room ready, food in the freezer, bags packed) can make me think that I've got this--or that I have time to spare. So when I have a night of contractions I start to panic, not because I might have a baby born before his due date, but because he's not coming according to my plan. 

You would think I've learned by now that babies come when the feel like it.

There is a spiritual parallel to my illusion of control about the day and hour that Seth will be born. The New Testament is full of warnings to be ready for the second coming of Christ, because none of us knows the day or the hour that he will come back to bring his children home and judge sin once and for all (Matt. 24:36; Mark 13:32; Acts 1:7; 1 Thess. 5:2; 2 Pet. 3:10). All we are told is to be ready. Ready to leave. Ready to follow him to eternity. Ready to give up our fleeting lives on earth for a better one with him. We are simply told to "keep watch" (Matt. 24:42). Like a mother waiting for the arrival of her unborn baby, we do not know when the true labor will begin, bringing forth the final consummation of the redemption of our bodies--our rebirth (Rom. 8:22-25). We can believe the lie that we have all the time in the world to get ready for that glorious day, but the reality is we don't know when that day will come anymore than I know when my Braxton-Hicks contractions will give way to the real thing. But in both of these blessed events, I do know one thing, it will come eventually. I will not be pregnant forever and this earth will not be here forever either.

So as I finish up these last days of pregnancy, I want to be ready. Readiness is a good thing for both a new baby and our final redemption. But I'm learning to let go of the illusion that I can control the day or the hour, that I can be so ready that it doesn't take me by surprise when it finally comes. Only God knows that day. And what a day it will be. 

What I Learned About Marriage From Gilbert Blythe

I don't remember exactly how old I was when I first watched Anne of Green Gables, but I know I've now seen it more times than I can count. For the longest time it was my go-to movie whenever I was sick. Who doesn't love the comfort of Avonlea when your fever is rising and your nose won't quit running? Because I am the only girl in my family, I even convinced one of my brothers to appreciate the story of Anne, Gilbert, Diana, Marilla, and Matthew (his wife can thank me for his enjoyment in classics like these).

With the many other fans of Anne of Green Gables I have been reminiscing about all that Anne of Green Gables meant to me as we learned of the sudden death of Jonathan Crombie, the man who played Gilbert Blythe. Like many women my age, I can count Gil as one of my first fictional crushes. I remember watching his often tense and teasing interactions with Anne and hoping that one day I could marry someone who loved me as passionately as Gil did.

A lot of my expectations of my future husband were fueled by unrealistic expectations at best, and a man in my own image at worst. But there is one thing about Gil and Anne's relationship that I'm thankful I have in my own.

Unwavering support.

I'm pretty sure the writing bug bit me in part because of Anne of Green Gables. As a young girl, I enjoyed pretending and telling a story, but seeing Anne publish, teach, and work at her craft really gave me a vision for writing that stayed with me over the years. I wanted to do the same thing. She wasn't like the other girls, and Gil loved that about her. But he also loved her enough to help her get better at her vocation--her writing.

Writers don't like being critiqued. At least I don't often appreciate it at first. It's painful. It feels like someone is tearing at part of your soul. A writer feels like her work is part of her and to tell her it's not good, or doesn't make sense, can feel like you are saying she doesn't make sense. When Gil told Anne to write about Avonlea, the place they both loved, it hurt her at first. But he was right. He knew the story that was inside of her and he was pushing her to allow it to come out. He believed in her writing.

I'm thankful that Daniel does the same for me, even though I might resent his criticism at first. At the end of the day no one believes in my writing more. No one believes in the words that are inside of me more than him. When I'm sloppy or unclear, he knows I can do better. When I'm tempted to compromise or cut corners out of fear of man, he knows I know the truth and challenges me to hold fast to it. He is my toughest critic and my greatest fan--which makes the often bitter pill of criticism easier to swallow.

I didn't marry a man who fights with me passionately like Gil did with Anne, although I thought that is what I needed when I was a young, passionate, and romantic girl. But I did marry a man who supports me as a writer and encourages me to write for God's glory and true to who I am. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

Four Feminist Myths

The last couple of months have been filled with trying to get ready for the release of my first book, The Accidental Feminist: Restoring Our Delight in God's Good Design. It's hard to believe it's almost here (it officially releases May 31)! I had the opportunity to speak both at Southern Seminary and my church (Midtown Baptist Church) on how feminism has influenced us as women and how God provides us with a better answer than feminism. Instead of trying to retell the entire book, I focused on four feminist myths and provided their biblical counter-examples.

1. I define myself
2. I can have it all
3. A husband and children can wait
4. The teaching gifts are ultimate

If you want to hear the messages in their entirety (and know the biblical counter-examples) you can listen here and here. I also spend some time talking about how feminism in a lot of ways is a response to real fears that women face. I hope to come back to that on the blog as we get closer to the release of the book. In the meantime, if you are interested, you can pre-order the book now on Amazon or directly from Crossway.

The Long Goodbye

I’ve always been pretty sentimental about things. My earliest memory of my sentimentality is crying outside my elementary school on the last day of fifth grade. I hate goodbyes. I hate when good things end. I don’t even really like change. So much so that I’m content to eat the same thing for lunch every day for weeks on end. I like the way things are to stay that way, for a very long time.

This is why motherhood is often so hard for me. Nothing stays the same for very long. In fact, the only constant about parenting children is that it’s constantly changing. A newborn baby quickly becomes an infant. An infant moves into toddlerhood before you have time to catch your breath from just having had an infant. Toddlerhood leads to school age. Elementary school leads to teenagers. Teenage years lead to college, which means they are gone. And now I’m already crying over something that’s at least sixteen years away.

I’ve been feeling this coming change acutely as we prepare for the arrival of our third son in just a matter of weeks. I never had a chance to really prepare for anything with the twins since they came so early, so this time around I’ve been a lot more introspective (with all the extra time to prepare). With each passing week I’m more aware of how the new normal of our life these last two years is about to give way to a whole new normal, one I’ve never done before. I’ve never had three kids. I’ve never had one baby at a time (THAT I hope is easier!). I’ve never been pregnant past 32 weeks.

But I’ve also been aware of how this life I’ve had with the twins (just us three a lot of the time) will now include one new precious person. My time will now be divided three ways, instead of two. And I can already feel the pressure of splitting my time between all of them, knowing that in a lot of ways I’m going to miss more opportunities with them than I would like simply because I’m one person limited by the constraints of time, energy, and quite frankly, only two hands.

As I’ve grown into this motherhood thing I’ve started seeing motherhood as sort of a long goodbye. While we all are on a journey of this long goodbye from the moment we take our first breath, parenting has a way of making you feel like everything is the beginning of the end in such profound ways. Motherhood is a temporary vocation. It won’t last forever. While I will always be their mom, I won’t always mother them in this way. One day, a long (but all too short) day from now, I will let them go. Everything I have taught them will not be practice any longer, it will be reality.

And I feel an ache in my soul about it all.

Most moms have had it said to them “the days are long, but the years are short.” And oh, how short they are, aren’t they? With each step we take on this long goodbye, we are reminded that each passing day is one that we won’t get back. They will never be two year olds playing in the snow for the first time again. Next year, they will be one year older, and allowing us to see the world from their eyes in a whole new way. But it will be one step closer on this long goodbye.

Understanding the reality of the long goodbye is more than just coming to terms with the ache of motherhood. It has theological undertones that find their hope in something greater than simply treasuring every moment of each passing day (though that is certainly a good and right thing). If my hope is in holding on to the moments that I know won’t last forever, then my joy will be determined by the limited nature of these days. But if my hope is in the fact that all of my days are guiding me towards a greater joy in the presence of my Savior, then I can trust that even the tears shed over fleeting moments aren’t in vain. They mean something. The answer is not holding on to my sentimentality anymore than it is in pretending like my heart isn’t experiencing the reality of living in a world that is passing away. Neither of these will bring me lasting comfort. But in the times of my greatest sadness over the temporal nature of motherhood, and this life in general, I must run not to my circumstances, but to the precious reality that one day Christ will return, make all things right, and wipe away every tear from my eyes—even the tears I shed on this long goodbye.

Motherhood, like all of life, is cursed by the fall—meaning it’s not what God intended it to be. It’s painful and it ends. So as we walk the road of this long goodbye called motherhood let us hold in tension the reality of enjoying this life, one day at a time, and longing for the perfect one to come.

The Complete Obedience of Our Christ

"Although the eternal Son, as God the Son, obeyed the Father and fulfilled what the Father willed for the Son to do prior to the incarnation, yet it was only the God-man, the human Jesus, who could obey in this way. To obey to the point of death requires the ability to die, and for this, Jesus had to be human. To be placed on a cross required that he be in a human body, and so again, this obedience required that he be fully human. But is this not the very point Paul is making--this eternal Son who was himself in very substance God and was fully equal to God, took on our human nature precisely so that he could undergo suffering, affliction, rejection, crucifixion, and death that he experienced, all because the Father had sent him to fulfill this saving mission? What a Savior is our Lord Jesus Christ. How amazing was his obedience, and how great was his love. May we cherish daily the beauty and agony of this eternal Son, becoming incarnate Son, all for the purpose of suffering death for our salvation (page 26)."

--Bruce Ware, The Man Christ Jesus: Theological Reflections on the Humanity of Christ

Reading to Our Children

Our library has a reading program that encourages parents to read 1,000 books to their children before they enter pre-school. It seems like an overwhelming number, doesn’t it? When you break it down, it actually doesn’t require a lot of the parent. Especially when reading the same book over and over counts as reading multiple books. (A must when you have toddlers who thrive on repetition).

As I’ve thought about this program and the value of reading to my children, I’ve been struck by how many biblical connections there are to the goodness of reading to our kids. Of course, studies show that the more you read to your children the better the fare. Reading encourages bonding as they snuggle up to you for a story. Reading encourages language development as they hear you talk and associate words with pictures. Reading encourages cognitive development as they remember things they see and hear. We can all agree that reading is good for kids (and adults).

But as Christians, it’s more than that. We know that God values words and reading, too. In a post-fall world, he gave us his very word to communicate with us. Faith in Christ and his finished work comes by hearing this word (Rom. 10:7). Without reading and hearing we are unable to know the God who made us and loves us. Without reading and hearing we are unable to understand the depths of Christ’s love for us displayed so clearly at the cross. Without reading and hearing we miss the triumphant victory of Christ’s defeat of death and our coming joy in heaven.

Of course, there are a variety of circumstances (many devastating) that prevent people from being able to read, hear, or comprehend this word. And I think, in God’s kindness, there is special grace for that. But, reading matters because words matter. God speaks to us through words. In an increasingly technology saturated society it is harder and harder to embrace and enjoy reading. We are so easily entertained that it is difficult to do the hard work of slowing down and reading something of value—or that’s more than 140 characters. But we must. And we must teach our children to do the same. Without a clear understanding of the value of reading and words, and the discipline to persevere when reading gets tough, we will all miss the treasure that is before us in God’s revealed word.

So I’ve signed the twins up for the 1,000 books reading plan, and we’ll see how it goes. While I want them to thrive in this world academically and socially through reading, I care more about the outcome of their souls. I want them come to a saving understanding of the faith that can only come by hearing—hearing the very words of God.

Our Third Son

One year ago today, we walked into an ultrasound room with hopeful hearts. We walked out of that very room heartbroken and confused. February 24, 2015 looks very different than February 24, 2014. I spent the better part of that day last year packing for a planned trip to Florida and processing next steps for our unexpected loss, all while weeping uncontrollably over the baby I would never meet.

It was a harder miscarriage than our first. Emotionally it registered about the same, but physically it took its toll on me and dragged on much longer than anyone ever expected. It made us wonder if we could endure another pregnancy, another rise and fall of dreams for a child. So we waited the months that were medically necessary because of the physical effect of the miscarriage and asked God to unite our hearts around the possibility of another baby--a baby we knew in our hearts we ached for.

And God heard our prayer.

We spent the better part of the first half of this pregnancy convinced we were having a girl. All the old wives tales about gender seemed to be leaning pink, so we were pretty sold on a name for the baby should we have a girl. But a boy? We were stumped. We had already used up two names on the sons we currently have, so thinking about another name proved difficult for us. So we didn't.

When the ultrasound technician informed us that our suspicions were false, we were floored. Daniel kept saying "wow" over and over again. We are delighted to add another boy to our brood, we just weren't expecting it this time around.

For weeks we talked about names, wrote down names, looked up names, and then talked about names some more. We could not come to a consensus. As we were driving to the airport for Christmas we settled in to listen to a seminar on parenting. The speaker read from Genesis 4 and when he got to verse 25, we stopped:

And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth, for she said, “God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him.”

"What about Seth?" Daniel said.

We have always liked the name, we just forgot about it until that moment. Seth means "appointed one" and in particular to the story in Genesis, he is the God-appointed son in place of the one who was lost. So much of this pregnancy has linked us to the baby we lost. We heard Seth's heartbeat the day after our other baby was due. We found out we were pregnant the month we were due with the one we lost. In many ways, we feel like Seth is the joy that has come in the morning (Psalm 30:5). After we talked about this name, and the meaning behind it, we knew that the story of how he came to be would be perfectly woven into his very name, much like the names of his older brothers.

For his middle name we went off from our normal way of naming our kids. So far we have chosen family names for our children. Luke's name is Lucas Daniel (after Daniel). Zach's is Zachary Garrett (after my grandpa), but we could not find a family name that went with Seth! When I first became a Christian I was exposed to the writing of Elisabeth Elliot. Reading her gave me a context for a female Christian writer. Prior to my conversion, I wanted to be a writer. As a new believer, she opened up God's word to me, and gave me a female example to emulate. And he also happens to be due the month my first book releases! Jim Elliot's story influenced Daniel as a college student as well. So we felt it fitting to name him Seth Elliot, to honor the lives of two people who have impacted us greatly.

As I reflect on all God has taught me in the year since our second miscarriage, like our first, I am undone by his goodness once again. In the dark days that followed our loss it felt as if I would never see the sun in my circumstances again, let alone in my own soul. But God is faithful. He restores the years that the locusts of sin, suffering, and loss have eaten. He brings joy out of mourning. He causes the sun to rise in the dark corners of our hearts when his frowning providence seems to tell a different story.

In two and a half months we will meet this precious boy, Seth Elliot. We love him already.