A Lesson in Obedience and Grace (part 2)

This is part two in a three part series on the story behind my second (current) pregnancy. If you've not yet caught the first instalment please read it here.

So far in the story, I've been diagnosed with infertility and I've tried the meds without success...

"At the end of May, while chatting to my friend via whatsapp one Saturday evening, she remembered about a photo that I'd sent our Life Group earlier in the week. It was a piece of paper that I'd  found in my jacket pocket that she'd given to me at least a year before with the following reference on it: Mark 11:24 "Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours". She told me how strange it was that she hadn't seen it before then, and that she and her husband had been talking about that very passage, and in particular the verse that follows "and when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your father in heave may forgive you your sins" and they had thought it was applicable to me. I accepted and thanked her for the message. I didn't tell her now it resonated with me immediately, for two reasons:

Firstly:
Earlier that month, just before Mother's Day, I had decided to write my mom a letter. My mom and I have never had an exceptionally close relationship, and we just always seemed on opposite ends of everything. By the time I was at university I'd become somewhat cavalier about it, and when I fell pregnant with Zac I made peace with the fact that I would just have a very different relationship with her. Still I wanted to ensure it did not negatively impact her relationship with Zac. My mother was never 'different' with Zac, I just didn't want him to experience any distance from her, courtesy of me - so I wrote her a letter. I acknowledged the status of our relationship, and wanted to let her know it was ok to be simply what it was. I told her how being a mother allowed me to now understand so much of what she had tried to do for us growing up, and I thanked for her role in my life. It turned out to be cathartic and incredibly significant: both relationships (my mother and Zac's, as well as my mother and mine) have since experienced such a drastic and miraculous positive change. I wish I'd done it sooner.

Secondly:
Just after Mother's Day, and in light of my letter to my Mom, my sister had bought me tickets to a women's breakfast and a parenting workshop hosted by Focus on the Family. We went to the women's breakfast - my first - together (because sitting in a room full of spirit-filled warrior women so much better than me was not really something I would voluntarily subject myself to, especially not alone, and I honestly think I was just expecting a feel-good experience). What should have been a 'generic' edification for all the women in the room, turned out to be a direct message from God, to me. As I listened to this speaker, I saw her words form a picture of a woman that upon closer inspection I recognised to be me. She spoke about the pursuit of perfection, wanting to do everything excellently - even heartily as unto the Lord - and in that, leaving no room for grace: No room for grace for others, and even more significantly, no room for grace for me. I realised I have spent the majority of my life doing just that - relentlessly chasing excellence for a sense of self-worth and acceptance, trying to 'please' God, and then feeling so short-changed when others who had done seemingly less than me, or done it in the 'wrong' way, received a reward exactly like mine (or worse - even better than mine!). It became clear to me that I had not yet really understood or accepted the principles of grace: While the law pushes us to achieve, arrive and accomplish, grace talks about humbly serving everyone else. While law disqualifies those who don't 'make it', grace invites everyone in, mess and all. While law brings justice, grace brings healing. Grace eradicates both justice and self-sufficiency. It is not forceful - we must ask for it. It does not make logical sense or demand a set criteria be met. It meets us where you are, without expectation. Grace is not interested in us meeting the standard. Grace is all about us meeting Christ. The penny was dropping, at last.

Two days after our whatsapp conversation my friend gave me another Word. I was starting to get excited about all God was revealing to me, and I wanted to tell Andel the full series of messages from her and from the breakfast. I wanted to forward our entire conversations, but my phone had lost all the messages when it had spontaneously rebooted, so I eagerly asked my friend to resend it. I was not prepared for what she replied. She sent this:

"I was very ready to click copy but God stopped me. It's in your heart. He has strengthened you and is equipping you to do what you are supposed to do, just as He did before I sent the message. He says you know, and you don't need a human reminder, so feel the supernatural reminder and strength as we commit your heart and desires to Jesus and as all your warrior sisters hold your arms high in the supernatural."

A little later she contacted me again and went on to explain that I needed to 'make right' with whomever has wronged me so that my womb and my children could be free of resentment, bitterness and anger. After the letter I had written to my Mom, this was simply another confirmation. But I knew it wasn't finished, and I started thinking about more people I needed to do a similar thing with.

I was literally sending Andel an email about it when I got one more message:

"I feel God saying that this is your journey for now, you are to walk this part alone with Him, He wants to show you great and unsearchable things! Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight (Prov 3:5-6)."

I was blown away. I so much wanted to share what was going on, and yet, God was wanting this time exclusively with and for me. In her first word she had originally said "...you've been hurt and He sees that and loves you through that...He has delayed the second born for a special time. He says He will reveal why soon, but you have to trust Him, with all of your heart, and not lean on your own understanding or logic!..." It was the same verse, and now it kind of made sense. So I said nothing, and instead I started documenting what was happening in order to explain it to Andel (and others) later."