BUT God

It's 3 in the morning Saturday morning and I can't sleep. Maybe it's the caffeine in the tea from last night, or the Bloomin Onion from Outback (Happy 39th Anniversary Mom and Dad), or maybe it's the Krispy Kreme doughnut that I had for dessert or maybe it's just that life sometimes isn't fair at least not according to our way of thinking.


A casual acquaintance at church has just found out that her sweet pregnant body is carrying a child without a heartbeat. See here to read her heartbreaking post. My heart is broken for her. She is not just a sister in Christ or just a sister at TSC but a sister in a club that we never voluntarily signed up for...infertility.


It was August 1999 when we went to the doctor for an ultrasound at 14 weeks. I thought something was wrong, the nurses thought I just had new pregnancy mom nerves. I convinced them to let me come in for an ultrasound. I'll never forget that day (and I tend to forget a lot of things). Looking at the screen and just seeing a very still baby on that screen...no heartbeat. We had already seen the heartbeat before. We had been given the clear from our in-vitro doctor. Once you see a heartbeat, then there's a 95% chance that you'll carry the baby to term. Well, who cares about statistics especially when they didn't work for us. We are in that 5% that never got to wake up in the middle of the night and rush to the hospital to deliver a baby. We are the ones that don't have a curly haired (dominant gene from Alicia) beautiful blue eyed (recessive gene from Derek because that's what I pick) child running around here on earth. Instead God chose to remove that child from this sin sick world and take he/she to Himself.


All the days that were ordained for our sweet baby were written in God's book before there was even one of them. (Psalm 139:16)


And we claimed "Our God whom we serve IS ABLE to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; BUT even if He does not, let it be known, we will not bow down..." Daniel 3:17-18


God didn't deliver us from infertility. I shared with our Bible study group on Thursday that God could've delivered us, but chose not too. For whatever reason, Derek and Alicia needed to stay infertile and that's okay, because He's God and He knows best even when we don't understand.


Just like God sent Joseph to Egypt, God sent us through infertility. Do you think Joseph's to do list included the following: betrayed by my brothers, sold into slavery, accused of rape, thrown into jail, etc.? No! Absolutely not, but God had a bigger plan and He walks us through those things to get us to His plan. God has a plan for our lives, but so does Satan. Satan wants us to give up, throw in the towel, stop fighting the fight, because the pain is just too much to bear and the cost is too great.
But God...
Genesis 50:20 (New Living Translation)
You intended to harm me, BUT GOD intended it all for good.


And so as sad and heart broken as I am for Melissa and David and all those who experience incredible and devastating loss and disappointment, I know on the other side there's a BUT GOD.


Until then all I can offer is Psalm 34 "The Lord is near to the broken-hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit." I know they are broken-hearted and crushed, we've been there.


BUT GOD...


Here's our first BUT GOD born in December 1999, welcomed home January 2000




Here's our second BUT GOD born August 2001, welcomed home October 2001





Here's our third BUT GOD born August 2002, welcomed home a few days after birth

Now to Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, to Him be the glory!