Special treat alert! Sorry. That was really lame. Let's try that again. Today I want to introduce you to my sweet friend Tiffany Lohse. We went to high school together but I wouldn't even say we were super besties as she graduated a year ahead of me. We remained Facebook friends, but that's about it. Shortly after Maggie was born, she reached out to let me know that we had the same due date. Crazy! Maggie and her son, Hunter, are just a few weeks apart. Since then, we have texted nearly every day. It's so nice to have someone to talk to who is in the same exact baby stage at the same time. It's so cool how the Lord places (and re-places!) people in our lives at just the right time. Today she shares her heart on what it means to fully trust God with our children.
“For this child I prayed." Such a beautiful verse. This verse is so amazing because it comes from a place of true joy and honesty. After years and years of begging God for a child and feeling like He had forgotten her, Hannah was pregnant. The scripture said that she was in deep anguish as she prayed for this child she desperately desired. Her heart ached for a little boy to chase after, care for, and most of all, to call her own. And then it happened. I can imagine the scene: She holds up the pregnancy test to better light (they had Clear Blue back then, right?). She rubs her eyes a couple times. Is this true? No way. Could it really be possible? No way! It begins to sink in. It is TRUE. After all this time, after all of those prayers, after all of those nights spent weeping and crying out, “Can you even hear me?”, she is pregnant. I absolutely love it. It brings tears to my eyes just imagining her putting her hand over her stomach, in awe of the precious gift that is growing inside of her, and saying, “For this child I prayed; and the Lord hath given me my petition which I asked of Him.” What a beautiful story. No wonder we see this verse written beautifully on chalkboards and canvases held by giddy parents as they announce that they too have been given the child they have prayed for. Some of these same parents have even felt a taste of that anguish that Hannah experienced. That longing for a child that reaches deep to their core. But this is where the story takes a different turn. Surprisingly enough, you never see the next verse written on those adorable chalkboards. Maybe it is because there isn’t enough room, or maybe it is because the next verse doesn’t convey as popular of a feeling. The verse before is exploding with excitement, relief, an answer. The next is filled with sacrifice. The next verse goes on to say that since God has given her this child, she will give him back to God. Some versions even use the term “loaned” or “lent”. Could this be any more true? We spend the first few weeks scanning the baby’s body, searching for something that looks like “yours”. The mom swears the baby has her nose and eyes and the dad swears the baby got his big feet and great hairline from him. We desperately try to find these features that prove that these children belong to us. To show that we took part in creating them. Yet the truth is simple. No matter how much your sweet angel resembles you, he is still the Lords. He was knit by the Holy Creator. God was with him, making him who he is, before you even knew he was growing inside of you. Hannah was so incredibly in tune with this truth. She had absolutely no doubt that this child was from the Lord. That He cared enough for her to loan her a son for a season. To entrust her with His precious creation. When you think of your child that way, a product of God’s amazing love, Hannah’s response makes sense. When we truly digest that without God, this child would never exist, it makes perfect sense that we then, in return, give them to the Lord. We forget the lists of dreams and plans we have for this child and we seek what God’s will is for them. We lay down our selfish desire to control their future and we pray for discernment. Now this is the part of the story where I closed my Bible this week and began to weep. Not just a tear here and there, but the straight up ugly, nose running, swollen eyes, crying. While this idea of giving our child back to God makes perfect sense, it is one of the absolute hardest things for me to do. Now, I tend to think of myself as a laid back kind of person. I love days without plans that I can fill with whatever passes my way. I enjoy going new places and meeting new people. But since having my son, I have experienced what true anxiety feels like. Since the moment he was born, I have felt this enormous weight of responsibility. The idea that my husband and I are the sole caretakers of this tiny, helpless human is sometimes unbearable. For the first two weeks of his life, I wouldn’t drive my son anywhere. Now for the first week, I shouldn’t have. Those glorious pain meds wouldn’t let me. But after those were done, my fear still held me captive. The thought of anything happening to this child that I had dreamed of meeting for nine long months seemed unbearable. I remember thinking that as he got older, less fragile, my anxiety would go away. And some did. I no longer stared at him as he slept to watch his chest rise and fall (I was too tired! Can I get an amen?). But it was still there. Sometimes I would feel a break. A few hours where I would think, “I got this!”. But it never lasted for long. The anxiety creeped up with every rash, every weird noise (and man do they make a lot of weird noises), and every cry that couldn’t be stopped. And I still do. I would love to sit here and tell you that I’m that cool mom, that chill mom that is phased by nothing. But the raw truth is that I am not. I am no where near it. I think every what if, google the craziest of things, and cry about the unknown. So this is why that verse hit me like a brick wall. My son is no different than Hannah’s. He too was uniquely created by God. He was formed by the hands of our loving Father. And what have I done to thank God for his life? I have told God that I can do this. I can take care of this child myself. I don’t need His help as I pace the living room floor in a panic. Now of course I don’t say these words aloud. My prayers don’t sound anything like that. I beg God for his safety, I continually thank Him for my son’s life, but my actions say otherwise. If I truly dig down to the roots, I find that my fear is rooted in my lack of trust in God. I don’t trust God enough to give my son back to the Lord. I don’t think He is big enough, powerful enough to take care of this precious child. So at that moment, sitting on my couch, a giant hot mess, I did it. I told God what I should have in February. I told Him I want Him to have Hunter. I want Him to truly have my son. I want to open my hands that are so tightly gripped on my ideas of what Hunter’s future looks like and take hold of God's plans. I prayed that He would guide me to HIS will for Hunter’s life. That He would give me discernment to raise His beautiful creation the way He wants me to. That He would give me grace and mercy in this season in which He has lent me my beautiful son. That He would exchange my ‘what ifs” for a deep trust that His will is good and His love is perfect. Now I would love to say that when I opened my eyes there were doves flying around my living room (not really, I hate birds) and I felt at perfect peace. I did not. Giving our children to God is a sacrifice. It is laying down our human nature to take on the nature of Christ. It is hard, it is sticky, it is messy. It is, and always be, a daily choice. There will be days that are harder than others. First days of school, getting a driver’s license, wedding days. Now don’t hear me that we are supposed to sit back on cruise control and enjoy the show or that we can be careless with our children. We still have biblical responsibilities to obey about raising our children in the way of the Lord. But when it comes to that desire to control the uncontrollable situations, to bite our nails away thinking about the worst possible outcome, or locking our kid away so nothing and no one can hurt them, we have to give it up. “Let go and Let God.” It is going to be unbelievably difficult, but how amazing it is to think about our children in the hands of the one who created the universe instead of one who can't remember to turn off the closet light? To know that my child doesn’t walk alone. Now the coolest part of all of this is the end of this story. Hannah gives her son to the Lord. She sends him to the temple at a young age to be trained in the ways of the Lord because that is God’s will for Samuel’s life. She exchanges her dreams of playing duck, duck goose for God’s perfect plan. I’m sure at times she wished God’s will would have been for her and Samuel to cuddle on the couch all day, but boy, does she see the goodness in God’s plan! Samuel became an amazing prophet for the Lord. And heck, he has two books of the Bible named after him. Yes, the first one is actually the important one. But for real, our God is good. He can be trusted. His plans are good. His ways are perfect. We live in a fallen world so there will be trouble. There will be pain. But no pain is greater than doing this parenting life on our own.
So there it is. The cold, hard truth. It’s amazing what God can bring to light in our lives from a story that happened lifetimes ago. So why write an obnoxiously long post about something that is so personal? Because it is accountability. Because there will days when I am so caught up in Web MD that I cannot think straight. There will be days where my fear is so much greater than my faith. And I am going to need one of you to slap me back into reality. No, I am not really giving any of you permission to slap me, but I do give you full permission to remind me of these words I wrote. To point me back to this story and back to the heart of God. So I challenge you to join me in this daily struggle. Whether you’re the anxious mom, the cool mom, or the mom who has it all together AND does yoga, let’s start living a life that reflects the sacrifice of giving our children back to the One who gave them to us. And to the "Hannahs" out there that are still crying out to the Lord for a child. He hears you. I know it seems like He doesn't. You are so sick of hearing people tell you that it will happen at the "perfect time" or that you have to be patient. But I feel like if Hannah could talk to you today she would say to continue to pray for your Samuel. Continue to pray that God will prepare your heart for the greatest love and the greatest sacrifice, because we all know it is much harder to give away something that we have waited for so long to have. God is good.Also, for model prayers on lending your child to God, read "The Power of a Praying Parent" by Stormie Omartian. You won't regret it!
