Inconvenient
Children are inconvenient.
It is inconvenient adding an extra 80 minutes to my daily commute. It is
inconvenient changing wet twin-sized sheets in the middle of the night and
helping a tiny little body slip into a clean, dry night gown when my calendar
tells me I have a 7:30 meeting the next day. It is inconvenient hauling two
tired and hungry girls into a busy store to pick up medicine from a pharmacy,
especially when the pharmacy tells you, “It will just be another 15 minutes.”
It is inconvenient trying to figure out travel, date nights, dinner parties,
decorating for holidays, shopping for groceries, house cleaning…
I saw this cover of Time Magazine at my doctor’s office as I
walked in yesterday for an appointment to investigate the source of renewed
bleeding with this pregnancy.
I smirked at the image of the beautiful people stretched
across the white sand. The image, for whatever reason, stuck with me. I tried
to think back to my own life before children. We traveled more. We went on
impromptu dates. We slept until noon on Saturday mornings.
My appointment didn’t result in the rosy prognosis I was
hoping for. Although there is still hope that the result of this pregnancy will
be a healthy, May-born baby, my risk for miscarriage and pre-term labor has
grown. I am on bed rest for at least another two weeks and will be followed
closely during that time. My doctor’s words were careful and kind, and I
appreciated the way in which he was able to deliver troublesome news while
still conveying real hope. Still, my heart was heavy.
Inconvenient. All of
it. Chasing my kids at home. The weather. This pregnancy. Bed rest. Timing with
work. Ugh.
And oh-so
heartbreaking. All of it.
The autumn sky outside the window of my exam room was
striking to me. The weighted gray melted into the tops of the trees and muted
the intense colors of fall, washing the world with a watercolor-like softness.
It was rainy and cool, the kind of weather that is inconvenient for those
walking out and about in it. But it was beautiful. Incredibly beautiful.
At one point, as I sat waiting on the exam table, staring
out the window, my thoughts drifted from that magazine cover to my own “Child-filled
Life,” and I found myself whole-heartedly
wishing I could squeeze my two little inconveniences and aching for the little
one whom I’ve yet to meet face to face. Yes, children are inconvenient, but their
beauty—even more so than that of the drizzly fall landscape--far exceeds their
inconvenience. I love my kids—all three of them—to the moon and back, and I
wouldn’t trade my “Child-filled Life” for anything.
My eyes burned with tears the whole way home.
I took a deep breath as I sunk into the safety of my couch.
In the sweet silence, a thought came to my mind that steered “inconvenient” in
a completely different direction. God’s
most beautiful miracles often take place in the midst of the inconvenient.
My mind raced through a list of stories—Abraham leaving everything to pursue the promised land, Moses leading God’s
people in the desert, the virgin Mary becoming pregnant, Jesus being born in a
stable, Jairus’ daughter dying before Jesus could reach her—and I realized
that “inconvenient” may be right where God needs me to be right now.
As I pour out my thoughts here, I’m not delighted by my
circumstances, but I am once again feeling lifted up and safe in the middle of
this heartache. So grateful for hope. So grateful for friends and family who
are stepping in to take care of my family so I can rest. So incredibly grateful
that the God of miracles yesterday is the same God of miracles today.
Romans 8:26-28 MSG
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