For many years, I longed to give life. It wasn’t that I merely coveted the title of “mother” or felt obligated to take the next step following marriage. No, the yearning ran far deeper than external pressures or an internal ticking clock. I was an image bearer who wanted to bear image bearers. But I couldn’t, not when I wanted to, and the ache of it drove me to question God’s goodness. Why would the Creator of the universe withhold life from his child?
The answer came slowly, a trickle of awareness that sprang the day my husband and I attended a domestic adoption seminar. During a panel discussion, we heard adoptees and birth mothers share their experiences. The birth mothers explained how they had wanted to carry their babies and provide for them, but faced circumstances that would have made parenting extremely difficult. The adoptees described how they cared for their adoptive parents and also wanted to know their biological parents. As I listened to their stories, I could feel the sorrow that lingered for those who lacked contact with the children they birthed and the mothers who brought them into the world.
A revelation dawned on me then: I wasn’t the only person in the room who suffered. These adoptees and birth mothers also yearned for more ways to give and receive love. All of us experienced loss at some level; all of us wanted relationships that, at some point, seemed out of reach.
We needed a Shepherd to walk us through grief and usher us into new life.
Read full article at Morning by Morning.
[Photo courtesy Daniel Hjalmarsson on Unsplash]
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