Growing in Christ
miscarriage
Suffering with Jesus
06 months ago
It was over two years ago now. I’d gotten a concerned call from Michelle and headed home from work. When I got there, there was even more reason to be upset and confused. The next day we found out we’d miscarried our first pregnancy, but for that evening, we were lost in confusion, pain, and a hint of what was happening.
In those moments, I didn’t know what to do, but I knew we needed to hear from God. In these situations, people typically run to the Psalms. They’re full of perspective and the reality of life in a suffering, fallen world. But I think in my mind that night, I wanted something that was long (because I honestly didn’t want the silence to crush us), and something that put us in God’s story.
After dinner, I turned to John, and we read chapters 13-17, Jesus final discourse with his disciples. Maybe this seems odd as a passage to read for comfort in suffering and pain. At the time it made perfect sense, and it still does.
The section opens with these profound lines about the mind of Jesus going into the crucifixion. John tells us that, “Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, [and] having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.” He goes on: “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper.” Jesus knew the pain and confusion of the world – he knew one of his closest friends was going to betray him to death in a matter of hours (under his own permission in fact), but he didn’t flinch, and he didn’t muscle through. Jesus knew that his Father was sovereign and in control of everything, even his own death, and he continued to love. He loved his father, and he loved his own. He loved them to the end.
In this vein, there are three sections that particularly spoke comfort in those dark hours: The Vine, The Victory, and The Prayer.
The Vine
In John 15, Jesus speaks of his union with his believers in such intimate terms that they are his branches, feeding off of his nourishment. In terms of suffering, like a plant, when one part suffers, the others feel it. We typically understand this in terms of other people sympathizing and feeling with us, which is right. But we need to take this back to Christ. When we suffer, Christ does. Being united to Christ means that all that we weather in him is weathered in his love. The paths of love are constantly, ever flowing from Christ to his people in all situations. John Flavel remarks: “Christ and the saints smile and sigh together.”
The Victory
Jesus said, “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 17:33). There’s nothing quite like the death of a long anticipated pregnancy to make you feel that the world is full of trial and tribulation. Here, Christ calls us back to seeing his own sufficiency for our need. The sorrow does not win, because Christ who took on the full weight of sorrow and suffering, did not stay dead. This doesn’t mean the pain isn’t real, or lasting, or a wound that won’t go away, but it does mean that there’s hope and peace and comfort in Jesus. Along these lines Paul later comments “[we do] not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thes. 4:13). We grieve, but with hope. I wrote about this after we miscarried here.
The Prayer
The High Priestly prayer of Jesus in John 17 is maybe one of the holiest sections of Scripture. If you want to know the Savior’s heart for you in this world, and in your trials, follow his prayer here. What this prayer did (and does) for me was give perspective. Jesus knows my trial, Jesus loves me and walks with me in my trial, and Jesus wants me to have the best thing at the end of my trial: seeing him face to face in his full, radiant glory. Suffering and sorrow will be swallowed up one day, and this Jesus who “loved me to the end” will see me, and I him, and will heal this heart wounded by the tribulations of this world. One day. One day soon. In the meantime, he has prayed for me to know him and his love, and the best medicine for sorrow and pain is to learn the hope and love that he is for me.
God’s Faithfulness, Infertility, and Miscarriage
51 year ago
We were recently asked to write up a testimony about our experience through infertility and a miscarriage to encourage our local church. The voice is a little different than my usual writing here. Feel free to comment or share your experience.
We got married in May 2007, just days after we both graduated from college. We loved being married and eagerly anticipated the day when God would give us children. After a year of marriage we began to start trying for children and though we prayed that God would give us a baby soon, month after month went by and we still weren’t pregnant.
While it seemed that everybody around us was getting pregnant and having babies, we were rounding the corner of infertility for over a year, waiting month after month for a gift that God seemed to be withholding indefinitely.
After just over a year we went to a doctor to get everything checked out only to find out that nothing was wrong. We began taking some medicine to help increase our chances of getting pregnant. After a few months of medical assistance, we found out that we were pregnant, in all places, at Disney World. We eagerly shared the news with our close friends and family who had been faithfully praying for us and caring for us. However, when we were six weeks pregnant we miscarried.
These were very difficult days for us. We had stood, mustering up as much joy as we could in watching many receive the very gift of children that we so desired, and when we did receive that gift, God took it away. Why was our Father doing this?
The wound of the infertility and miscarriage was very deep, and those days were very dark. Through this time, the Lord specifically spoke through his Word to comfort us. It began with the preached Word we had heard just the Sunday before our miscarriage that because of our sure hope in Christ, “we do not grieve as those who have no hope”. Our sorrow was bitter because the effects and outfall of sin in the world is bitter. But Christ is a hope-giving Savior, and in many ways the Resurrection became more precious to us, when we would say good-bye to this fallen world and be with Jesus.
The Lord also spoke to us through the Psalms. Through psalms like Psalm 16, 121, 130, 27, 73, the Lord spoke to us not minimizing our suffering, but turning our gaze to Him. It was only through looking at the glory and character of God that we found comfort in that time. Through seeing who Christ is – that he is a loving, caring, gracious, sovereign, all ways faithful God – did we have a standing place amidst the storm and confusion of the sorrow.
And, again, the preached Word was a primary means of grace. As we were working through life after all of this, our pastors preached through Words of Comfort, and through Isaiah 40 we experienced the humbling joy of knowing Christ our great Comforter. Through all of this, God was showing us that though our trial was difficult, God was still faithful because he was the true God who never fails to walk through his people’s trials with them and work their circumstances for their joy.
After losing our baby we decided to continue trying to get pregnant and using the medicine. After several more unsuccessful months we began praying about whether or not God was calling us to adoption. Even before we got married we have had a heart to adopt, but we assumed that would be when we were a little older and already had some experience as parents. At this point we were still trying to get pregnant, but we knew that we only had another month that we could continue taking the medicine we were using.
As we prayed about this we felt God give us peace, not as to whether we should start the adoption process or not, but peace that he would direct our steps. God was again drawing our attention to himself, to see Christ and know his presence with us, to see God as our faithful God.
As it so happens, we did conceive a healthy baby that month, and welcomed Owen Scott into our family on October 18, 2010.
Owen is a small expression of the hope of Psalm 27 that “We shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.” Through this whole trial and journey, we have continually looked upon God’s faithfulness to us. He’s continually drawn us to see Jesus Christ, our Shepherd, King, and Friend. He has continually exposed the idols of our hearts through this so that we might receive the grace of repentance. He has continually given us his Word, both in preaching and in our personal devotions; so that we might know that He is with us. Though the trial was very difficult, God has been faithful. And he will be faithful again.
Thank you.
Given, but not given to us to raise
41 year ago
As unbeknownst to some, and yet newly informed to others, we are expecting. There’s one in the oven, as you might say. (Or as I tell my wife, there’s an alien growing in her dome. She laughs, seriously.) Happiness abides in the Young home, and expectant joy with every karate match I witness of our son in the womb. It’s tough having a ninja for a father, but he’ll grow into it.
And yet, as some may know, this is not our first child. We had the joy of conceiving a child last fall after waiting on the Lord’s “opening of the womb”. And shortly after, we had the sorrow of the Lord taking our little one away.
The sorrow was deep and abiding those first several months. There were moments where I would choke up at work with no one else around, for no other reason than an arrow of hopes dashed sailing from my memories and hitting the mark. There were other times when I’d try to relay current events and feelings in our home, and thankfulness to God for his faithfulness, and unintentionally crack in the middle of it.
It’s ok. Men cry; a lot.
So, it’s taken me a bit by surprise as the waves of sorrow and grief have been reoccurring in our new season of pre-birth-anticipatory-felicity. It seems out of order, even selfish and self-absorbed (if I were honest), to continue to have grief over a lost child in the midst of the happiness of a new child.
I brought this up to a friend. They’d had a similar experience.
“What categories do you put this into? How did you guys process this?”
“We wanted to validate the gift of our fist child, a real gift from, while also celebrating the blessing of our second child. We worked through the category of seeing that God had given us our first (whom they gave a name to). He wasn’t an accident, nor a joke from God. He was given, but not given to us to raise. However, God did give us our second, whom he did decide that we would raise.”
That was helpful. Very helpful.
Here, I think the weighty truths of “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21), and “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good” (Romans 8:28) come together and kiss. On the one hand you have the sovereign reality of God’s giving and taking, and on the other hand, you have the motivation holding us before God: our good in him. We bless the Lord when we see his purposes and the events of our lives (joyful and sorrowful) not as antagonistic flicks from the divine hand, but as his loving, Fatherly hand “working all things for [our] good”. God treats his children with love – even in the painful things of life.
The Lord gave us a child, and took that child away. Yet in no way did he diminish the value of that child’s life or our delight in receiving that child. And yet, in the mystery of his love, in the mystery of how “all things work together for [our] good”, he decided to not give that child to us to raise.
My friend’s counsel has been helpful because it gives me grounding to think about the miscarriage of our first without making the experience into a wallow in the dust. Sorrow is dark. The loss of that child was a wound that will not heal until I die and see Jesus. Then he’ll cure the wound entirely. The darkness of the wound will be healed by the light of his presence.
The difficulty of the miscarriage is: Am I diminishing the gift of our first child in the joy over our second child? Seeing the lost child as given but not for us to raise strikes a helpful path for me. It’s not well-intentioned, but unhelpful counsel (i.e. “But you’re baby’s with Jesus now.”), and it’s not angering advice either (i.e. “It’s not like you actually lost a child…”).
The pain of miscarriage is different all together, and yet under the gracious hand of our Father. Ge gives, and takes away as he chooses, not because he’s trying to make a point, not because he’s vindictive, not because he’s indifferent, but because he is the Almighty Wise One, who sees what he is doing as The Shepherd who love his sheep, and gives them exactly what they need.
I do not expect to understand why these things have happened. The Bible never promises full clarity on God’s providence. But I do know that He is Good. He is Love. He is my Shepherd. He gives and takes and gives and gives and takes and gives and gives.
But most importantly, he gives Himself.
The Christian life a strange one. A life simultaneously mourning the effects of sin in meaningful, deep ways while also celebrating gifts without fear and real joy (Romans 12:15 and 1 Corinthians 7:30). It feels much like an open-handed life. A life of gratitude in all things (1 Thes. 5:16). A life grateful for knowing God as our Shepherd, who leads us through the green fields and dark valley’s (Psalm 23).
So with an open hand I received the child the Lord gave us last fall, and with an open hand I watched him take him away. The sorrow is real, and experienced open-handedly by clinging to a God, grateful for his kindness not to leave me. God did no wrong to me in taking our child. He was ultimately never mine to begin with. And yet, with an open hand I now receive this new little boy he’s given us with thankfulness and joy.
The only thing guaranteed in life is the presence of God. With an open hand He gives and takes away – the open hand of Christ in mercy and love for us. So, with an open hand we receive, and reach up to cling to him, not the gifts.
He gives and takes away, blessed is the name of the Lord.
Miscarriage of Suffering
02 years ago
Part 1
When I hoped for good,
I tasted evil;
When I reached for wine,
It had soured;
When I looked to Heaven,
It turned to steel;
When I longed for death,
I remained an hour.
When I turned from you,
He looked at me;
When I hated Him,
He prayed with blood;
When I cursed His face,
He washed my feet;
When I turned Him in,
“Thy will be done.”
Part 2
With cries of anguish he birthed me new,
The Spirit’s bloody baby who
Knew the curse as no curse at all,
Reversal of Great Adam’s Fall.
Using now these painful arts,
To write His name upon my heart,
Devil’s schemes He new contorts,
Temple in me, His tender work.
Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
12 years ago
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…
I don’t know why, but the sorrow just won’t go away. Tomorrow will be three months since we found out we were pregnant; which means that it’s been two and a half months since we miscarried. It’s strange, my attention for the longest time was towards Michelle – helping her walk through the sorrow and pain. I don’t think I lost sight of caring for my own soul before the Lord – there were several nights on my face before God. But lately the miscarriage has continued to be a struggle.
In the midst of sorrow, especially prolonged sorrow, the heart becomes difficult to discern. The questions constantly swarm: Am I angry at God about this? Am I legitimately sorrowful about this? Am I throwing my fist at God? Am I jealous of my friends? Why did God do things like this? Why did he take our baby?
I will fear no evil: for thou art with me…
From here I crawl, scrap, drag myself in prayer to Jesus: “Jesus, my Lord, I don’t understand what I feel. This stuff is hard. You know how to discern my heart better than I do. Take away the sin. Sanctify the pain. Hold me up, help me trust in you for today. Just today. Grace for today.”
I have made the habit of excluding “God” from my mouth when talking to unbelievers and inserting “Jesus”. This is for a couple reasons, but the main one is this: I hold to Jesus, my Savior and God, who is ever with me by his Spirit. I cry to Jesus. I take joy in Jesus. I trust in Jesus. I look to seeing Jesus. He is God’s steadfast love and faithfulness (link Ex. 34:6 and John 1:17).
I have felt deep battles and drownings in depression at times in the wake of the miscarriage. I think this is a season of deep weakness. But honestly, at the same time I have not felt more deeply met in prayer by a sense of Jesus love. As I’ve gone to him, he’s met me. He’s faithful.
Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
One of the more stark realities of the Bible and our hope of the new heaven and new earth is that we really are never promised to know why God does what he does. The hope of the eschaton isn’t that we’ll finally understand why God worked all things the way he did. No, we’re simply promised that he will whip our tears away and make all things new. I don’t mean to be contentious, certainly the possibility is there, but the Biblical promise is that Jesus will be enough. Not Jesus + explanation. It’s a counseling mistake to say we’ll understand why God did X in the end – that is not our hope. Jesus is.
God leads us through all things as his children on the promise of his sustained character. That doesn’t change. The victory of Jesus crushing sin by the gushing of his blood; that doesn’t change. Why did God take our baby amidst such satisfaction in answered prayer? That answer is never promised, directly. Indirectly, God promises in Romans 8 that in union with Christ we have only loving acts from God to us. Was the taking of our baby loving? Yes. God’s character never changes, all of his acts towards us are always loving. Even ones without explanation. I don’t understand why he did things this way. Sure there are hunches, things I’ve learned. But do I really want to say that the lessons learned were better than the life of a child? Such things are to high for me to consider (Psalm 131:1). I leave those thoughts to God – possibly forever. Jesus is my only hope.
The miscarriage has been hard. It has been a blow from his rod. But his strikes have been for my good and his glory because God says so. They comfort me because I’m turned to see Jesus as my hope. With tears and pain I will kiss the rod, and call it blessed, for it has kept me near to Jesus.
How The Gospel Engages My Sorrow
12 years ago
The miscarriage happened a little over two weeks ago. That’s a strange thought. This has to have been the craziest month thus far in my life, followed in a close second by the month Michelle and I got married. Honestly, getting married was a lot more fun. I knew miscarriages were sad and unfortunate, but one of the things I hadn’t expected was the lingering, cloak-and-dagger type sorrow that follows behind the loss. The sorrow comes in waves it seems – no real trigger, if there were, I’d like to avoid it. And most frustrating and tiring of all, it seems to stick around. You’d think I could talk about it by now with a straight face, but my eyes still seem to leak every once and a while – I hold it back, who really wants to cry at work over computer parts?
There is the inner swarm of thoughts: Why’d this happen? Why this way? Memories of when it happened. My father’s reaction to when I told him in person that we were pregnant. Coming home to Michelle crying that evening. The doctor’s office where they confirmed it. Frustrations over how this affects Michelle. I find it difficult to find steady ground. I feel that all I have in these moments is the single beam of light from God’s Word that tends to the simmering coals of faith. I feel a naked faith of sorts, the kind that’s likened to anemic people in the hospital – still human, still living, just barely.
In my devotion reading this morning, David, carried along by the Eternal Spirit, sung to me, “Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered” (Psalm 32:1). David’s statement is all encompassing, it’s a declaration. God has brought his righteousness near to me and covered me (Isaiah 46:13) because of Jesus work to take my sin upon himself (2 Cor. 5:21) that I might be forgiven and be blessed in enjoying God. Why is that so hard right now? Or is it? Joy isn’t always clothed in joyfully raised hands. Joy takes on the cloths of sorrow (that’s why 60% of the Psalms are in a minor key). At church this past week there were songs and prophetic words (if I remember correctly) about the Lord Jesus taking on our sorrows and griefs. He took these sorrows on that I might be declared blessed in the free justification of his grace. He has born these sorrows to a depth that I will not, because he’s made a declaration over me. So in my sorrow, I take hope that the one who has turned these events as they have gone is the very one to whom I must go, because that’s what it means to be blessed, to be surrounded by the steadfast love of the Lord (Ps. 32:11).
I trust in God, my rock and fix my mind on him in this sorrow that he would give me a perfect peace, the peace of Christ that surpasses all understanding and guards me from falling away (Isaiah 26:3; Phil. 4:7). Even still, however long that peace is withheld, he is strengthening these feeble legs of faith to walk after him; to step when the pain is in the walking. This is how the Gospel engages our miscarriage – Jesus has lead the way and taken the full force of sorrow and grief that we might know God. How do I know I don’t experience the full weight of the sorrow? Because I see Jesus, and he has overcome the world (John 16:33). All things are now not in vein.
Grieving As Those Who Have Hope
22 years ago
There is sad new to report here: we lost the baby Monday night. The miscarriage was confirmed yesterday when we went to see the doctor. The sorrow is deep, the miscarriage of answer prayers and the ensuing joy. But we do “not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13), Jesus has overcome the world (John 16:33). This does not dissuade the sorrow or pain. Grieving at the curse of the fall is the godly and right response here (John 11:35), a response born and carried by the Holy Spirit’s work in us, the fruit of Christ’s victory over death. In the simplest of terms, we know that Jesus loves us, for as John tells us, he loved us to the end (John 13:1); that is, we know Jesus loves us now because he loved us to the cross. My Lord has dealt us a heavy blow, but I return this heart, bruised and bleeding, to him.
At the moment, my simple prayer is that as the Lord has given us this turn of events, that I might have more of him. He does what is right, and in my heart of hearts I rebuke any thought that questions his goodness in these events – Who are you, O my soul, to answer back to God (Rom. 9:20)? I shall not. As a weaned child I will sit on my Saviors lap, I will not lift my eyes to high (Psalm 131). This is the fruit of the Holy Spirit, Self-Control with her twin sister, Peace of Christ, and they spread the grace of the joy of God in this valley of the shadow of death (Gal. 5:22; Phil. 4:7). I will weep, but I will not weep as those with no hope, for Christ is my portion. For Michelle and I, this is our prayer and only hope. God has chosen is infinite, holy wisdom to take our child from life. To the Great Redeemer I trust this little one. As for us who still walk this pilgrim’s road, I join the hymn and pray:
Let sorrow do its work, come grief or pain;
Sweet are Thy messengers, sweet their refrain,
When they can sing with me: More love, O Christ, to Thee;
More love to Thee, more love to Thee!
