It’s now eight days past my due date, and we’re still waiting to meet this little girl, snug and squirmy in my womb, who has stolen our hearts and affection for months now. But still, we wait.
It’s actually taken me by surprise that we’re still waiting. I had expected that she would come early, maybe even be a Valentine’s Day baby. But that holiday went by. Then President’s Day. Then a full moon. Her cousin’s birthday, her uncle’s birthday, her aunt’s birthday. All these extra special days inched by and still she has stayed put.
I try not to personify the waiting, like thinking that, “She wants a special day of her own!” or, “She knows that ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder.’” Because of course, that isn’t the case at all. I can’t read too much into the waiting, except that she or my body aren’t quite ready yet.
Just as we had to wait to conceive her, I now find myself back at that same place, trusting God to finish what he’s started. To bring this lady out into the world—and into my arms—healthy and well.
It seems this is a lesson God keeps wanting—needing—to teach me, time and time again. It seems that even though I’ve been through it a million times over now (just try searching for the word “waiting” on my blog!), I still don’t have this thing down. My heart still has to fight to believe and trust and have joy in the waiting.
One of the verses that has really spoken to me in these last months of pregnancy is James 1:2-4: “Whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow—so let it grow! For when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything.”
Time and again I’ve found inspiration and solace in this verse. And now as I wait, I came back to this verse again and realized that the trouble I am currently facing (waiting on the baby to come, in great hopes of avoiding a medical induction), I can choose to have joy now:
I do not have to wait until that which I’m praying for has come. There is joy to be found even now, in the waiting.
And so, tonight, while I continue to pray and wait and fend off my tendency to worry, I whisper to my heart to have joy, to rejoice in what the Lord is doing even now. Because, as I have seen time and time again, he is always doing something. It usually just takes awhile for us to actually see it.
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