In the Waiting

It’s one thing to wait expectantly for your preferred future, but hope deferred makes the heart sick. And my preferences have rarely seemed to work out thus far. 

My deeper longings though…

I carry within me. Intertwined in my soul -- I know deeply what I want and my preferences never seem to get me even close to the birth of them. 

Other than running for her life --I’m not sure what motivated a very pregnant Mary to ride a donkey into the unknown. Right when she’s about to give birth to promise everything in her life must change. She did her part -- she carried this baby in her aching body. Fed him her life. And her reward is greater uncertainty. I’m trying to find the kindness in that. 

The urgency of birth is innate. 

I’ll never forget being in the room with my dear friends as they expected their second son to be birthed into the world. The impatience grew in all of us -- it was time…..but not quite yet. The waiting. The tedious waiting. The silence. The staring out the window watching the construction. The hours of small talk and basketball games and forehead kisses and staring at the clock. 

When we are on the precipice of the promise - we get tunnel vision. I wasn’t even the one having this baby - but so help me if the world didn’t stop. How could everyone have such laissez-faire attitude about this?! 

I always find myself wrestling when I get to stand next to death beds, births, vows, and the miracle of life. Why doesn’t the world stop? 

No matter- it doesn’t. It continues. 

And so with the pangs of a birth nearing Mary loads up and moves out into the unknown carrying her promise with her. Would there be a place to lay her head? To find rest? How would this come to pass? 

There is a deeper knowing mothers have --also innate. A presence that the promise will come in due time in the way it's intended. Seeing new life born into this world has been one of my greatest honors. Even though we were in the wrong place and the wrong time, we were in the right place at the right time. Even though preferences demanded something completely different I realized in that birthing room that a promise fulfilled is a tree of life, indeed. No need to plant roots on earth when they are already planted within you. 

And so as the pangs of birth burst within me. I loosen my grip and shift my gaze into the unknown and I know the promise of my deeper longings will come to pass. She did it. They did it. So can I.