Sometimes...It Doesn’t Work Out The Way We Planned
Today, I am thirty six weeks and two days pregnant. Six days ago, we sold our house and closed on it as we moved into an RV for the weekend. Two days ago, we moved into our new home right after our doctor's appointment to see our baby girl for the last time before her arrival...in the midst of some of the most severe weather our little area has seen in four years, according to local meteorologists.
Would I recommend this adventure to those soliciting my sage wisdom? Probably not. Heck, it wasn't even my plan! But like I tell the high schoolers I work with when we face some adversity: Sometimes...things just don't go how we had it planned.
Just a bit over two years ago, my husband and I started trying to get pregnant. After all, we had been married for four years, and the initial plan - our plan - was to start having kids around year three. Three months in, and still no baby. Doctor visits to see what was up. Medicines to help boost fertility. LOTS of prayers. LOTS of tears. LOTS of fearing what could be wrong with me and my body. Then, resignation to the fact that we might not have a child the way we had planned, but that was ok because God knew that and He was still faithful and on His throne. Month 18: Doctor visit to start talking about the next steps and the possibilities of what our journey to parenthood would look like. We scheduled some tests, and were encouraged to take one more pregnancy test to see where we stood. Three days later, a positive pregnancy test. Cue the LOTS more tears...and waiting again. This time to check in and see the little nugget growing inside of me.
You see, it wasn't our plan that it would take 18 months for us to get pregnant. It wasn't in our plans that we would have to wait, to schedule tests, to spend time in tears, to take fertility medicine, to question the functioning of our bodies. None of that was something we had planned. But God did. He knew. He knew we needed that time to press into Him. He knew we needed that time to press into each other. He knew we need that time to shatter the dreams we held so closely that we may see His dreams for us. He knew that we needed that experience to break away from the ideas that our American society had put into our minds of what it meant to be a parent, to be whole, to be a woman or a man, to be a family. He knew what He was doing. And now, He's gifting us with a precious little girl to raise to know and experience Him.
Around the same time that journey started, we began to pray for a home closer to where I work. We started to pray that we would find a home to do bit of growing as a family with a little bit of land. We had a few obstacles to overcome: the area we were looking is priced far beyond our price range, homes in our price range don't come up for sale often and if they do, they move quickly because the area is greatly desired, and it would increase the commute for my husband. But, we felt that is where we were supposed to be. We looked at home after home. We made an offer that got rejected. We continued to look, even at homes just outside our price range, hopeful for negotiations. We kind of gave up for the time, still talking about our hopes, but not really thinking anything was going to happen. So, we started making the minor improvements to the house we were living in, thinking that is where we were going to bring our little girl home to. And we were good with that. But then, at dinner one night, we learned through some conversation of a home that was looking to be sold, but not on the market at the moment AND it was in our price range. We went to look a week later, and the Lord worked out all the details so that it would be our home. That's the home we are bringing our little one home to; it's the home she will grow up in.
Again, that's not exactly how we had it planned. Who looks for a home for 18 months?! Who gives up while still having a hope, regardless of how faint? If it was up to me, I would have been in our home 17 months ago, but God knew. He was pruning us, teaching us. He knew we needed to walk through another moment of trusting Him for those things we were asking. He knew I needed to be reminded that He is, in fact, God of the impossible.
Now, I find myself sitting in the midst of all these things happening at once. (Not to mention the fact that we are praying for some other opportunities). It's the end of school, I am on the brink of delivering a child, and we are in the midst of moving and getting things ready to bring home a baby girl. We have been praying for these things for so long, yet God, in His infinite wisdom, waited to say "yes" to these prayers until now. I have to giggle as I ask myself why He would do that, but I am thankful. He is faithful to hear our prayers, and He gives us good gifts. BUT it doesn't always work out like we have planned. Never did I dream up this road to these answered prayers. Never did I imagine they would happen at once. Never did I imagine the work that would happen in my heart and soul as He was work, though seemingly silent at times. It didn't work out the way I had planned, but it worked out according to His plan. ...And I have a sneaking suspicion that He's not through with us yet.
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heave and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it." Isaiah 55:8-11