Last Sunday morning I wrote the following to my prayer circle:
This morning I am torn. I long for music, prayer, corporate worship, and hearing from the Lord through His servants. But I dread facing our church family--some of whom already know [about Verity's diagnosis], but many others who don't. I can't stay home and hide forever. But I am not sure I'm ready to face this in a large group setting. We are very much in prayer about how and when to share publicly; our biggest desire is to bring the sacrifice of praise to our loving Father, the fruit of lips that confess His holy name. Salvation is found in no other name!
One of my dear friends, mentors, and ministry and prayer partners responded with this, below, which I share with her permission. It was a fitting response, especially in light of the fact that we celebrated the Lord's Supper during our church service (I did, in fact, end up attending the service with my family, sans mascara and with extra tissues in my pocket).
Oh my sweet friend. You are in a type of no man's land of sorrow and grief...I started to write something more and then received a picture of our Lord Jesus on the cross. Often we hear, and as believers we agree, that we are to walk with our Lord in His suffering....today I had the image of Jesus having to yield his flesh to the perfect will of the Father and He had to do so to the point of death. I saw a bloody, bruised, and brutalized Jesus.
So how does this apply to the life of little Verity? She is God's perfect plan for you and Ted. You are carrying life, a sign of the love between the two of you and of the oneness of your relationship with God. You praise Him for life and you are continuing to praise Him not only with your lips, that sacrifice of praise, but with your continued devotion to Him as you walk out His plan in the midst of sorrow, grief, and the pain of a broken heart. You are actively yielding your flesh to walk out His purpose, to fulfill His plan. Jesus had to yield His human flesh to pay the price, to bring the gift of salvation. You are wrestling...not against God, but rather that wrestling of desiring to bring that sacrifice of praise in the midst of your sorrow and suffering and how to do that in a way that honors Him. My temptation is to retreat to my Father's arms in times of grief and not let humanity in to observe my pain and suffering. I know He will give me rest but then I thought about Jesus...His suffering was visible...he groaned, cried out, was tormented, and felt abandoned by God. And then the victory..."into your hands I commend my spirit...it is finished."
We are able to walk through the whole process and celebrate the perfect plan of the Father revealed in the suffering of Jesus. We know the end of the story. It makes reading it easier....I know that you are fully human and God loves you with an everlasting love. He has placed [Verity] inside of you, to grow and be nurtured by you, protected by you, loved by you. He has made her visible to the world through your growing and changing body. He has also given you knowledge that her life is compromised and she might not live to birth. This is contrary to what we expect when bringing life into the world...and Jesus' suffering and sacrifice is contrary to what most people expect when thinking of the Son of God. The question is why did God choose the sacrifice of His only son to bring salvation to the world? Wasn't there another way? Why is this God's plan for Verity? For you and Ted and your family? As your flesh groans, you ARE praising Him. Each word you share about your desire to bring honor to God is praising Him. As you share your sorrow and still walk through the process (yielding your flesh) to His purpose you are praising Him, as you love and desire this little girl, IT IS an act of praise in our fallen world. Sharing with your church family and allowing them to see the reality of the yielding of the flesh, in the midst of pain and sorrow, to the perfect will of God is a high calling...one for which you have been well prepared.
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