His Grace is Sufficient....

It was July 2010 early in the morning when I told my husband the news…. I’m PREGNANT!  The joy in my heart was obvious and my husband shared in it! Together we told our boys… and rejoiced.  To celebrate we decided to go to Mass that day and thank God for this new life. 

While I was truly overjoyed by the gift of this new life, I also knew it meant the next nine months would be far from easy.  I have had difficult pregnancies that seem to get harder each time.  We’ve lost two babies through miscarriage and then found naprotechnology which helped us discover I had low progesterone.  Thankfully it can be treated through shots twice a week. 

Having just had a baby a little over a year before, I knew what I was getting into.  It meant lab draws, shots, hormones that made me (and let’s be honest… everyone around me) a little crazy.  It meant carrying a puke bucket around for months and an exhaustion that was so fierce I wondered if I’d ever feel normal again.  And it meant an emotional rollercoaster of praying and hoping for my baby’s safety.

So when we arrived at mass, I was praying in thanksgiving, but I also was praying for grace to endure the suffering that would surely come.  And then I heard the first reading from Jeremiah, 1:4

                “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I dedicated you”

My heart leapt.  I knew that God was with this baby and with me.

Then the Psalm 71:5-6

                “For you are my hope, O Lord:

                My trust, O God from my youth.

                On you I depend from birth;

                From my mother’s womb you are my strength”

I felt like God was telling me that he would protect this baby and not to worry. I experienced a deep peace and joy. 

Then the gospel was Matthew 13:1-9, the parable of the sower and the seeds.  I have heard this parable many times, but at some point since becoming a mother I began to hear it differently.  The same things that Jesus warns us can keep us from bearing spiritual fruit: trials, lack of roots, the anxieties of daily life and the lure of riches, are the same things that often keep people from bearing physical fruit: more children.

I felt so encouraged that this was the reading for the day.  So that nothing... not fear of suffering, financial concerns, or the anxieties of life with small children, could rob me of the joy of this new life growing inside me. 

The pregnancy was a time of suffering for me, but also of great consolation.  Jesus continued to give me great peace and encouragement.  The first time I went in for my lab draw I was feeling a little sorry for myself… here we go again I thought…. And on the secular radio station that was on in the lab was “I Can Only Imagine”.  It was a little gift to me. 

And there were moments that I drew upon the grace that was given to me that day at Mass.  One instance in particular when I was about four months along and I started bleeding.  I was at the ER and I kept almost hearing the word, “protected”.  I felt a deep peace even before the sonogram showed a little baby with a beating heart!

Our little boy was born, not only full term, but 8 days overdue!   Healthy and beautiful little boy!  And the suffering of those nine months was nothing compared to the joy of our new son.  

I experienced that God's grace is not only sufficient, but it is abundant!

p.s. My husband writes about this time in our lives also... check it out