Mother's Day...The Other Side
Before I get swallowed up by preparations for our Mother’s Day celebration, I thought I should share my thoughts on motherhood. Well actually, this post is more about the lack thereof. Although over the past few years I’ve grown a fondness (if not obsession) for this beautiful ministry, I’ve also grown a sensitivity to those who’ve lost children, those who’ve lost mothers and more so those who struggle with infertility. I understand that the celebration of this day can be especially difficulty for them as it emphasizes their painful reality. Together with the prayers I offer for them, this year I want to share the hope there is for them. God in his wisdom, has littered His Word with characters who’ve been through the same.
There’s a handful of women who lost their children in the Bible. The first, is the very first woman that lived. Eve lost her lastborn son Abel to the jealousy of her firstborn, Cain. In the process, she also lost Cain, not to death, but to the consequences of his actions. There is no detail of the emotional pain she endured from her loss, but from what she says when her son Seth is born, one can tell that Abel’s death left a void in her (see Genesis 4:25). I don’t agree with her understanding that Seth was Abel’s replacement, because each child is unique with his own gifts and purpose, but I totally understand her pain and the comfort she feels from having been given another son.
The woman who tugs at my heart the most in this group, is a woman named Rizpah. Her story is told in 2 Samuel 21. She was Saul’s concubine and had two sons by him. These sons were killed by the Gibeonites on a hill after their father was also slain. They were left there to be scavenged by animals in a season where there would be no rain.
“Rizpah, daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on a rock. From the beginning of the harvest till the rain poured down from the heavens on the bodies, she did not let the birds of the air touch them by day or the wild animals by night.” verse 10
I understand her actions as her refusal to let the memory of her children fade. She stayed there with her sons bodies an entire season until David sent for them for their burial. She risked her life in the process, what is a grieving mother in the face of wild animals in the dark? But God pins down these details so we could see how he understood her pain and what mattered to her. We don’t hear of God blessing her with another child, but we see God providing her with her heart’s desire which would bring comfort and closure to her, allowing her to heal.
God understands the pain of losing a child, regardless of how and at what age they were when it happened. Above understanding, God, as the God of all comfort, has comfort for all those who’ve lost. What’s important is not to refuse God’s comfort.
“…A voice is heard in Ramah, morning and great weeping, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because her children are no more. This is what the Lord says: ‘Restrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, for your work will be rewarded,’ declares the Lord. ‘They will return from the land of the enemy. So there is hope for your future,’ declares the Lord. ‘Your children will return to their own land.” Jeremiah 31:15-17
I made that statement bold, because that, my dear sister, is what God says, there is hope for your future, simply on the basis of what God still is to do with your life. The children Rachel cried for weren’t only taken to exile, some died. Nothing could be done for those who’d died, but God had plans with those who remained. Yes, you have lost, but don’t allow your pain to blind you of what remains and what God can do with it.
As part of the cycle of life, many Biblical characters lost their mothers. Isaac is one such character. We don’t hear of his mourning when his mother dies in Genesis 23 where his father is seen weeping over his dead wife. Isaac was about thirty seven when his mom died.
“Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her; and Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.” Genesis 24:67
We see how much a loss it was for Isaac in the way he held on tightly to his mother’s possessions and by the fact that he wasn’t comforted from his mother’s death which occurred a few years before this verse. In his case, we see how God comforted him through a relationship, loving and being loved brought him healing. Again, people are irreplaceable and nothing can ever take their place once we lose them. Rebekah could never be Sarah, and I believe Isaac understood that in the way he loved her, and he found that embracing what God had given him now helped him heal from what he lost then.
Sarah, Rebekah and Rachel all struggled with infertility. Not only was it hard to deal with on an emotional level, but they had also married into a family with a promise of numerous offspring. Double pressure and expectation. God does not hide their struggle. Sarah gave up hope waiting and organized a surrogate. To her dismay, it didn’t turn out the way she planned. She was so hopeless that when God showed up promising her a child in a year’s time, she laughed in disbelief. Rebekah was lucky to have a prayerful husband who prayed for her when they were almost twenty years in their marriage with no children. Rachel had the pressure of her rival sister Leah who kept them coming like it didn’t hurt at all. Once, she got so frustrated she lashed out to her husband: “Give me children or I’ll die!” (see Genesis 30:1) She was so taken up by the pain of infertility, she was suicidal. Hannah is another character who was deep in depression because of it. She would cry so much and be engulfed in misery so much so she would neglect the husband who loved her so much. Through them we see how focus and emphasis on what we don’t have can injure what we do have. Both these last two women had husbands who were mad in love with them, but they were too taken up by despair to realize it. It’s no secret the ravaging effects infertility has on marriages, but it doesn’t have to.
Children are a blessing from God, but they are not a sign that a marriage is blessed. God blessed marriage when he initiated it and all who step into it, the way God has ordained, step onto blessed ground. I’ve always argued that being fruitful, as part of the blessing spoken in Genesis 1:28, is not limited to biology. When I make another of my kind, I am fruitful. I can therefore be fruitful even through those I’m not physically related to by nurturing and training them to be that which God called them to be. For every marriage God has a plan and purpose and as much as he can respond to one barren family’s prayers with conception, to another he will respond with grace, grace that is sufficient for them, grace that allows for God’s power to be perfected in their weakness.
So there is comfort, there is hope and there is grace. Take shelter in these in the coming days. I’ll be praying for you.
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