on a Sunday in March

We’ve only been to church a handful of times this year (after a seven-month-long stretch of staying home). I haven’t wanted to participate in worship, so we arrive late. We hurry out after the sermon ends, because I haven’t wanted to run into anyone who hasn’t seen me since last May.

We were late yesterday, but the worship team was still playing as we scooted past a beautiful family of six, including an infant. My heart began to race when I recognized the song as “The Lord Our God” by Kristian Stanfill. The last time I heard that song was when I was pregnant with Jane. I even blogged about it.

I can hardly bear to go back and read through the posts I’ve written about my grief. Sometimes I can’t believe it’s me that is experiencing all of those emotions and bearing all of that (this) pain. When I wrote that post in June I was terrified out of my mind, but deep down I believed our baby would be healthy. I listened to that song and thought God WAS leading us out of our dark grief from John and into a time of joy with our second baby. My most prayed prayer over my second pregnancy was that God would be delighted to give us a healthy baby — that it would bring Him joy. I thought with a prayer like that, surely I will get to hold this baby and watch it grow.

I threw myself into desperately hoping, desperately praying, desperately reciting verses... and when I got home from the hospital after saying goodbye to my second baby, I was, and continue to be, simply desperate.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
-Psalm 73:26

I don’t know why, or even how exactly, but my mouth opened in church yesterday and the words came spilling out. I heard my husband’s voice softly rising alongside mine.

Still we can know you are good.

I imagined what we looked like to God... two of His people, weary and heartbroken, lifting their voices in obedience and faith. We sang knowing full well God could have given us healthy babies. We sang knowing full well only God knows our future. We sang knowing full well this hard road we’re on may be longer than we’d like.

Tiny step after tiny step, we move forward.