TeamDavis

musings on marriage, faith and life

3 Weeks Ago March 18, 2009

Filed under: family — hokiecaryn @ 2:18 pm
Josiah & his mom at 3 weeks

Josiah & his mom at 3 weeks

Today is Josiah’s three-week birthday!  I guess the time does go quickly, although when your hours are broken into about 3 hr time blocks of eating and sleeping (including through the night), the days do tend to feel long.  We are still enjoying the precious moments with our baby, and the crying and fussing has become a bit more tolerable as we are getting more sleep and I believe it is somewhat lessening at least in the wee hours of the morning when it’s definitely harder to take.

Most mornings this past week, I have taken time with Josiah to sit on the porch for about an hour and enjoy the coolish Florida mornings with him.  He seems to most often like being out there, a gentle breeze, our wind chimes chiming, and the birds singing; an occasional other noise that he tries to listen to.  It’s a special time and as I’m more of me each day, I am really trying to enjoy those times and take time to talk with him.

Today I was pondering how much our life has changed in three weeks.  There are so many aspects of our life that have changed since the birth of our son.

Three Weeks Ago:

  • I had never been through childbirth
  • I had never held my first child at 15-seconds-old in my arms; or known such love for a purple wriggly 9 lbs of human
  • I had never known what it would feel like to nurse a human being from my body
  • I never understood the true meaning of “recovery” from childbirth
  • I did not understand all that was loaded behind the phrase “sleepless nights” with a newborn
  • I had never loved someone so much at first sight
  • I did not know how lovely every square inch of my son’s precious body would be to me
  • I did not realize how quickly and easily it was to brush off being peed and pooped on at the same time
  • [warning: nursing reference] I did not know the frustration and agony of engorgement and sitting in a puddle of my own milk, crying because nursing was so painful

    CUTE!

    CUTE!

  • I did not believe the painfulness of nursing would slowly wane and I would find more rhythm and ability in it
  • I did not know how strong and yet how weak a newborn really is
  • I had not yet experienced the utter joy of seeing my husband lovingly gaze at our son
  • I had not yet experienced the pride in seeing my son in the arms of my own mother and father; and witnessing their complete joy over him
  • I did not know how much I would want to chew on my baby’s cute little chubby cheeks
  • I did not realize how much I take for granted in my daily freedom before our high-needs infant came into my responsibility
  • I did not know how much I was willing to relinquish my comfort and freedom for my son
  • I did not know the depth and strength that it would take to be a mother
  • I did not know the honor of stepping into the circle of mothers in history who have bravely traipsed into the land of raising children
  • I did not understand the immensity of the calling three weeks ago.

Three weeks ago, I was completely unaware of the joy that would be mine today, despite adversity and difficulty and pain.

 

The Fatherhood of God March 14, 2009

Filed under: faith,family — Scott @ 5:15 pm
Tags: , , , , , ,

I’ve spent much of the last two weeks gazing into the face of my infant son Josiah. It is an awesome and fearful thing (in the old sense of both words) to become a father and to hold your son in your arms.

Josiah loves his daddy

Josiah loves his daddy

I had been told by many fathers that they inexplicably loved their children from the moment they lay eyes on them. That certainly held true for me, though I believe the love kicked in quite a bit before I saw him. I vividly remember being overwhelmed with love for my unborn child the first time I felt him kick Caryn’s womb.

I look at him and wonder at the love I feel for him. Where did it come from? Why do I love him so much? He has never done anything for me, and at this point I can’t imagine that he ever will. This is like nothing I have ever felt before. Why do I love him? No answer satisfies, except “because he is my son and I am his father.”

I am his father, and it is right that I should love him unconditionally. It would be wicked to fail to love.

Imagine if I did not love him! You would rightly call me a monster, an unfeeling wretch. How could a father not love his own child? This law seems written into the human soul – “fathers, love your children.” Even in a morally desensitized society we cringe at stories of parents who fail to love their children, who neglect or abuse, who shame, who murder.

A frantic thought passes through my mind as I gaze at Josiah. What if he doesn’t love me in return? I can’t imagine a worse end than that. Unrequited love between a man and a woman is painful indeed, but between a father and his child? How could a child not love the one who sired him? How could he reject the parents who conceived him, bore him, nursed him, fed him, cleaned him, raised him, trained him, gave him everything they possessed out of pure love?

That a child might reject and hate his loving father is a monstrous crime to imagine. Again, this law seems written in our souls: “children, honor your father and your mother.” We cringe at stories of children who reject and hate their loving parents. As we’ve grown in Christ, many of us have discovered the need to repent of little rebellions and hatreds in our hearts towards our parents, and to seek restoration. When I think of my own earthly father, I find this to be true:

I am his son, and it is right that I should love him in return. It would be wicked to fail to love.

Which brings me around to God the Father, revealed by Jesus to be his own eternal father and ours by adoption:

Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
[John 1:12]

For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba [Daddy], Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.
[Romans 8:15-16]

By nature of our being creations of God, we certainly owe him both obedience and love. After all, he created us and gave us everything that is good! But something even greater has been revealed to us by Jesus Christ – God the Father adopts those who are in Christ to be his own sons and daughters.

God is not a distant uninvolved watchmaker who set the universe spinning and then stepped back. He is a father, The Father, who is intimately involved in creation, and especially in the lives of those he has adopted into his own family.

Our Father loves us not because of anything we can do for him, but because we are his children. He loves us because we are his! That is a great comfort as we struggle through this life, limping along towards God, and wrestling with our sinful tendency towards rebellion.

Our clear duty as dearly loved children is to love and obey our heavenly Father in return. This truth is written into the hearts of all human beings – we are made to know and to love our creator God. For those who have been joined to Jesus Christ and thus adopted as children of Father God, we know this truth to run even deeper, for we relate to him as dearly loved children.

God loves us because he is our Father and we are his children. We love him in return as a child loves his parents, because he first loved us. God wove this magic into the fabric of the universe, and the fabric of human fatherhood, at the dawn of time. And he saw it, and it was very good.

 

a sensitive topic: children and family March 9, 2009

Filed under: Uncategorized — Scott @ 9:18 am

wedding bandsIn my previous post, I talked briefly about my process of coming to be open to having children, of seeing childbearing as a good (and in a sense necessary) part of marriage.

This is a sensitive topic!

I have many dear friends who are married but unable to bear children for medical reasons. Others who deeply desire children but do not because they are unmarried. And a few close friends who are married but choose not to bear children.

Few topics are more private and sensitive than the choice and ability to bear a child!

I remember reading a helpful book for our premarital counseling class. Overall the material was great, but one paragraph in the introductory chapter set my teeth on edge – it read God’s blessing on Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply as a command. “Who do they think they are, saying that all couples must have children, or at least make the attempt?”

I still don’t read that blessing as a command, but I’ve moved slowly towards the idea that it is God’s intention for marriage that children will normally be a result. Like all else in this world, brokenness and disease and sin hinder God’s design, so that we live as best we can. Many will not bear children. Many cannot bear children. But God’s design for marriage is that it normally will bear children.

In calling Israel to repent of unfaithfulness towards their spouses, the prophet Malachi reveals what God was seeking when he designed the oneness of marriage:

Because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. (Malachi 2:14-15)

This is a sensitive topic, so let me be clear what I am not saying: I’m not saying that those who do not marry are somehow less valuable or less fulfilled or less spiritual (remember that Jesus and Paul never married). I’m not saying that those who are married and medically cannot bear children are less in any way than those who can. I’m not saying that those couples who chose not to have children are necessarily disobeying God by their choice (though some might, I know I was!).

I’m simply saying this: despite the fallenness of this world, despite our own limitations, despite the good and godly reasons that some do not bear children, as Christians we must still uphold and celebrate God’s good intention for a man to leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and become one flesh – that they might produce godly offspring for their Lord.

…

I’ve been pondering these thoughts for several days, wondering how to communicate them effectively and graciously. I was finally stirred to write by a wonderful blog post from Dr. Del Tackett, touching on the same subject. I hope that I’ve done a good job and will avoid offending my friends and brothers and sisters in Christ.

 

 
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