Expectations

I recently bought a brand-new teal planner. As seems fitting with my transition at work, my Skyline planner is about to run out. In July, I can start scribbling dates on pages topped with little tropical scenes. It was the best $6.97 I've spent in a long time. As I started to fill in appointments for the next several months, I was struck by how far away December seems. Some days it seems as if we'll never make it. For those of you who don't know, I've struggled since winter with unidentified connective tissue issues, mainly pain/numbness in my hands, feet, and/or chest. I'm working with a rheumatologist, but it has been a scary journey for someone so high control (and high anxiety!). Pregnancy has made some of the symptoms and a lot of the fear worse. My body no longer "plays by the rules."

As many pregnant women probably do, I began thinking about Mary. About how she was a mother, yes, but more how she was a teenage Jew. She had grown up hearing whispers of the Messiah, the one who would restore the oppressed nation of Israel to the glory intended for it. God had been silent for 400 years. Now, she and Jews everywhere were only nine months away from the realization of their dreams. She was not awaiting just her child, but the birth of an entire new era. How long those months must have seemed!

However, as I kept reflecting, I wondered how Mary felt when she held an impossibly fragile Messiah. When she fled to Egypt with his hot cheeks against her chest. When she watched her son executed, blood of her blood draining from a hole in his side. I wondered if she longed for the days she had wished to pass quickly, the days when the Messiah spun quietly in the safety of her womb. Did she wish then for the nine months of waiting, seeing the time as blessing instead of curse.

I wonder if I will wish the same when this time of pain and anxiety is over. Is there blessing in this time that I will long for? Will I miss the nearness of God, the knee-bowing humility that has fallen over me, the feeling of smallness and desperateness that has helped me understand for the first time in my life Jesus as burden-bearer and man of sorrows? I've noticed it already. On days when I have been pain free, I often did not think of Jesus until the end of the school day. He can slip to the fringes of my consciousness. On days when fear comes thick, his name is on my lips almost constantly.

I told Patrick last night that this was a scary ride and that I wanted to get off. But, I think God has more for me than this. My friend Kristen once told me a story of her friend who had lost her husband. A mutual friend of theirs had asked the woman what the hardest time of the day was for her. She replied the nighttime, when the kids had gone to sleep. The friend had said, "Then God has something special for you in the nighttime. Don't miss it."

I am going to believe that God has something special for me in this time of pain, of waiting, of uncertainty and  lack of control. Instead of praying for this time to pass quickly, I am going to ask for eyes to see what gift God is giving me right now. I do not, do not want to miss it.