One Month

It's after midnight now, but, since I haven't gone to sleep yet, I'm still thinking of today as Thursday, December 29th. I clarify that because my thought all day has been: "I'm exactly one month away from Ian's due date (Jan. 29th)."

One month doesn't seem like very much time. Factor in all that must be done in that time, and I'm sure it will feel like even less.

Daniel and I just got back on Monday from a visit to Maryland for Christmas. I had gone out there a week before so that my mom could throw me a baby shower. The shower ended up being such a special time. I'm sure it's a memory I'll treasure for a very long time regardless of the outcome. The theme of the day was "Ian is a blessing." From almost the very first moment we realized the severity of the news concerning Ian's health, we wanted to make sure that we were celebrating and enjoying every bit of his life. This shower was part of that. God has blessed me with such dear family and friends who were able to join with me in doing that. I shared with them a dvd of a 3D ultrasound I had a few weeks back. Everyone was taken with him, as he had put on a show for the camera, sucking his finger, rubbing his eyes, smiling, blinking, and more.

The rest of my week in Maryland was good as well. I never get to see everyone I want to when I go back for such a short visit, but I did get to see many.

After really living away from home for the first time ever, spending Christmas with my family was also special. I'm so grateful to my parents for flying us out there. We were still missing Mike unfortunately as he's deployed currently, but we got to talk to him and opened all the gifts he'd sent. I won't say it was almost like he was there, because it wasn't, but I think we had the next best thing.

This was my first Christmas with Daniel and with Ian. That made it amazing regardless of where we were. Celebrating your most prized "possession" in one accord with people you are so inherently intimately connected with is, I think, a very God-glorifying thing.

The rush of Christmas has passed now though. We are back in California. And, while New Year's is still to come, it feels like the holiday season is gone and the time has come to prepare for what's next.

One month and so much to do. One month to make the most of our time with little Ian. One month to love, to hope, to pray for, to cherish. One month to prepare and make plans.

A year ago, I was planning my wedding, and it was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. Little did I know then that a year later I'd be facing the prospect of planning a funeral for my firstborn son. I know that's an awfully morbid thought, but it does me no good to hide from the likely reality.

Somehow, I must maintain that delicate balance between making the most of the time with Ian and yet simultaneously preparing for his departure. It is a mixture of such opposites. Birth and death. Laughter and mourning. Joy and sorrow. Such is life it seems. You are never far from one or other or both.

If you had one month, what would you do?

Refocus

One of my dear friends wrote a post that serves as a timely reminder this Christmas season. Please head on over and be edified:

 "A Song for the Season"

Discovering a Name

Daniel and I had an exciting ultrasound appointment on Tuesday. I'd forgotten we were even scheduled for an ultrasound. A happy surprise. The purpose of this one was to try to determine the baby's gender. Earlier on in the pregnancy, we'd been content to be surprised, but circumstances being what they are, we changed our minds in order to allow us to enjoy this baby by name.

Even with my excitement at the "surprise" ultrasound, I wasn't very hopeful that we'd be able to find out. The baby is still in a breach position, sitting very low, and when they looked last time, he was crossing his little baby legs.

Not so much this time. The doctor checked three separate times and each time found evidence to the same end--we're having a little boy! There is fairly conclusive picture evidence of such, but I won't embarrass the little man.

Dr. H also took some other pics for us, showing us what he could. Little man was licking something for a while. Pretty cute. As you can see from the picture below, he was also holding his hand up by his head much of the time (rather like Daniel does when he's tired).

When we got home that night, we began the process of narrowing down name options. Our first choice was out. Although not necessarily so, Joy is generally thought to be a girl's name. My Uncle Joy would probably disagree, but Daniel and decided to go ahead and leave that one even though it was so fitting: Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. -James 1:2-4

It took us a good 24 hours to decide finally, which is really a false statement on two accounts. First, we'd really been thinking about it ever since that first appointment when we heard about the baby's condition. Second, we realized as we were mulling it over and discussing that it wasn't so much our choosing as it was our discovering. 

We came to understand that this baby had been named from long ago. From before Daniel and I were born, this child had a name and a purpose. "Choosing a name" was really a process of God revealing his name to us. It felt like the most weighty "decision" I'd ever made. It may be in fact one of the most significant journeys God has taken me on--the road to discovering who God has declared this little one to be. What a heavy and yet light and joyful thing. 

After much seeking, we found it. His name was Ian Dominic. It means "God is gracious" and "of God; belonging to God" respectively. Amen to both.

"It's Too Heavy"

In my reading tonight from Angie Smith's I Will Carry You, the story Angie used to close the chapter was so beautiful and profound that I have to share it. It's actually a quoted passage from The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom (one of those books that I've always meant to read and perhaps now will):

He turned to look at me, as he always did when answering a question, but to my surprise he said nothing. At last he stood up, lifted his traveling case off the floor and set it on the floor.

"Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?" he said.

I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with the watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning.

"It's too heavy," I said.

"Yes," he said, "and it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It's the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger, you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you."

And I was satisfied. More than satisfied--wonderfully at peace. There were answers to this and all my hard questions--for now I was content to leave them in my father's keeping. 

I'm not exactly sure yet if I need to apply this to the question of yesterday's post, but I'm certain that, as I walk this road I'm on, there will be times when I will have questions that are too heavy for my mind and that I will need to be content "to leave them in my [F]ather's keeping." What peace there is in knowing that sometimes the answers I long for but don't receive are because my Father loves me too much to make me carry a load I cannot lift. 

Of Toughest Questions: Infant Salvation

Easy or mundane thoughts have no place in my mind these days. When they do arise out of chance or necessity (Did the Capitals win tonight? When is that electric bill due?), I find them awkward and sometimes unnerving. Strangely, it is the deep, grave thoughts that usually we fend off that seem most fitting fodder for my mind. To think of lesser things almost seems a waste or even a betrayal of the situation at hand. I realize that to some extent that is a dangerous idea to follow and so fight against it, because I know that life is partially comprised of the mundane and inextricably so but I must weigh that against the counter that death cannot be taken too seriously.

How much do funerals cost? Cremation versus burial. The theological implications of such. My own personal reactions to each. What is pain? Where do I draw the line between saving my child from pain and my responsibility to care for myself for my husband and possible future children--c-section versus a more natural birth? Intervention versus non-intervention? At what point is intervention crossing the line into grasping for control over life that isn't ours to have? And perhaps the most significant question of them all--the salvation of a child that dies in infancy.

This last one is the one that I've been wrestling with the most I think. Everywhere I go I hear fellow Christians speak to me of the comfort in knowing that even if this baby does die quickly that I will see him in heaven again someday.

The author of the book I'm reading, Angie Smith, is married to the lead singer of Selah, the Christian musical group. They wrote a song of the same name as the book I'm reading--"I Will Carry You." It's a beautiful song, and part of me longs to take comfort in its sweet sadness and grave joy. Go read the words. If you're up for it, watch this heart-wrenchingly beautiful video tribute to Audrey, the daughter about whom the song was written while you listen to the words:



Don't you want to believe what this songs says in the second verse? I do. I want so much to believe that if this baby dies, he or she will be with God. What a joy that would be.

But that is the same hope I would have for any of my children. And as with any other child that I might have, I need to ask myself the question of whether or not the Bible has given me such a hope to stand on.

I've been reading and thinking on it now for some time. And though it's not the first time I've asked myself what I believe in this area, it is the first time that I've asked it in which the answer had any real impact on how I think and live. What I've found in my research thus far has been profoundly unsettling. That is, I've found that men whose serious thoughts I generally trust to a degree have rather irresponsible reasons for believing as they do.

I suppose I should back up a bit and say that for the most part I find that churches teach that all who die in infancy go to heaven. I was actually a little surprised at how widely this view is held despite otherwise significantly different systems of thought. It seems that while Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, and Arminians all have different views on exactly how salvation is achieved, they all seem to agree that babies somehow automatically get a pass, whether in their actual doctrinal statements or in the general belief of their congregations and teachers.

This has never seemed that simple a question to me. For when I look at Scripture, I find no explicit statement defending such a belief, and when I look to scholars to help me understand why they believe such, inevitably I find that at some level they all in part believe this because the idea that infants might go to hell is inconsistent with what they understand as a good God. Even C. H. Spurgeon, generally known for his responsible though not expository preaching, relies heavily on this argument in a sermon on infant salvation. I expect this kind of teaching from guys like Rob Bell but not Spurgeon and not Calvin whom he claims as saying the same. Where is the responsible scholarship? We do not define what is good and then hold God accountable to some external standard; we define what good is by what God does. When we start imposing our own standards on God, we begin to undermine our entire system of belief. This is no small matter. And I am unwilling to walk that road, regardless of what great men may have trod it before me.

I fear that last bit sounded prideful. After all, who am I to judge these men who so devoted their lives to the study of theology? I must tell you, however, that it gives me no great pleasure to be thus standing on the outside looking in at the company of their knowledge and wisdom. I wish that I could enter whole-heartedly into fellowship with their thoughts on this. But I can't. Not yet. And not ever in that particular argument that says a good god would not send children to hell.

My search for answers is not over, however; and perhaps soon I will be able to join with them in concluding that all who die in infancy do go to heaven, but until I am so compelled by the reading of plain scripture, I remain feeling slightly alienated from them and from any who would give such comfort to me.

Fortunately, in the meantime, I am not floundering in hopelessness. My commitment to calling what God does good, regardless of what it is, means that I can trust Him still. I hope with this child as I would with any that He might be chosen of God to receive salvation. The only difference is that I may not have the opportunity to see it happen.