Beginnings.

To my left cockroach crawling on wall. To my right clothing hanging on line strung from window bars. In front two classmates doing Pilates. Nothing worth mentioning from the back.

My world has become consumed with babies. And I find that I like it. But Tanzania has taught me this time, not America. What will happen when I return to America and her ways? I wonder what she’ll think of me.

Hospital.

Beginnings.

Could this be right?

It is right.

There were two infant deaths today. When I walked into the hospital there was a little girl wrapped up. Later there was a tiny, tiny baby boy who was came very early. Too early. It has been an odd processing journey. My first reaction is why? But I know that will never get answered so I move on to how? If that doesn’t get answered it’s on to what do I do? Where do I fit into this equation?

There is rarely proper time to do anything at the hospital, but mourning the death of a precious baby is important. I try to make space. I imagine I’m in an empty room where it’s me, Jesus and the baby. He’s holding her and tears are just coming… he can’t finish her story. He had it all planned out and only got to just finish the cover page. The inside pages will be blank. His creative father heart is denied. It’s a crude reality… this thing. Death. We were never created to handle it. We weren’t made to loose in that way. My mind can’t comprehend any of it. I hate it. But I can’t get rid of it… some days it’s all around me. Confrontation of the worst sort. Stemming from lack of… what? Prayer? Medical supplies? Timing? But that’s not fair. I just don’t understand.

And life at the same time. Healthy, breathing, thriving babies. Why this one and not that one? How can this be reality? My job is to commit little tiny brand new beings to Jesus… and now I realize that that means breathing or not breathing. Heart beat or no heart beat. God grants grace… and I cling to the hope that he hears my prayers and will breath life into the lifeless little ones. And when control is stripped away from me he grants the grace to walk into that hospital tomorrow and face another day.

“Hope is not a ball and chain that we drag around, but it is of utmost value because it carries us through the darkness and tells us that a brighter day is coming. It tells us that a brighter day is coming, not because we deserve it (we don’t!), and not because we’ve earned it (we can’t!) but because God loves us, and desires to give us that brighter day. “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full,” Jesus said. I don’t for a moment pretend to understand the darkness, or to know why the valley’s can seem so incredibly low. But this I do know. The valley is not where we are meant to stay. It is a part of the journey, but it is never our destination. And the key to getting through the valley is not to abandon hope, but to hold to it with all that we have, with prayer and fasting, with tears and crying out to God because it is God Himself that we need to encounter, it is God Himself that is our hope. Our hope is really not that our prayer will be answered, though God does that too, but our hope is that we would in clinging to hope, cling to God.” -Jerry Ireland