Even If - Sarah Green
What Mom doesn’t want a baby girl? I was a mom of boys for 6 years and when I found out I was having a girl I instantly freaked. I thought of all the things I had put my parents through, and I thought about the law of “sowing and reaping.” (You reap what you sow.)
“Oh God, PLEASE don’t let this be a girl for real.” But it was. And as soon as I realized how much fun it was to shop for all the girl stuff I decided I could put up with a few bad teen years. I did turn out pretty good after all, right?
My pregnancy was perfect. My delivery was perfect. And my tiny little girl was perfect. Just. Perfect.
I had given birth via C-section and usually my Mom stays with me. However, she was out of town taking care of another injured relative. My boys were off with their Daddy and I was all alone at the house, cuddling this beautiful baby girl.
My phone rang. I juggled Anna Jo around to be able to answer it.
“Hello?”
“Hi, this is Doc M, your daughter’s pediatrician.”
“How nice for her to call,” I thought. “I don’t remember her calling for the boys. But, I don’t remember if I showered this month. Maybe because I haven’t?”
Back to reality.
“I wanted to talk to you for a minute. Is now a good time?”
“Sure!”
“So, on every newborn we do a few standard tests.”
“Okay?”
The pause in the next breath is what caught my attention. Silence can be very intimidating.
“Anna Jo has come back positive for Cystic Fibrosis, have you heard of that?”
“No, I have not.”
“It is a genetic disease. I want her to go for further testing. Now, don’t google it! We don’t have all the answers just as yet and I don’t want to worry you.”
Um, too late for THAT.
“I have scheduled you to see a lung doctor at the Children’s Hospital downstate….”
She continued to give the details and I sat there, staring at this perfect child wondering how on earth anything could be wrong?
I hung up with the doctor and immediately did what I was told not to do. (Remember, the girl that gave her parents all their gray hairs.)
After just one or two articles I was sobbing, huge, uncontrollable crying. Kids with CF face very daunting lives. There is no cure. It is a death sentence. It may take 20-40 years, it can take as few as 3-4 but, it is not a disease with a favorable outcome.
Seth and I were so shocked and so hurt we could not even form this information into words. For several days he and I told no one except our parents. We cried. We held each other and our precious baby. When we finally were able to form the words, I made a FaceBook post and people around the world started to pray for my girl. That weekend our church gathered into a circle and had special prayer for our newborn baby girl.
You have probably experienced deep moments of grief, deeper than the one I am have shared with you. You have had your moments of tears, agony, trouble, loss, death, grief - affliction. King David said, “Thou hast dealt well with thy servant, O Lord, according unto thy word. I know, O Lord, that thy judgments are right, and that thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me.” Psalm 119:65-68, 75
Sometimes God allows affliction in our lives. We pray, we fast, we beg God to move on our behalf when we are under affliction. And He often does. But even if He doesn’t, we should praise. We should hope. We should rest.
Almost a week to the day from that phone call with the Doctor, my little family made the mournful trek to the Children’s Hospital. Walking into that cold, clinical place where suddenly everywhere I turned was a pale, thin child wearing a mask, in a wheel chair or staring at me with huge eyes was such a difficult moment. We met with the doctor. They explained in even further detail what we were facing but they wanted to run one more test on our baby girl. They gathered her sweat to test the salt content. This is considered the “gold standard test” for cystic fibrosis. They ran it twice that day and the results came back immediately.
My daughter had cystic fibrosis genes…two defective genes that should cause her to have physical issues all her life. But, the sweat test showed that somehow, one of her defective genes was working. She did have a higher salt content but not enough to cause her to be a cystic fibrosis patient. My little girl was going to be okay. No daily mountains of pills. No vest to “shake” her to help break up the mucous in her lungs. It was a kind of miracle. The doctors asked for us to enroll Anna into a study program because of the oddity that she would have two defective genes and yet be “normal.”
I remember looking around the waiting room and thanking God for being so good to us. To my baby girl. I remember tears of relief and thankfulness for the people who had been praying and for God hearing.
And then I saw a mom across the waiting room holding her little boy who has “classic” CF, the kind I just found out my baby did NOT have. And my next thought was, “Would I be thanking Him even if my Anna Jo had not had a good diagnosis?”
Would I still be praising Him even if He chose to tell me no?
Would I still trust His mercy even if He let my innocent child suffer?
Even If
When loss stalks your life and pain is a constant companion; when sadness lingers longer than smiles and you can’t help but wonder why; in those moments, that is when we must look deep to find the courage to stand and say “Lord, I know you have the power to take all this away, but, even if you don’t, I trust you.”
Even If
It is such a small phrase that carries such a punch. It is easy to praise God when He heals your daughter. It’s not easy when He allows a friend to die before their 31st birthday.
Even If
It’s easy to love Him when he provides for you, gives you the good and perfect gifts that He can bestow. It is not easy when He allows your husband’s business to go bankrupt, losing everything you’ve worked years for to be gone within 2 months.
We don’t always get the rosy outcome. God doesn’t always fix our troubles. He was so gracious to us in that moment with my girl, but since then I’ve had moments on the “bad” side where I had to say “God, thank you for your will. Even if I don’t like it. Even if I don’t necessarily agree with this.”
So, when the storm clouds come your way, call out to your Father to help you weather the storm. But when you pray, even if God doesn’t answer the way you want Him to, determine in your heart “Lord, no matter the outcome I will be faithful. Lord, even if I lose it all, I will be true. Father, even if I don’t think I can do what you’re asking me to do, I will trust in You.”
He is faithful.
He is true.
Even if.