The Pangs of Parenthood

 Ethan's First Day

A couple weeks ago a friend called to cancel our coffee together, she and her husband are expecting their first child and they'd just had their ultrasound to make sure the baby was healthy, etc.  At first, she sounded fine, then her voice got a little wobbly as she told me that they found that the baby had a non-life threatening medical condition that may require surgery shortly after his birth.  As she cried a little and asked if we could reschedule, those first pangs of parenthood flooded my mind once again.  For most of us who are blessed to have normal pregnancies and healthy children, we experience those pangs the first time our baby is sick.  As a mom, we long to heal them, to take away the pain, even carry it ourselves so that they can be 100% and enjoy life.  Ethan had lots of little colds, etc. when he was a newborn, but his first serious illness was RSV when he was a few months old.  He was wheezing and coughing... I remember giving him a breathing treatment in the middle of the night, listening to his breathing, praying- asking God to help him breathe, even finding myself taking deeper breaths as if somehow I could give him my healthy lungfuls of air.  Never in a million years did I dream of almost physically aching to take on the pain, the illness of another to free them- and yet that is exactly where parenthood brought me- the pangs of parenthood, the ache to heal another.

After I got off the phone with my friend, as I remembered those first pangs, it struck me how our Heavenly Father has those same pangs- multiplied a thousand times over.  All that we see is His creation, intended to be a reflection of His beauty, His creativity, His character, His love- especially mankind.  Yet almost as soon as He created it, created us, we broke it.  All that we see, even the most breathtaking scenery in the world, has been twisted and is groaning under the weight of sickness, sin and death (Romans 8).   It was only a matter of time until the Father of all we see provided a Healer, a Remedy for our sickness, our sin.  He sent His Son, Jesus to come in human flesh, walk the earth and, in the way only God could, do what we, as earthly parents, so often long to do for our children.  He literally took the weight of our burden, our sickness, our sin, our death on His own shoulders so that we, His children, could have life.  He did what I am unable to do, provide complete healing, hope and peace to His children.  Staggering...


As I write this I am blown away by my God.  We, as parents, ache to carry the burden for our children.  How much more does our Heavenly Father!  Yet, so often I echo my now two year old, "I do myself!"  I struggle and wrestle and sink under the weight of my burden when the God of the Universe offers to take it and provide rest for my weary soul (Matthew 11:28-30).  Will I ever learn to truly let go?  Will I trust Him to carry my burdens?  Will you?