If you experience pain, are you in sin?

I've been waiting, these last few months, for a serious topic to grab my attention... something bigger for us to discuss than bubble blankets.

Yesterday a topic sparked my passion.  I was reading through a string of comments on Facebook, many lovely women weighing in on the heated and heartfelt topic of childbirth.  It was the comment of one woman in particular that caught my attention.  She told us that her births were pain free and it was because Christ has reversed the curse placed on mankind.  She told us that because she believes this idea and has faith in it, she is able to exercise authority over her body and tell it what to do and therefore experience no pain.

This prompted a new string of comments, some throwing unnecessary, strong accusations at the well-intentioned woman and others revealed that her comments hurt them as it suggested their own painful labors were due to lack of faith.

This woman has touched on a very large theological debate that exists within Christianity.  People falling on either side of this debate are all lovely people I would be privileged to call my friends.  I don't usually enter big theological arguments.  It doesn't usually interest me.  But this time the greater debate (see: "health, wealth and prosperity gospel") (see also: "word of faith movement") touched a topic that is near and dear to the heart of all women everywhere... childbirth. Feelings are getting hurt and I want to weigh in.  I want to offer peace to a few hearts.

I do believe this woman's story.  I believe she experienced a pain free birth and it may very well have been because she was gifted by God with the ability to relax and trust Him through the birth process. She may have been able to speak with authority to her body and expel fear and other things that sometimes get in the way of a beautiful birth experience.  A few women do get the chance to experience birth as God originally intended in His original design.  We should rejoice with these women and not begrudge them their beautiful experience.  We need to give them freedom to be different from us.

However, my hope is that women who have this experience, will also give the rest of us freedom to be different in return.  Allow us to experience pain without judgement.  God doesn't promise anyone a pain free birth or a pain free life.  In fact, He says that we WILL share in His sufferings, at times, and He will comfort our hearts through the pain. (2 Corinthians 1:5-7)

I am reminded of the story of a friend.  She told me her first birth was relatively easy and she thought she was super good at this birth thing.  Her second baby brought another story.  The mind blowing pain forced her to new levels of surrender in her walk with God.  The pain was completely out of her control and God used this experience to bring her to a new level of dependence on Him. She has been gifted with the understanding that a great many things are completely out of our control. An inspiring story.  This is where I desire to be at all times: experiencing new levels of surrender to my Creator.

Then there is my own birth story...  I have a high pain tolerance and I went to the hospital all excited for natural labor, having read books and talked to many experienced women, I was totally prepared for a beautiful experience.  As it turned out, I labored in great pain for 24 hours.  Eventually my baby was in distress and I had a c-section.  During the c-section the doctor finally saw the hidden culprit. My bone structure was too narrow.  My baby girl would never have passed through.  200 years ago, before c-sections, both my baby and I would have died.  God's gift to some women is pain free labors.  God's gift to me is c-sections with painful recoveries that are every bit worth the sacrifice of love.  

On that day, and many days following, I had the privilege to say to my daughter, "this is my body, broken for you."

Can we pray for pain free experiences?  Certainly.  Often God is pleased to rescue us.  At other times, He will walk with us through the pain, easing our suffering by being right next to us, coaching us all the way through it.  Both the pain-free experience and the pain-filled experience have the potential for powerful beauty.

Homemaking - My Choice

As I said, there is a baby in this story...

Two nights before her delivery, I was awake at 4 am, sitting on a big blue exercise ball, trying to stay comfortable through contractions.  The following journal entry is what poured forth from my pen that night. This was the night I re-connected with my life as a homemaker in a deep way.

December 5, 2012 – 4:30 am

It’s in a moment like this that it becomes crystal clear to me that the life I have chosen for myself is exactly the one I believe is my personal calling.

The countercultural nature of my lifestyle has tempted me to insecurity many, many times.  I defend myself, I hide myself, or I try to compete with other people by rules that don’t apply to me, rules set by a very different lifestyle choice.

Tonight I am proud of my decisions and I vow never again to apologize for them or hide them.  I will celebrate this life.

I was a single woman with no job outside the home.  I was provided for financially by my father.  I learned the art of homemaking from my mother and I learned to care for children.  My time was free to pursue any project inside or outside the home to be productive.  Work was a value and laziness was not excused.  Yet this type of work was flexible.  I could put down a current project at a moment’s notice to serve other people, especially other women.  At 17 I spent 5 weeks in the home of a woman who just gave birth and was unusually sick.  Her husband was also sick and she had 6 children to manage.  I went to her side to help her for over a month.  This is only one example out of dozens where I was free to serve when others were tied down by careers.

If society does not create at least a certain percentage of women, like me, to do this type of work, who will do it?  A paid nanny or paid companion?  Few can financially afford such a luxury.  And will a nanny or companion, trained only in a classroom, be as good as a woman who lived and breathed this lifestyle from girlhood?

I’m married now.  I’ve been married for 12 years without children.  Part of the philosophy behind a life of homemaking and serving during my single years was to prepare me to be a wife and mother.  When I didn’t become a mother soon after marriage, I often lost perspective and wondered if I should have pursued a career to “stay busy.”  I could have had any job I wanted.  I was a smart child.  I could have gone to college to be a lawyer or a nurse or a business owner.  I had the brains for any of those options.  But that is not the life I chose.  At a young age, I saw the value of a homemaker and I embraced the training my parents and others were willing to give me.  I could blame my parents for “pushing me into this lifestyle,” but I can’t do that.  Plenty of other girls were encouraged by their parents to live the life of homemaking I was living and many girls chose not to go this route.  The choice was mine. 

I could have pursued a career and I might have enjoyed it very much.  But if I had pursued a career, I would not have been free to serve the people I have served as a married woman without children these last 12 years.  Tonight, my only regret is that I didn’t serve more people and make the most of the time.  I regret the times I spent feeling lost and useless and paralyzed.

I am about to have a baby.  I will still be able to live this life of homemaking and serving other women, but my time will be more limited than before.  I am now the woman in need rather than the woman who is free to go.

Tonight I am lonely.  I'm wishing there was a single woman in my community who would come and sit by my side as I go through the days and days and night after long night of childbirth pains that lead up to final labor… or even a married woman to at least sit with me during the day while our husbands are at work. 

Where are these women?

Our society has eliminated most of them.

Let me say that I fully support and applaud women who's heart's desire is to work outside the home with a vibrant career. I'm grateful we live in a day and age when women are respected and free to do so.  At this point, the problem isn't that women who want a career can't have one.  At this point, our challenge, as a culture, is to make sure women who chose homemaking feel equally productive and respected even though their productivity is measured differently than in the corporate world.

I want to end by saying thank you to Jaime and Amanda; two women who were there for me at the hospital during the most challenging moments of my entire life.  Jaime is a homemaker with 4 children.  Amanda is currently staying home with a 7 month old baby boy.  That night, these women embodied the true spirit of homemaking and women helping women.