Dealing with infertility is hard. Each month that brings another cycle also brings moments of tears, pain, frustration and questioning. For someone who believes in the sovereignty and providence of God this is especially difficult because the question that ultimately comes is “why God”. If God is the giver of life and is capable of the indescribable, why would He choose to not bless us with children? Through the last 4 years this question has evolved from “Why God are you not coming through” to “I do not understand your ways but I trust you anyway”. I have been brought to my knees several times in tears because of my lack of understanding; why God would continue to hide His face to our requests. This feeling was even worse when we came to the decision that we would no longer pursue fertility treatment. We had given up and were told our chance of getting pregnant was less than 5%. No words could ever describe the moment when this decision is made. Crying over the hopelessness that this isn’t for you yet still trusting that God knows best is a scenario that I will never forget.

Each time I question Him I also am broken in another way. Who am I that I feel bold enough to question the one who is so much more powerful, wise, and loving that I could ever be? I have felt humbled as if standing with Job being chastised by God Himself.

“Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand. Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it? On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone—while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy”?

See, who am I to question Him? How can one with limited wisdom, knowledge, strength, finite in time, and considered just a vapor in the wind question someone with such immensity not even the entire universe can contain Him? Here is the realization I have come to. Even if my wife and I are never gifted with a baby, God knows exactly what He is doing and just because of who He is that He is afforded all the praise and worship I can muster no matter what the situation He leads us to. Ultimately, even in the harshest of times, by praising His name, I know it is Him who is glorified. What more could I want from this life? If every breath I breathe and moment I live is defined by giving Him glory, then no circumstance I find myself in will ever be able to rob me of the joy only He can provide. This kind of worship and praise is possible in any situation, in the midst of a jail cell, in the middle of an ER trauma, in the midst of death, or while struggling with infertility.

But even in a jail cell, bars are loosed and opened thanks to prayer. When His children are diligent in prayer and submission God will ALWAYS come through in surprising and sometimes unexpected ways when their trust is in Him. I can’t imagine how Moses felt with a vast sea before him and an insurmountable army to his back. What would have gone through his head as he headed to the water not sure what God had in store but believing something was going to happen. What did he do or say when he saw the waters part that allowed his people walk to safety on dry land? How much praise filled his heart seeing that God, once again came through! When all things seemed lost or hopeless, when we are at the end of ourselves and feel there is no way, this is when God comes through. When He does come through our worship to Him is even sweeter!

The hand of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?”

I said, “Sovereign Lord, you alone know”. (Ez 37 1:1-3)

Only God can know if something that was once viewed as desolate could produce life. But once He does the evidence of His power is undeniable. Today I am humbled that He has chosen my wife and I as living examples of how magnificent His power is. To be chosen to show how life can be produced through even the most unbelievable of circumstances is astounding. I can not help but praise Him for allowing us to show the world that even when all seems lost, when we trust Him, this is not the case. With Christ there is no such thing as impossible

How sweet is the worship that comes from our mouth when a result is, of no doubt, from Him? Going from the point of giving up and realizing that getting pregnant is not based on anything we can do to being blessed with such a miracle is a journey that has ended with praise and adoration toward the author of life. God is the only one that can bring life out of despair and through such a long season of barrenness. It is only through Him that life is able to overcome!

Because of Christ, the author of life, there is now new life growing inside my wife’s womb! Because of His timing her womb has gone from empty to full! When all seems lost in our view He is still able to overcome. Through God alone my wife is able to joyfully declare her pregnancy with a joy that seems to have no compare.

Nothing is more beautiful than when a husband can celebrate with his wife by exclaiming… “rejoice because [God] rescued me. No one is holy like the Lord! There is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God. (1Sam 2:1-2).

I see my soul singing the praises first written by David

God hear my cry pay attention to my prayer. I call to You from the ends of the earth when my heart is without strength. Lead me to a rock that is high above me, for You have been a refuge for me, a strong tower in the face of the enemy.

When I was at the end of myself, to the ends of the earth, when my heart was without strength from nights crying with my wife, I remember who my rock, in the past, has been. To him I turn, and it is because of Him that my enemy of uncertainty, despair, and hopelessness have been defeated! It is because of him that I can sing His praise as I have never have before. It is through His goodness and for His reputation that life will always and forever have its victory over hopelessness, despair, uncertainty, fear, and ultimately death.

After so much anguish, tears, and shared heartache with my wife over the idea of fertility with the questions and doubt this brings toward a Holy yet merciful God, our tears of despair have been turned to tears of unbridled joy! This is only possible because of the one who is able to bring forth life from any situation.

For part 1 follow the link