Faith Through the Journey

Tonight I was looking at pictures of our three children. They are adults now, amazing people in their own right. My husband and I are incredibly proud of them and so grateful that they are in our lives. There were people in the medical field who believed that it was best, for my present and future health, not to have children.  In our minds, we found that “advice” to be unthinkable. From the early days of our relationship, my husband and I wanted children and, during the years I was in remission from the Crohn’s Disease, there was no reason for us (at least in our minds) not to have children. By the grace of God, I was able to deliver three healthy children; in fact, I was extremely healthy during those pregnancies. Our third child was born after my first surgery, the one where at least one of my doctors thought I should have a tubal ligation. In faith we had our third child 2 years later, and what a blessing she has been to us. She has looked into the faces of children in the Bahamas and Kenya,  Africa as part of a missions team, and I wonder what their lives would be like if she had not been contact with them. In the same way, our older two children have touched many lives, and I know their spouses cannot imagine their lives without them! The joy of watching them grow up and make contributions to the world cannot be measured.  More than once I have asked God to give them a healthy mom, one who would not be constantly ill and who could always be available to them for whatever their needs were.

And yet, as much as I worried that their childhoods would be marred by having a sick mom, I “forgot” that God was able to use my illness  to do a work in their lives as well. They have learned compassion for others, faith to trust God to take care of them whether I was with them or in the hospital, and they have learned to pray in every circumstance, confident that God would hear and answer them whether they liked His answers or not! Having three wonderful, smart, caring children is a blessing that cannot be measured. We are SO glad that we didn’t  listen to doctors who encouraged not to have our lives “complicated” by raising children! They are our greatest legacy, for they will touch the lives of people that we will never see.