Born Anew

 I'm not sure why, but the first weeks of living with a newborn are rarely documented it seems, and when asking those who have parented and now have grown kids they vaguely remember the first few weeks. We've had an incredibly easy baby, one that generally wants to eat every 2.5-4 hours, enjoys cuddles, has hiccups, and only really cries when she's hungry or wet.  After hearing stories of babies that would cry 18 hours a day for the first year of their lives, I wonder how we got this lucky. 

There are certain things we were very purposeful about doing in the early parts of the pregnancy, like talking to her as if she was there. We frequently read her stories from the bible, and addressed her by the name that we felt was hers. We would have a daily ritual where just before going to bed we would tell her about what the day was like, and talk about people we met, meals we had, what mom was up to, and what I was up to. Even though these things seemed mundane, there was often a positive response felt. I would ask her questions and feel with my spirit what she needed. Mom would rub her belly affectionately, especially when it started growing to the point of feeling the baby in the womb, and the kicks got more intense around the ribs. I frequently blessed her with what I felt were things Abba wanted me to bless her with, and other than that, just eating normally (except no onions), there weren't really any drastic things that took hours and hours of time. 

The labor wasn't easy when the time came. I tried to hold Evelinn's knee's for the contractions, but they started at around 9pm and went until 3am. I tapped out around 11pm when she got a small dose of morphine. Elizah Sophia was born at 3:15am, and when she came out we had to cut the umbilical cord fairly quickly because she didn't give her first cries. We took her into the next room while the medical staff took care of mom and the delivery of the placenta, and they rubbed her back with a towel and then baby cried. She then went to sleep soon after and slept pretty easily for the first day, and then had her first feeding sometime later. Now we're in the first couple of weeks of her life, and there are the poops, the pees, and the pukes. Other than that, she still sleeps the majority of the day. She started getting about 6 hours of non-stop sleep during the nights at the end of last week and has kept that pattern up. 

We haven't done a whole lot, and when she sleeps she spends a good majority of that time in her nest. So mom and I and a lot of downtimes just to spend chatting with people, watching tv, reading, writing this blog post, and a few other things. I think everybody hopes for an easy baby, and maybe they'll draw this up to luck. I think there's more to do with it than that.

Why, I wonder? - a representative of one

 When I was a kid we were taught the six 'W' questions to ask to get all the information for a paper. "What", "who", "when", "where", "why", and "how". Now, I enjoy these questions, and I would say that they are ordered from easiest to hardest to answer. Of course, there's a lot more one can say about each question, and great studies have been done about what each word really entails. However, I will be writing about 'Why?' here. This is a question that when put into a religious context, or even in the context of relating to God, I believe is rarely answered, or when it is answered - even correctly - the answer is almost always rejected or unseen. "Why did God allow the crusades?", "Why did God put me in a family where I'd be abused and rejected?", and "Why is He so judgmental in the Old Testament, and so merciful in the New Testament?" - to put a few of the questions that I've heard most often out there. Frankly, these questions are only truly relevant to our culture that has been programmed to hate war, condemn judgment, and celebrate victimization. 

Let me put the frame of Jeremiah onto this post, and lead you into seeing through the lenses of a common jew. We see Jeremiah, throughout the book, prophesying that God will utterly destroy Jerusalem. (34:2) Thus saith the LORD, the God of Israel; Go and speak to Zedekiah king of Judah, and tell him, Thus saith the LORD; Behold, I will give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire. Why was the Lord destroying Jerusalem? Well, Jeremiah knew this very well, but the Israelites were in utter denial. There were false prophets in almost every other chapter saying that there will be peace! It was partly because the people were putting their faith in the false prophet's words that there had to be destruction, and partly because they had been following idols since the times of Isaiah and all the way back to their time in Egypt (with a few exceptions). 

Jeremiah definitely had a few questions of his own (15:18) Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuseth to be healed? wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar, and as waters that fail? He was confused and had very much been feeling the pain of abandonment from the Lord whom he was serving. Why though? Well, looking at it through the pattern of how God has dealt with people through history, He rarely judges just an individual, but instead deals with people as societies, and communities. Of course, there are generational curses because of certain private dealings, but for the most part, Jeremiah was caught in the crossfire. Better yet, God has purposed that Jeremiah would go through this pain with his own people. 

Being faithful to God doesn't protect us from pain. If anything, it increases the amount of pain that we will go through. We can take the perspective of the common jew and ask "will you always be lying to me?", but realize that God never promised to keep you from pain. He promised to give you His peace that surpasses all understanding. Only with that peace, and joy can we go through the pains of life fruitfully.