The Will of God...

...and other difficult things.
Last month, I read an article that has been HAUNTING me since  I read it.  It was about 'circumstantial infertility'.  The premise of the article was that just as some women expect to have children within their marriage and deal with the difficult reality of not being able to have biological children, there are even still a greater number of women who thought that they would be married/have children and have not found their spouse.  Each year that goes by, brings them closer to the reality that they might not have children.  The article spoke to the reality of  how that is a form of infertility as well.  Was the article insensitive to those that toil with their husbands day in and day out trying to ride the crazy ride which is fertility treatments, or did it speak to something greater.  For some reason, I keep going back to it, and so I decided a blog post was in order.

When I was a little girl, I was certain I would be married by 18 (most of this certainty had to do with being positive the world would end in 2000).  I remember calculating when I would meet my spouse, when we would have kids, etc...As my early twenties came and went and my mid twenties came and went, I began to toil with the reality that I might never be married.  If you know the story, I went to the Holy Land, prayed for peace or a spouse, came back and 3 weeks later got the spouse and 1.5 years later had the spouse and child.  But, what if it would have gone differently.  What if I had prayed, so sincerely, and God's answer was, 'no' or 'not now'.  What if I was not called to married life?  Where would I be right now if I hadn't met Aaron, if we hadn't had a child?  Would I have been able to be at peace with the Will of God in my life.

Right now, I have friends/family who are married and wish they weren't.  Who are single and wish they could find someone.  I have friends/family who have children and wish they didn't have so many.  Who can't have children and desperately want them.  I have friends/family who have one or two children and want more.  It seems like we are often times wanting what we can't have.  And there is often so much heartbreak involved.  Had I not found Aaron, would I be able to be content with the fact that the Will of God might be that I was not married?  If we had not had little Aaron, would I have been able to be content with the fact that I am called to motherhood in other ways?  If we do not have any more children, will I be happy that I was blessed with one? If I can't stop having babies and it breaks us financially/emotionally/etc..., will I be content that God is leading our family through the gift of life?

These questions are all hard to answer.  But, as I get older, I am realizing more and more that life is much easier if you choose to trust God with what He is doing in your life.  BTW- I don't think the 'blame' lies with God alone.  If your single and want to get married, what are you doing to make yourself available?  If you are married and miserable, what are you doing to get help?  If you can't have children biologically, maybe God has one for you planned out perfectly through adoption.  If you can't stop having babies, maybe you need to be more discipline about NFP.  I get all those things.  We have to meet God half way, but when we have, and we still end up living a life or part of a life that we didn't expect, how gracefully do we except it?  How gracefully did I accept it (not very gracefully) how gracefully will I accept tricky things in the future (probably not gracefully).

In these ponderings, I have come to the conclusion that the bottom line is that we have to TRUST.  Trust when it is difficult.  Trust, when we don't want to.  If we have a God that loves us, we must trust him with all things and TRUST that he is moving in them.  Trust him in our married life/single life.  Trust him in our fertility or lack there of.  Trust that he is pouring his love upon us, even in the crosses that we carry...

These are things I am pondering today- thoughts?