Secrets

I am taking my first ever Beth Moore Bible study.  I’m pretty sure that means I’m officially a Baptist woman.  I feel like there should be a ceremony of some sort to mark this officious occasion.  I told my friend this was my first study and she was amazed and somewhat impressed that this was my first time.  I believe there was a joke about virgins after that. 

Anyway, that wasn’t the point of this post.  The point is that I am taking this study called Secrets and it’s really good.  I’m learning quite a bit.  Last Sunday we were doing part three and, as so often happens seems to happen all the confounded time, part of the lesson focused on pregnancy and motherhood.  I didn’t realize until pregnancy became a touchy subject for me just HOW MANY times it comes up at church.  The scripture Beth (cause we’re tight now, so I can totally just use her first name) was using is familiar.  It’s from Psalm 139:

¹³ For you created my inmost being;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
    your works are wonderful,
    I know that full well.
¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you
    when I was made in the secret place,
    when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw my unformed body;
    all the days ordained for me were written in your book
    before one of them came to be. (emphasis added)

One of the costs of infertility and of adoption is that you have very few secrets left.  My body has been exposed for numerous doctors and nurses to poke and speculate on.  My entire life has been laid bare for Bethany to inspect.  On top of that, I try to be very open to all of you guys about every step of this journey because I want it to have worth.  If someone else can feel camaraderie because of it, then I’ve achieved my goal.  So I’m thinking all of this while I’m listening to the lesson and I’m feeling a little sad and very exposed.  I’m feeling a little sad too because there is no secret life nestled in my womb and that sadness doesn’t just evaporate because we are filling out adoption stuff.

Then it hit me, and I have to say that it must have been God inspired, that God still sees my baby “in the secret place”.  And really that’s what matters.  Even with all of the openness that adoption requires, my baby is a secret being held by God.  Eventually, we’ll all get in on the secret, birthparents, adoption counselors, and Josh and me, but right now God is writing out the days of our child in His book.  How cool is that?!  And how comforting to realize that even when this whole process feels very out of my control, God’s like “I’ve got this.  I see into all the secret places in your heart and the secret place where your child is growing.  So lean in close, my precious daughter, and let Me tell you a secret.”