Life As We Know It

Eight weeks...

Exactly eight weeks until our baby girl arrives! No, not in the mail or by stork. Just like the "proof is in the pudding," I can say, "the baby is in the belly." And you know, it's been all this time, but honestly - the impact of what is about to happen hasn't fully hit us yet. Everyone keeps saying this one distinctive phrase: "life as you know it is about to change." Duh. I'm not sure if they intend to say that to encourage us, or to let it loom ominously over our foreboding heads, but either way it's daunting. I think we are still dumbfounded in a way. I mean, we're not in denial or anything - we're super excited! But since it wasn't a planned pregnancy, I can say this: we are elated that this joy is coming into our lives, and we've dreamt of it for so long - yet at the same time, it's like the feelings we expected to feel haven't caught up to us yet. We've run really far ahead of them.

The antsy feeling waiting for the little blue + on the tester. The friends at our side to cheer our good news. The sheer feeling of intentionality with something so meaningful to us, something we wanted to get the conditions just right for...all these didn't happen. Nonetheless, I've realized that it probably never would have happened if we were waiting for all the "perfect" conditions. If we waited until everything lined up and fell into place as we envisioned it to, we would be childless for a long while! A great artist named Warren Barfield said it best in a song of his called The Right Time:

When we got the news, it was like God saying
"I knew better than to wait on you..."
If you're waiting for the right time
The right time will fly right by you
Always planning, never moving
Always praying, never doing
It ain't living if you're just spending your life
Waiting for the right time

Check out this amazing song on YouTube -

















Let me be clear: there's no stale taste in our mouth. How could there be, we're getting the one thing we've been preparing our hearts for since long before we entered adulthood - our prized and precious child. The fruit of our love. We've had absolutely no problem wrapping our heads around the who, what, where, and why- we've just had to adjust to the when of our little joy coming into our lives and the how we experienced the news vs. how we thought we would.

But you know what I've come to learn through this experience? Preconceived notions are overrated. I dreamed of being the perfect example of a Godly father, someone who listens to their children every time and executes sound judgement with wisdom and compassion. But from what other parents have told me, that's pretty unrealistic! Let me tell ya, I'm going to do my best to be that father, but much to my chagrin, I'm going to screw up sometimes. I know there may be times when I'll be frank with them when I should've listened. I know there may be times when I will need to assert my wisdom, but instead I will opt to leave things unsaid like a coward...or I may assert it too often and become the father no one listens to or respects.

That's the beauty of it all, though. No one has ever gotten fatherhood perfect but God himself. That's why one of his nicknames is "The Perfect Father." I'm glad I'm not trying to live up to the job description of "perfect father"- that's a lot of pressure! If I go into this expecting perfection out of myself, I will be sorely mistaken and end up disappointed in myself pretty quickly. One of my favorite bands, Shane and Shane, got it right in a recent song of theirs, The One You Need:

I wish that I could be your everything
Be the one to give you all the things you need
Sometimes I'm gonna let you down
But there's someone if you just believe
He'll be your hero like he's always been for me
Darling, Jesus is the one you need...

Check out this tear-jerker on YouTube --->

















The closer the time comes, the more I realize that God has been equipping both me and Jodi in very specific ways all our lives, and that my disillusioned expectations, if pandered to, will subtly set me up for some major insecurities. All I can hope to be is a Godly model of a father to my children and raise them to know Jesus for who he is. The rest is going to fluctuate with the circumstances, but I can resolve to be intentional about sharing my faith with them. I can be intentional about valuing their formation above the things that bite at my time. I can be intentional about raising them well, not trying to raise them perfectly. That's how people become resentful many times - from being raised in a home with unreal expectations, or none at all.

So if life as we know it is about to change, I can say without a doubt..."I'm ready." Not ready in the ways I thought I'd be, but who is? Who will ever be? I'm glad the goggles we see life through now is about to change. The way we define what "life" is. Life as we know it is about to be exchanged for a very different life...a very welcome other kind of life.