Living in the "Now"

I must admit that I have a problem with focusing on 'now.' I couldn't wait to graduate from high school, and go to college. Then when I went to college, I couldn't wait to get married. When we were married, I couldn't wait to finish school and start a family. Now that I'm pregnant, I'm already looking forward to the next one.

Of course, it is good to anticipate joys in our lives. But I have far too often pushed aside today in my eagerness for some coming event. I am called to glorify God with my living every day, not just with big decisions and big events. My focus was misplaced as I finished high school, came to college, and got married. I should have been seeking to glorify God and enjoy the moments of the phase I was currently in. I truly have been trying to take this lesson to heart with this current season in my life.

Today, my husband and I celebrate an anniversary of sorts-- 7 years ago today he asked me to be his girlfriend. We have spent 7 years being able to spend as much time as we'd like focusing on each other in our relationship. But in 3 months, that is going to change when we bring baby Abel, our first born, home to join our family. As eager as I am for that little one to join us, I am focusing each day on soaking up one on one time with my precious husband. This pregnancy has flown by! I want to be sure I don't miss the wonderful times in this season in my hurry to prepare for and look forward to the next. This re-focusing has made this time alone with my husband so sweet, instead of a time of anxiety.

This lesson is one I am trying to apply to my life in a different way, too. As I mentioned before, Reed and I are planning on moving to Kentucky in less than a year so he can attend Seminary (Lord willing). Knowing that I have such a short time left here in Lynchburg tempts me to close off my heart to those here I love. Since I know I am leaving, why pour into those friendships? Why join another group at church, another study? We're just going to leave, and the more relationships we make, the harder it will be to go. I am already truly heartbroken that we're leaving, why make it worse?

But I can't focus on next year. I am here, Reed is here, because the Lord would have us here now. We are seeking to glorify God wherever we go, whenever He places us there. Since we are in Lynchburg, I am opening my heart to friends here so that we can learn and grow from each other. When we move to Kentucky, we will probably only live there as long as it takes Reed to finish school. But I sure hope to build relationships, pour into the local body of believers, grow and make friendships in those 4 short years. How sad and miserable (not to mention un-Biblical) my life would be if I waited until I thought we'd 'arrived' in life to settle down, make friends, and build relationships.

When we began building a new (precious) friendship here in Lynchburg recently, our new friends jokingly said to Reed and I, "Let's start hanging out a lot, so we'll be really sad when you leave." Every time I think of that, it makes me smile and it makes me sad. But I am willing to be sad when we move to enjoy a godly friendship now!

Each day we have is a gift from God, and I truly hope that I act like that is true. I do not want to fast forward through today just to get to an exciting event, or live my life like I'm just killing time until we arrive at some perfect life circumstance.

Kerr Baby #2

I am joyous to announce that on Monday, Reed and I found out we are pregnant again! We are so happy that it only took three months since loosing Moriah to conceive again, though at the time it felt like an eternity! We are so very excited, though we are certainly aware of the difficulties that lay ahead due to my clotting condition. For the curious, for our first born boy and girl, we are still going with one of the names we picked out before, either Abel Kenneth or Michaela Reed.

I have already begun my Lovenox injections nightly and am already bruised all over, like in the picture from my previous post. Small price to pay. I have my first appointment tomorrow (high risk pregnancies can't wait the typical 8-10 weeks to go in) and I am eager to hear what the doctor has to say. As for my best guess, baby Kerr is due February 5 but I have recently switched OB/GYN's and she wants to induce about 2 weeks early--- Unless baby experiences intrauterine growth restriction, another negative side effect of my clotting disorder that would cause the induction to be moved up.

Please be praying with us. Obviously we hope that this child will be our first of many to hold, but ultimately we desire for God's will to be done.

Trying to Conceive

God has been teaching Reed and I so much in these past weeks. It is wonderful to me how God can use one lesson to teach so many different things to my heart. We have gone from trying to praise God through our storm, to knowing and trusting it was all for His glory, then realizing His will is greater than ours. This last lesson is the one I am currently still growing in; acknowledging that God is Lord and I am not is a hard lesson learned for a selfish sinner such as myself.

I find myself thinking about having a baby in the back of my head, this interior monologue that plays throughout my day. "Am I pregnant now? Will I be this month? If I am, when will the baby be born? Will there be complications? Will we lose the next one, too?" I have justified this constant parade of baby-thoughts because I feel that this is now my role in life, to have children, and since it is not going according to my plans, I am trying to plan even more. But no matter how I try to hide what my feelings truly are, I must be honest with myself: my thoughts during the day are nothing more than worry and attempts at control.

This is sin! In Matthew 6:24, the Bible says "Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." Worrying about tomorrow does nothing but try to take control out of God's hands. By worrying or planning, I will not change a thing. Proverbs 20:24 says, "A man’s steps are from the LORD; how then can man understand his way?"

Not only should I not worry, and not try to over-plan my life, I need to rejoice in the truth that God's knows not only what is best for me, but for His glory! God is an all-knowing God, He alone knows why I am not pregnant. Maybe there is a lesson He wants me to see, a sin I must overcome. Maybe I would become violently ill when pregnant (like my Mom did) and would have to stop working. Maybe we're going to have triplets and we need to save up money first. Maybe He wants us to adopt all of our children and is teaching us patience first. It is not my place to know! My job here is to step out in faith, and trust in the Lord to do what is right.

The purpose of my life is to bring God glory while I am here on earth, and to obey Him in all I do. If the reason I want children is to glorify the Lord, and He would have something else for me in my life right now, than children must not be how He wants glory right now! I do not want my children, before they are even born, to become idols in my heart. God is first; if my heart truly wants children for selfless reasons, then I will be happy to surrender parenthood for God.

I need to step back, and not allow 'trying to conceive' to become my identity. That is not who I am, but a part of it. I will continue to follow my husband's lead and try to start a family unless God makes it obvious that He has some other plan for us. But I will no longer allow a month to feel pointless and wasted if I did not get pregnant. My desire is for Christ, and His best for me, not my best for me.

Psalm 37:4 says, "Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." This verse is not saying that God will give me want I want if I love Him, but that if I love Him, my desires and His will be one in the same. If that is true of my heart, than my desires and Christ's will be one in the same.

Lord, have me desire what it is that YOU want for my life. Allow me to use this time in my life to serve You and others in ways I will not be able to if you bless us with many children. Teach Reed and I what it is we are to learn, and continue to conform our hearts to Yours.

To God be the Glory

Genesis 22:12 "now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me."

Last Friday, March 13, I began experiencing some bleeding. After calling my doctor, going in for an ultrasound with Reed, and waiting for what felt like an eternity in the exam room, the nurse confirmed that we had lost our little baby at 6 weeks 3 days. A deep wealth of sadness, disappointment, and disbelief swelled up in and poured out from our hearts that moment and the hours afterwards. Through tears, Reed and I named our little one Moriah, after the land Abraham went to sacrifice his only son Isaac to demonstrate his loyalty to the one true God above all else. (Read the story here) We mourned for the little one lost, and for our sudden change of plans as we so hope to become parents.

Isaiah 41:10 "Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand."

Since that first day, God has done an amazing work on the hearts of my husband and I. We truly understand that for whatever reason, this was not the child the Lord wanted for us to have as part of our earthly family. We know the loss of our Moriah glorified God because He allowed it to happen, and for that we are thankful. Reed and I desire for our lives to be a living sacrifice to Him, for His glory, and to whatever end He desires. Because of this, not only do we know in our heads that loosing our baby was for the best, but we also rejoice in our hearts that He is glorified above all else. We not only accept it as God's will, but we eagerly pursue it, even if that means putting our own ideas of 'what's best' aside.

Not only has God used this an an opportunity to grow us closer to Him, He has also used it as an opportunity to mature the relationship between Reed and I. We have felt such a strong bond between each other through this, and have been drawing strength from the other's faith in God. To hear my husband's prayers for me, for our future family, and for our healing from this has been such a balm to my spirit. I find myself pausing more and more often to thank the Lord for such a godly, selfless, devoted, and caring lover and friend.

Psalm 16:8 "I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand I shall not be shaken."

So now we begin the journey again, because waiting longer to mourn Moriah will not take away the ache in our hearts, or fulfill our dream of becoming parents. From the very beginning, we are laying our desires down as a sacrifice to the Lord and we recognize now more than ever that our future is in His hands. My doctor told us that we do not need to wait 3 cycles to try again, as was previously believed, but that as soon as my hCG (pregnancy hormone produced by the placenta) is down to zero we can try again. We are praying that this will be next week; I go in for more blood testing Monday.

I feel less innocent going into the trying/pregnancy cycle this time around, I now have experienced what happens when a pregnancy does not go full term. I am praying that I can relax, and depend on the Lord, knowing He is in control of it all. Whatever He wills to happen will be so, no matter how much I plan or worry.

The unique mixture of joy and trial, faithfullness and testing that Reed and I feel is captured in these verses:

1 Peter 1:6-9 "In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls."

Happy Valentine's Day

If all someone knows about me is the life and death of my Savior, and the reputation of my Godly husband, then I am pleased.

I am blessed to be the daughter of the Savior, and honored to bear my husband's name.

Lord, thank you for enabling us to know love, in that you loved us first. For being the example of selfless, unconditional love, and of sacrifice. Thank you for giving me the love and devotion of a husband who strives to love me like You do. I pray that I willingly, humbly, and wholeheartedly submit to my husband, as to the Lord.

Happy Valentine's Day! I love you, Reed.

1 John 4:19 "We love because He first loved us."

Romans 5:8 "but God showed His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

Ephesians 5:25 "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her"

Ephesians 5:22 "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord"

Mere Christianity

Reading is one of my favorite hobbies, one that was pushed aside for a while. Getting caught up in the business of life made me loose time for the things I enjoy-- like reading! Since I have gotten back in the habit, (though trying to fit in school work does cut in on the amount of reading I'd like to be doing) I've decided that after each book, I will post on the passage from that book that was the most meaningful to me.

The book: Mere Christianity
Author: C. S. Lewis

From chapter 3: Social Morality

"In the passage where the New Testament says that everyone must work, it gives as a reason 'in order that he may have something to give to those in need.' Charity- giving to the poor, is an essential part of Christian morality: in the frightening parable of the sheep and the goats it seems to be the point on which everything turns. Some people nowadays say that charity ought to be unnecessary and that instead of giving to the poor we ought to be producing a society in which there were no poor to give to. They may be right in saying that we ought to produce this kind of society. But if anyone thinks that, as a consequence, you can stop giving in th meantime, then he has parted company with all Christian morality. I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I am afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare. In other words, if our expenditure on comfort, luxuries, amusements, etc, is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, we are probably giving away too little. If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charities expenditure excludes them." (emphasis mine)

I think that the principle of Christian charity is something that has the potential to make Christians very uncomfortable. It is so easy to say you love your neighbor, but when it comes down to showing that love in a real and tangible way, are you willing to sacrifice your comfort? We live in a culture that is obsessed with self gratification. Lewis said that if we're living the same way as others with similar income, we're not giving enough! Is your standard measured by others around you? Or do you measure yourself by Christ's example, who served with everything he had? It is so easy to write a check to the church every week, or donate to a charity at Christmas, but where is your heart? If your brother needs something you have, will you give it to him to make him more comfortable than yourself? If we are called to love enough that we would lay our lives down for our friends (John 15:13) shouldn't it be understood that He also expects us to give our time and our resources?

1 John 3:16-18 has been particularly convicting for me recently:
"By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth."

You may not feel like you have 'the world's goods' but you surely have more than someone else. Let our love for each other be evidenced by action, and not 'in word or talk.'

Preparing

Now that dh and I have been married for nearly two years, and are nearly finished with school, we no longer see any reason to postpone the addition of children to our family. We have arrived at this decision after much prayer, discussion, and consideration! Obviously, there will never be any 'perfect' time to have a child because life is alway crazy, finances can change any time, and trials are always right around the corner. But we both see children as a blessing and feel that waiting any longer, for us, would be a selfish reason at the core: wanting to further our careers, buy a house first, find financial 'stability.' But this wasn't a 'pros' vs. 'cons' decision, we both love children and are very excited about having our own! I have always wanted to be a SAHM, and recently have felt even more like that is my responsibility as a Christian wife, but it would be difficult without kids of our own :)

We have always known that this would be a difficult journey for us, as I hinted to in my first post when I said I would track our 'trials' in this area. I have the blood clotting disorder Anti-Phospholipid Syndrome (http://www.apsfa.org/aps.htm ) which causes my blood to clot. I had a clot in my lungs when I was 15 after a broken leg, which caused the discovery of my APS. Since I found out that I have APS, I've known that I am at risk for pregnancy complications, the most devastating being miscarriage. My primary physician recommended that I see an OB before we even start TTC.

A few weeks ago I had my first appointment. I was surprised to find that my doctor was very positive about this future pregnancy, because I had read many intimidating things that other women with APS had gone through. This is what I learned from my first appointment:

• I will need to be on self-injected Lovenox before we even start TTC because I have a history of APS, and I've already had a clot
  
• I will need to be induced a little early (around 39 weeks) so that the doctors can make sure I have no blood thinning agents in my blood (Lovenox/ asprin) during the delivery
• If I go into labor before they induce, an emergency c-section would be very dangerous, and I would not have the option of an epidural
• For 6 weeks after having the baby, I myself will be at a high risk for clots. So, I will continue to give myself injections for 6 weeks after the birth to prevent one.
  

I see my hematologist next week and will be able to make sure he is on the same page as my OB.

Please pray as we begin this journey. Dh and I are comforted that we know the One who is in control of all of this, and that He already knows our future!

December 31, 2007

I wrote this post 2 days after my (step) Dad Mike died on New Year's Eve last year. It was originally posted to another blog, but I wanted to share it here, as well.

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For those of you who know my family, you know the history of health problems my (step)dad Mike had. For over 10 years, he has fought cancer, gone through a bone marrow transplant, fought graft vs. host disease, was listed for a lung transplant, diagnosed as having a failing heart, kidneys, and liver, diagnosed with melanoma, and finally had 2 heart attacks.

This past weekend, I received a call from my mom saying that Mike wasn't doing well, and had to be rushed to the hospital. Reed and I were there by Sunday, and spent the night with Mike in the hospital, who was on a respirator at this point, so that my mom (who had a fever of 102) could go home to get some rest. After an exhausting night, the next day my mom came back, we (my mom, Reed, and I) decided to take Mike off of the respirator. He struggled with a lot of pain and discomfort over the weekend, and had expressed that he was aware that death was near in the past few months, because he knew that the fight was coming to an end. At this point in his fight, there was no hope for him to recover, due to the melanoma, his lungs in such terrible condition, and a myriad of other problems. He never would have survived off of the respirator, and died a few minutes after we turned it off.

He was surrounded by family and friends. I was there, and I have never been through a weekend so mentally, physically, spiritually, and emotionally exhausting. But, I know that my family did the right thing.

While this is an extremely difficult time for my family, we are fully aware of where Mike is. Jesus says "Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life." (John 5:24)

While we miss him, terribly, we miss him out of selfishness. We miss him for our own sakes, as a father and husband. But we know that while he was living, he was in constant pain, particularly struggling this last weekend. We also know that he is in Heaven now, in the company of our Savior, and the pain he experienced here pales in comparison to the life he is living now. My family is far happier that he is pain free, enjoying the glory of God in heaven, than sad because we miss him. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 says "Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope."

Thanks be to God who gives us hope! By believing in the life, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, my dad has entered into eternal glory. I know that one day I will be joining him, because Christ is my savior as well. This world is so temporary, and that fact was really brought to my attention this weekend. If we are not living to bring praises to God, then what is the point?

Death is not the exception, life is. Thank you God, for giving us life, and I pray that we will live it for You.