Both of my sister-in-laws are pregnant for the very first time and both of their babies are due in early September.
Both walk around with their skinny frames and bulging bellies and both are content to spend the day feeling their very own baby move around inside of them.
Both have been given a span of nine months to develop a connection with the little person who belongs to them and at the same time prepare to become a full-time nurturer once that little person comes into the world.
If there is one thing I’ve noticed since my sister-in-laws became pregnant, it’s that the process of pregnancy is beautifully mysterious. Our Creator knows how overwhelming it would be to one day be a woman and the next become a mother, so he designed a period of time in which a woman becomes a mother one step at a time, until eventually, she is more than ready to deliver her child and experience the depths and riches of motherhood.
Like my sister-in-laws, I too have been experiencing a period of “pregnancy.”
No, no, I am not pregnant with a baby, nor will that be happening anytime soon. However, for the past year God has been pushing me through labor pains, preparing me for the birth of a dream that is also due in September.
For the last year I have been experiencing some intense labor pains. On July 15th, 2013, I was boarding a plane that would take me across the world to Australia. There, I was tested, stretched, healed, and blessed for four wonderful months, which prepared me for the final semester of my university studies and set me up on a new course for my future. During my final semester, I was further equipped with an understanding of who it is that created me and what is I have been created to do. This period of my “pregnancy” made it clear that I must answer God’s call to join the World Race as a missionary for eleven moths.
After a year of labor pains, on July 15th 2014 I will be in the middle of my training for the World Race and I will finally begin giving birth to the most incredible opportunity God could have given me for my post-grad future.
I do not know if every day on the field will be easy and painless, but I do know that every day will be worth it, and every day I will be exactly where I am meant to be. Just like my sister-in-laws, who will continue learning what it means to be a mother after their babies are born, I too will continue learning what it means to be a World Racer once my journey begins. Along the way there will be hiccups and burps, but all these will help me grow into the woman God has destined me to be, enabling me to proceed along the powerful path he has been planning all along. Perhaps God will even take me on another year of labor pains as he impregnates me with a new dream sprouting from the World Race.
Whatever may come, I know that my labor is not in vain. May I always be pregnant with the work of the Lord!
