Thank you to Family Shield Ministries and Kay Meyer for covering the topic of barrenness and He Remembers the Barren on the “Family Shield” radio program yesterday afternoon. I hope you’ll have a listen, too.
Click here for a direct link to the program’s MP3 file.
Or, if you would like to learn more about Family Shield Ministries, please click here.
In a world that tells me I can “have it all,” it is quite hard to accept the fact that God may not have a houseful of children planned for me. I’ve wanted that since I was young. As a little girl, I saw lots of moms with their children. I saw the joy reflected in the faces of mothers and their children as they interacted with each other. Motherhood seemed to be a happy time.
The truth is that I don’t always get what I want. As a young, married woman, I saw that I was not receiving a quiver full of children. Without lots of children surrounding my table, how was I going to be happy? Thus began a struggle to “have it all.” I had forgotten that God provides what I need, and He knows what is best for my eternal good. God provides abundant blessings to all of His children, whether single or married. God’s sons and daughters receive the forgiveness of their sins and eternal life and so much more. Those blessings can only be good gifts.
I never imagined that barrenness would be part of my vocabulary. I never dreamed that it would be part of my life. To hear the word “barren” would conjure up visions of darkness, loneliness, and lack of hope. What a wrong picture that was. God’s blessings abound for the Christian, barren woman. She is a baptized child of Christ. The Lord is with her always. He grants to her the forgiveness of sins and so much more.
The Lord, in His mercy, has granted me a loving spouse and a dear daughter. I know that I gain nothing by trying to control my own fertility, or by coveting the children that have been given to others. I have learned to rejoice in the blessings that have been given to me, and that has helped me to be content.
If my source of contentment is myself, then my world will constantly make me unhappy. I am a sinner, and my feelings will often lead me to pity myself, to covet the gifts others have received, and to be angry at God. None of that could ever lead to happiness because it is subjective. There will be no contentment for me when I focus on my selfishness. Things go wrong. My life is not always a happy place. If I’m going to trust contentment to come from within me, then I’m going to be sad nearly all of the time. There is suffering in this world, and Satan uses suffering to lead us to despair. He tells me that my barrenness is what’s giving me sorrow. If I can find some way to “fix” my barrenness, then I will be happy. If I have one child, then I will be happy. If I have another child, then maybe I’ll be happy. To that, I say, “Satan, be gone!” Barrenness is a cross to bear, but Jesus Christ has borne my sins and sorrows for me and gives me Himself.
True contentment can only come from outside myself. Jesus Christ is the only true source of peace. Thus, being content does not always mean that I will be happy. And thanks be to God that my contentment does not rely on me. There will continue to be times of sorrow throughout my life. I have pain and trouble; I don’t always feel happy. Thank God that my faith in Him does not depend on my feelings. I know with 100% certainty that I am saved from myself through the blood of Jesus. Because of His grace and mercy, I can go to sleep in peace. My world is filled with troubles, but I know that I rest in the arms of Jesus. There is no safer place to be, for it is in Him alone that I have complete comfort. I am at peace in Christ alone.
Question Submitted: Could you recommend a book that would be helpful for my husband? He feels immense guilt and sadness about our inability to have children. I know there are books geared towards women, but I don’t know of any that are geared towards men.
As a barren husband myself, I wish that I knew of a book or article out there that addressed this topic for men. From what I’ve been able to discover, though, there is little if anything out there that seeks to provide comfort to barren men. That being said, I do think that many men would benefit from reading Katie’s book. Yes, there are sections of it that speak much more to the specific grief and pain that the barren woman feels, yet many of the feelings of loss, abandonment, and loneliness are shared by both husband and wife. He Remembers the Barren helps to point each of us back to our abundant worth as children of God.
I’ve also found that studying the Lutheran (Scriptural, really) doctrine of vocation has been beneficial in my personal struggles with feelings of helplessness and of having let my wife down. For the general reader, Gene Veith’s God at Work is the go-to text for learning about this doctrine of vocation. Through vocation, we Christians gain a tremendous comfort in knowing that the things we’re doing in our lives, as well as being able to identify who our neighbors are in life, are all providential gifts of God. He intends for us to serve our neighbor in many and various ways, and He uses us as his “masks” in order to serve them. We find comfort in seeing God’s will concretely revealed for us in the exact circumstances in which we find ourselves.
In fact, using the general doctrine of vocation as a guide, I’d encourage all men who are suffering from barrenness to listen to God’s Word for them in Ephesians 5:25: “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.” (ESV)
Here is God’s general desire for husbands: love your wives. Christ came not to be served but to serve. Hearing that we husbands are “Christs” to our wives in marriage (Paul tells us that marriage is a mysterious picture of Christ and the Church), our vocation then is understood as one of serving them. In other words, we should look first to their needs. Our needs are taken care of in Christ’s gift of our wives. Marriage is so beautiful, because, as we serve our wives and give ourselves for them, they likewise will serve us, too.
So, practically speaking, lead your wife in life and especially in the faith. Find a good devotional resource that you can use on a daily basis. A couple excellent ones are the Treasury of Daily Prayer and Bo Giertz’s To Live with Christ. Pray with and for your wife. Set aside a time each week where the two of you will go and do something which you both enjoy together. Once a week, get out the grill and make lunch or dinner. When something breaks in the house, don’t call the repair man, but instead see if you can learn how to fix it yourself (but, please, don’t kill yourself!). These are all excellent vocational ways to actively love and lead your wife.
Finally, men, don’t be afraid to go and talk to your pastor. I know it’s true that we want to appear strong and might feel that talking with your pastor would be a sign of weakness. Please don’t feel this way. Your pastor is there for you, to listen to you and speak Christ’s words to you, in your need. Every single one of us needs this. Hear what the writer to the Hebrews says about Jesus: “Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.” (ESV) See what care God has for you? Jesus is there to speak comfort to you, because He completely understands you. Don’t be afraid to come to Him and His pastors, so that your ears can hear his words of mercy for you.
Rev. Michael P. Schuermann
He Remembers the Barren is now available on Kindle. It is also available internationally at amazon.co.uk, amazon.de, and amazon.fr.
Order your Kindle version here.
Thank you, Pastor Chepulis, for writing these words of comfort and for sharing them with us for our benefit:
On July 5th, 2011, I stared at the deafeningly silent ultrasound monitor. I watched the technician stoically glare at the screen, her foot nervously shaking. No heartbeat. The only sounds were the rapid thumping of my own heart and the gentle humming of the ultrasound machine. We learned our first child had died around the tenth week of pregnancy.
We went back to the hospital very early the next morning to have the child surgically removed- an extremely long and silent 85-mile drive to Grand Forks, ND. Then, the following week, my wife Amy and I, along with our families, gathered at the cemetery of St. Paul Lutheran Church in rural St. Thomas, ND, where our circuit counselor officiated a grave-side service for our little one.
David confesses, “For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” (Psalm 139:13-16) God creates life; life that begins even at the earliest stage of development.
God saw our little one as she was being intricately woven together. He lovingly formed her body and imparted to her a soul. Our child is a person created by God; a person for whom Christ Jesus suffered, died, and was raised again; a person who is loved by God and her mother and father.
There is Gospel for faithful Christian parents. Not that the faith of the parents save their child, but as parents who prayed for the child and brought him or her to church, Christian parents are to be distinguished from those of other religions; and Luther certainly sets his thoughts this way.
A good friend of Luther’s, Rev. John Bugenhagen, wrote a commentary on Psalm 29 and in the appendix to his book Luther wrote about Christian women who suffer miscarriages, “…because the mother is a believing Christian it is to be hoped that her heartfelt cry and deep longing to bring her child to be baptized will be accepted by God as an effective prayer. It is true that a Christian in deepest despair does not dare to name, wish, or hope for the help (as it seems to him) which he would wholeheartedly and gladly purchase with his own life, were that possible, and in doing so thus find comfort…One should not despise a Christian person as if he were a Turk, a pagan, or a godless person. He is precious in God’s sight and his prayer is powerful and great, for he has been sanctified by Christ’s blood and anointed with the Spirit of God. Whatever he sincerely prays for, especially in the unexpressed yearning of his heart, becomes a great, unbearable cry in God’s ears. God must listen, as He did to Moses…” (Luther’s Works: AE Volume 43; Copyright 1968; Fortress Press; Published Concordia Publishing House; Saint Louis, Missouri, page 247, 248)
The Lord has heard the prayers offered on behalf of the child by her mother, father, friends and family. Prayer isn’t simply psycho-therapy to make one feel better but they ascend to God like sweet incense, and He is, indeed, moved by them. We don’t just wag our tongues in prayer, but God Himself has promised to hear them.
We have been given hope and comfort from a God who hears the petitions offered to Him by His people; hope and comfort that flow from the grace and mercy of our Lord, who came to earth, died on a cross for our sins, for even the sins of our little child. He went to the deathly grave, but it couldn’t hold Him; rather, He was spit back out. Jesus has conquered death and the grave for us. He is risen and has given the promise that all who trust in His work of salvation we will be raised to new life in Him on the last day.
What a gift our Lord has given us! Forgiveness, salvation, and eternal life graciously given to us through the death and resurrection of Jesus. Gifts He continues to give through Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and the precious Word of His Gospel. All the benefits that Jesus won on the cross are given to us through these ordinary means; gifts that our child was given, even as she was developing in the womb.
Though our child, of course, wasn’t baptized, her mother dutifully brought the child to church where the Gospel was preached. The child wasn’t sprinkled with the waters of baptism, but was immersed in the Gospel each Sunday and in our home devotions. The Word is active and alive. It creates faith and trust in Christ. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ,” Paul writes in Romans 10:17. The Word of God is powerful and efficacious enough to penetrate the womb and enter the unformed ears of a child.
It is interesting to note that when Jesus healed the deaf and mute man (Mark 7:31-37), the Lord opens his ears by speaking. Jesus said to the man, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be open” and it was so. The spoken Words of Jesus were the cure for the man’s deafness and his sin. At the command of Christ, His Word entered into the ears of a deaf man and caused, not only his ears to become open, but also imparted to him faith. The tongue that Jesus loosed immediately began to proclaim Christ. As the Word of God entered and restored a deaf man’s ears, so too has it entered the unformed ears of our child.
Our child, even in the womb, was given faith in Christ. She trusted in a Lord who redeemed her. Some might say, “How can a child know of such things?” Faith and knowledge are two very different things. A small child can have faith, but not theological knowledge and a person can have all the theological knowledge in the world but lack faith. We’re not saved by how much we know about God, but through the grace of God brought to us through Christ; that is received by the faith that He gives through His gifts of the Gospel, Baptism, and the Lord’s Supper. (Matthew 19:14) “Let the little children come to me,” Jesus says. Even a child so small can have faith.
David’s child is a good example of this. After his adultery with Bathsheba, the child which resulted in this adulterous affair dies. Not only does the child die, but he dies on the 7th day, (2 Sam. 12:18) one day short of being brought into the covenant of God through circumcision. Yet David confidently says, “I shall go to him [his child], but he will not return to me.” (2 Sam. 12:23b) David looks to the resurrection where he will go to his son in heaven. He proclaims the trust in a merciful God who has received David’s child. David also makes his confession in the resurrection, that he will see his son again in the flesh. There, at the joyful reunion in Paradise, we will see our child again. What joy to know, what a wonderful promise we’ve been given.
That’s what the Lord does. He doesn’t always give us answers to all our questions, He gives us promises. He promises that though we are sinners from conception, Christ has paid for our sins and the sinful nature we inherited from Adam’s fall. He promises that on the last day, He will raise all the dead from their graves and give eternal life to all who trust in Christ. This is our hope and joy.
A hope and joy that we wish to confess. We don’t know the gender of our child but regardless of gender, we decided to name our child Anastasia. The name Anastasia comes from the Greek word ἀνάστασις (anastasis), which means “resurrection.” Whenever we think of our child’s name, we remember the promise the God has given. The remains of our child that we recently buried won’t remain there forever, but will be raised again out of the grave and we’ll see our child in the flesh. We look forward to seeing Anastasia again at the glorious return of Christ, when He will return to resurrect and bring to Himself all His faithful people. We take great comfort that death has been swallowed up in Christ’s victory. (1 Cor. 15:54b)
Hope and joy, even in the death of a child. God has heard our prayers, worked faith through His Word, and has given eternal life to one so small. We commend our child to a merciful God, who has conquered death for you, me, and our child; looking to the resurrection of all flesh and the joyful reunion in Paradise.
Rev. Mark Chepulis
Our Savior Lutheran Church, Cavalier, ND
Thank you to KFUO Radio and Roland Lettner for interviewing two of our site hosts on the “Studio A” program yesterday afternoon. We hope you’ll have a listen, too.
Click here for a direct link to the program’s MP3 file. (Our interview begins at 29:10.)
Or, if you would like to learn more about KFUO Radio and the “Studio A” program, click here. (To listen to our interview from this link, click on the hour 2 MP3 file of the Wednesday, September 7th broadcast. Our interview starts at 29:10.)
Comment Submitted: I turn 44 this month, and all I can do is cry. I feel, as a barren woman, like everyone has caught their bus in life, and I am alone at the bus stop with no bus for me. I tremble at the thought for the rest of my life I have to hear the words, “How many kids do you have?” and that I have to mumble, “None,” with a lump in my throat – for the rest of my life! I am a Christian who loves God and often wonder why He left me out.
My dear sister, do not hold back the tears. Your barrenness is one way that creation groans in response to the disease of sin (Romans 8:22-23), and it is unfair and painful and confusing. Of course you feel left out! Though, it is not God who has left you out but the messed-up, miserable ways of this fallen world.
Here is the hard truth: Outside of giving you the Child Jesus to save you from your sin, God has never promised in His Word to give you a child of your own.
Yet, God promises you so much more, and – joy of all joys! – He keeps His promises. God promises to love you (John 3:16, Romans 5:8); God promises to save you from your sin (Matthew 1:20-21, Mark 16:16, Romans 6); God promises in baptism to adopt you into His family and make you an heir of heaven (Galatians 3:26-4:7); God promises to never leave you but to faithfully come to you in church through the reading of His Word and in the Holy Supper (Hebrews 13:5, Matthew 18:20, Exodus 20:24b, John 1:1, Matthew 26:26-29); God promises to provide all that you need to support this body and life (Matthew 6:30-32 and 10: 29-31, Colossians 1:17); and God promises to work all things, even your barrenness, for your eternal good (Romans 8:28).
Sometimes in our grief and suffering, even though we know and trust in these promises of God, it can still feel like God has abandoned us. Thankfully, God’s love and care for us exists apart from how we feel. God is present, whether we feel Him or not, because He promises never to leave us (Hebrews 13:5).
On those inevitable days when your flesh deceives you and makes you doubt the presence of God, remember that you cannot increase your faith of your own doing. Faith is a work of the Holy Spirit within us through the blessed means of His Word. It is for this very reason that I urge you to be in church regularly and to go talk with your pastor about your suffering. Let Him speak those faith-increasing Words of God into your ears, so that you may be truly comforted and strengthened unto life everlasting.
“Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing;
heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled.
My soul also is greatly troubled.
But you, O Lord – how long?
Turn, O Lord, deliver my life;
save me for the sake of your steadfast love.
For in death there is no remembrance of you;
in Sheol who will give you praise?
I am weary with my moaning;
every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping.
My eye wastes away because of grief;
it grows weak because of all my foes.
Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.
The Lord has heard my plea;
the Lord accepts my prayer.” (Psalm 6:2-9, ESV)
I’ve asked myself that question time and time again. I seem to experience various stages of grief throughout the year. I never can tell when the feelings are going to surface. Different situations stir up hurt and anger and sadness. I see the new mom in the store, her baby sleeping peacefully in the car-seat. I see the teenage parents, holding their toddler’s hands. I read the birth announcements in the newspaper. These things all create a longing, a hunger for a child to grow inside me. And I wonder: When will the pain ever stop? When will I finally be “at peace” with my current station in life?
It’s really a control issue. I want to be in control of my life, and I want to direct what happens to it. I want to have another child, and it hasn’t happened yet. Then I realize the greediness and selfishness of my thoughts and confess my sin. God knows; He hasn’t abandoned me in my anger and sorrow and sin. He forgives me and washes that sin away. It’s gone. And I am content with all the blessings that are already mine.
Until I see the new parents in church with their little bundle of joy. And I want what they have. Yes, I get those feelings of anger towards God while in church. In church! Why hasn’t He given me more children? Children are gifts. Why haven’t I received more of His gifts?
Here’s the truth: I have received His gifts. I have received His name in Holy Baptism. I have received His very body and blood in the Lord’s Supper.
Why haven’t I received more children? I don’t know the answer to that, but I do know this: God knows me, and He knows what is best for me. He has already given me His best – His own Son Jesus – for ME. I have already received so many blessings!
So… will it ever stop hurting? I can’t answer that, but God knows my sorrow and hurt. His own Son hung on a cross and was abandoned by the entire world. God knows anger; His children have turned their backs on Him for years. And still He loves me. He knows my grief and my sorrows. He loves me despite my anger towards Him. He knows that I hurt, and He’s right there beside me. He knows me, and that brings some comfort to my hurting soul.
Whenever new acquaintances learn that I do not have any children, the first response I usually get from them is, “But you’re still young! You have plenty of time to have a baby. Your time is coming.”
I’ve been hearing that for nine years, now, and each year it gets a little harder to hear. Part of me is thankful for the optimism of strangers, because deep down inside I really do hope they are right. But what if they aren’t? I often think of my barren friends who are past the childbearing age. What was it like when new acquaintances stopped making plenty-of-time-platitudes to them, when strangers could tell that their time had indeed passed? What kept them from despairing when all physical, worldly hope of ever carrying a child in their womb had gone?
I recently received the following email from a woman who is past the age of childbearing, and her confession of faith brought me great joy. How comforting to know that the same promises of God which console me in my barrenness today will continue to sustain and comfort me should I remain childless past the time of my own fecundity.
My heart goes out to you, since I am also barren. Even though I am 57 years old, it still is difficult to realize that God did not intend to give me the blessings of children of my own. From early childhood on, I only wanted to be a mother. That never happened. When it didn’t seem to be happening for us naturally, we explored first adoption, and then medical help, but neither were options for us. We waited too long and were considered too old to be considered adoptive parents by church and state social agencies, even though we were in our mid 30’s. Private adoption at that time meant that the birth parents would have all the say in how we raised our children, and we weren’t comfortable with that. We then went as far as we felt it would be God-pleasing in the medical procedures of that day and time. We finally had to accept that God’s will for us was His will for us! Knowing that He loved us even more than we loved each other, we could look forward to whatever He planned for our future.
Now, two decades later, I still mourn the fact that the infants I hold and the children I love will never be mine. God is good. My family is huge. There are new babies joining our family every few months. The most recent was born in June, and now we hear that another niece will be blessed with her second child in January. God has given me many nieces and nephews to love and cherish. However, it will never be the same as raising one of His precious lambs.
So…we hold to God’s love for us and our love for each other. He has blessed us in so many ways! His wisdom is not mine, and that is good. He does know what is best for me, for my husband, for my family, and for you. Whatever God has in store for you will be a blessing to both you and to others. I pray He gives you a child, but only if that is His perfect will.
The nurse was finishing up the preparations for mom, dad, and the new baby to leave the hospital and I was standing off to the side, waiting to play my part. The unique circumstances of their situation had given me the opportunity to be able to drive the happy family home from the hospital. The entire week prior had been filled with unexpected peace and contentment as I was caring for their other children, giving lots of hugs and rocking the littler one to sleep. It had been such a long time since I had had the pleasure of giving that kind of love. The Lord was keeping me afloat, allowing my heart to keep the unhelpful emotions at bay.
The hospital staff gave us the OK to leave. Mom and dad shuffled on ahead, careful not to strain their healing bodies, and I lifted the car seat, barely noticing the extra weight from the tiny body tucked safely inside. I left the room with a cheerful smile, grateful for the chance to be useful. After a few strides down the long corridor I had an overwhelming feeling of déjà vu. I had been here before. I had been in this place, carrying this car seat, heading for home with a new life. I had been here before a hundred times in my mind, in my daydreams—only in my dream the baby in the seat had been mine.
A wave of dizziness overwhelmed me as the intensity of the emotions that had been held back for so long seemed to slam against the wall that was holding them back. My surroundings blurred and I had trouble seeing the hallway ahead of me. Not yet, Lord, I prayed. I can’t lose it now. Not yet. Just let me finish what needs to be done. I frantically searched for something else to focus on, something I could use to mentally plug up the leak that had sprung in the dam.
How do you handle the tears? Do you welcome them when it’s a convenient time and let them come unstifled, knowing that you will somehow feel better—cleansed in a way—when the spell is over? Or do the tears make everything worse for you, causing you to fall into a depression that’s hard to get out of? So often we’re just not sure what to do with the tears.
Perhaps we should all get ourselves a lachrymatory.
I know—I had never heard of it either until recently. It’s a special bottle used to collect tears. In ancient times it is believed that they were used to collect the tears of mourners. In Psalm 56:8 King David even refers to God as having His own lachrymatory: “You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?”
David paints such a vivid picture for us of a loving God who is attentive to the most minute detail of our lives, who is ready and waiting with a bottle to catch every tear that falls from our eyes. The Lutheran Study Bible has a wonderful explanation of this verse.
God cares for His people and pays attention to their pain, fear, and grief. Though David tossed and turned in the night, stressed with anxiety, God has taken careful note of every single moment…God does not forget a single tear shed in grief…Such is the comforting depth of God’s love for His children. (p. 901)
The tears we shed in moments when we’re overcome serve more than just a biological purpose. They have a spiritual purpose as well. Just as the consumption of salt creates thirst in the body, these salty tears of sorrow should create in us a thirst for the Living Water, the Messiah, who told the Samaritan woman that whoever drank from this Water would never thirst again. He proclaimed to her and to you and to me: “The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life,” (John 4:14).
The barren woman who thirsts for this Living Water can find it in God’s Holy Word, especially the Psalms. It is here that the Holy Spirit calms her troubled heart by revealing to her the mercies shown to the Lord’s servant, David, a man who has likewise tasted the salt of his own tears. The Living Water from his Savior replenished his soul and poured over into thousands of words that quench our thirst still today, more than two millennia later. May we imprint these words into our hearts so that they would well up within us as we look to that eternal life that has been promised where “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away,” (Rev. 21:4).
