Crippling Fear & Bad Theology: My Story

I still have a love-hate relationship with the Biblical story of Job.  


While it can be comforting in difficult times, it can be terrifying in good times.  Maybe you know the feeling.  The feeling where with your mouth you praise God for His faithfulness, but in your heart you are waiting for the ball to drop.  In those moments, I think of the lyrics of the Jars of Clay song, "Hand:" "I'm here waiting for something new to break my heart." 


I felt like that for much of 2009, and most of 2010.  And I'm not entirely over it yet. 


I'm not entirely sure how this blog and the words that I'm writing right now came out of my experiences over the last year, but they have.  It is not what I would have expected.  But let me share my story. 


On June 14th, 2009, I took three pregnancy tests, and all of them were positive.  It had been our first month trying for Baby #2, and voila, two pink lines (or six, if you count them all!)  


On June 15th, 2009, I found myself bleeding and too upset to concentrate, and by the time I went to the doctor, the levels of HCG (the pregnancy hormone) in my blood were far below what is considered positive for pregnancy.  I was sad, to say the least.  But the way I remember it now, it seems like I got over it quickly.  I had had a feeling of "doom" about the pregnancy for the whole 1 day I had known I was pregnant, so I was not exactly surprised.  I was definitely grieving, but everything had happened so quickly that the most confusing thing emotionally was trying to remember that I wasn't actually pregnant anymore, and trying to convince myself that I never had been. 


But then, on July 17th, 2009, I had another (3 or 4) positive pregnancy tests.  I was feeling optimistic, but terrified.  This time, I prayed hard.  I prayed every day for that baby to be OK -- it was all I knew to pray, that it would be "OK."  I prayed that we would see a heartbeat, and I told only a close few that I was expecting and planned to tell more when I saw that heartbeat. 


And I was waiting "for something new to break my heart" every day.  Every time I went to the bathroom, I feared seeing that stream of blood.  I really did live in fear, even though I tried very hard not to.  I prayed for peace, and I thought I received it.  In fact, I even thought that I heard God tell me that the baby was OK.  


I prayed that God would, at the very least, give me a sign, help me to prepare mentally.  I prayed that if this baby was "not OK," I would bleed and miscarry the baby naturally as I had previously.  I could not think of any reason why such a request would not be honored, so on the morning of the first ultrasound, I assumed the baby was OK.


But the baby was not OK.  On August 18th, 2009, I went in for my first ultrasound for my third pregnancy, and there was no heartbeat.  In fact, there wasn't even anything identifiable as a baby.  An embryonic sac with maybe "something" in it.  I knew my conception date.  I knew the date I had my positive pregnancy test.  I had to have been at least 9 weeks along, at which point one should see not only a heartbeat, but possibly even arm and leg stubs.  Some call what happened to me a "failed pregnancy," and others a "blighted ovum" -- but everyone calls it a miscarriage. 


The second time, I was floored.  I had been "speaking scripture over" my baby.  I had believed I had heard God's small, still voice telling me the baby was OK.  I had "received peace," and I had had absolutely no signs of impending miscarriage -- no bleeding, very few cramps, and plenty of morning sickness.  God couldn't even "have the decency" the answer that part of my prayer.  And for that, I was very angry.  


In my own diary and in my prayers, I called it "The Great Fake-Out."  I felt like God had tricked me.  Or maybe I was insane, and maybe not only had that "word" not been from the Lord, but maybe everything I had ever thought I had heard from God was fictional.  Maybe it was me, making everything up.  And fear began to cripple me. 


I don't know which of the numerous possibilities I had thought of was more frightening: 1) That God had said all the other things I had thought I'd heard from him, but not this one, and that God chose not to answer my prayer because...who knows?  He was mad at me? 2) That God does not speak to us at all and does not interfere in our lives.  3) That God does speak to us and interfere in our lives, but I was not important enough, or faithful enough, or something enough. Or 4) That God does not exist, and everything I had thought I had ever heard from God was either insanity or a figment of my imagination.  
None of those options seemed good to me, and I didn't know who I was, or who God was. 


And then I thought of Job.  And it did not comfort me.  The truth is, the more I thought about Job, the more I was afraid.  My initial reaction to the miscarriages had been, "But I've done everything right my whole life!"  And I was serious.  I don't mean to say that I believed that I was sinless or perfect -- but I believed that all of my major decisions in life had been "the right thing to do."  And they had.  I had been faithful, I had been a "good girl." I had been, at times, a little overly careful not to break the rules. But Job had been good too.  And His troubles just kept on coming -- not in spite of his own faithfulness, but because of his own faithfulness.  The whole thing had been a wager!  The kind of God that would make wagers about Job's faithfulness with part of the stakes being the lives of Job's children was not the kind of God I wanted to worship.


But I had bad theology.  Despite my knowledge of the story of Job, I had thought that being faithful, being "obedient," being "good," would keep me safe.   I had thought that God owed me something, and that if He ever made a promise to anyone in the Bible, then I could take that promise and hold it over His head and say, "But, hey, you promised!"  That I could play back His own words for Him and show Him how He owed me retribution for my suffering.  But He owed me nothing, and my theology changed.  


I had come of age as a Christian in a "name it and claim it" kind of environment.  And even though I said that I didn't believe you could just name it and claim it all the time, apparently when it came down to it, I did.  Not all the promises in the Bible are for me.  And I know that I am stepping on some people's toes when I say that, but consider this: 


"Worship the LORD your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you, and none will miscarry or be barren in your land. I will give you a full life span." -- Exodus 24:25-26 (NIV)


This promise is straightforward and simple: All you have to do to get rid of food poisoning, sickness, and infertility or miscarriages, is worship the Lord.  But it was given to the Israelites during a specific period of time.  I cannot claim this unless God specifically tells me I can.  It must be true that I don't get to claim this promise as part of my personal covenant with God -- because if I do, He owes me a lot of back-pay in good health, and He has some explaining to do for the early deaths of some dear friends.


If anyone reading this has ever used the above scripture to help them get through a tough time, and taken it as their own, then I am not saying they are incorrect in having done so.  That is between them and God.  Any promise that He makes and fulfills once He can make and fulfill again.  But that's His call, and I am not entitled to anything.   


But what about Job?  What on earth is up with that story?  The one, you know, where God makes a bet with Satan that Job will always remain faithful, and as a result allows all of his children to be killed?
Honestly, I don't know.  Some say that it was so that Job could have a face-to-face encounter with God.  Others claim that either Job's children were faithful and ended up in heaven anyway so no harm done.  Others claim the opposite -- that God was carrying out His vengeance on Job's sons.  But I don't know. 


But I do know this: the truth about safety is that no one is safe, ever.  No matter how good we are, or how careful, or even how much we pray, bad things will happen to us.  We will experience grief.  We will be disappointed.  So if bad things are going to happen to us whether we are living our lives in crippling fear or whether we are being bold and doing the things we love and have passion for even if they are not as "safe" as not doing them would be, then why not change the world?  


You may be wondering what conclusion I came to about what I thought I heard God say.  I don't believe that I'm insane, but I do believe that I am still recovering from bad theology.  I believe that God speaks to humans, I really do.  But I also believe that we have been taught to believe things about God that are not biblical, and I that I was misinformed about what God's role in my life was -- namely, that He is not a fortune-teller, even though He knows the future.  


You may also be wondering if my heart was broken again.  Well, I am 27 years old and certain that I will go through more times of sadness and loss in the future, as that seems to be the course of every human life.  But I have not had another miscarriage, and now have a healthy 4-month-old baby girl (named Faith, after everything I'd been through) whom I conceived two months after my second loss.  Nothing in my behavior changed between my miscarriages and my pregnancy with her -- in other words, the miscarriages were clearly not punishment from God.  And I was the most fearful I've ever been during that pregnancy.  Still, sometimes I'm afraid that it's all another Great Fake-Out and she will suddenly die, or something will happen to my son now that I have a daughter.  And I have no proof or promise to hang onto that nothing will happen to either one of them.  But I choose not to live in fear, understanding that no one is ever safe ever, but that statistics are overall in my favor and tragedy will come when it comes regardless of whether I worry about it or not. 


Does the fear ever come back?  Frequently, but I am doing my best not to let it cripple me. 
My next post will be more on The Truth About Safety.