Holy moly! Liliya and I are about to have a baby in just a couple more days! Our life is about to change forever as we get ready for the birth of baby Sophia! We’re really excited and very ready and it’s been a long and awesome process of preperation! There have been a lot of lessons that I’ve learned over the last 9 months as I’ve watched my wife’s belly grow and stretch, but none of them have been as pogniant to me as this: The pregnancy process perfectly parallels the Christian’s present progress through life: from new birth to final glory. So bear with me as I try to stretch things a bit.
It starts with a seed...a spark. New life. Something miraculous and mysterious happens on the molecular level and new life comes into being. This life is simple and primitive in its’ first phase, but it quickly grows and progresses, accumulating new abilities. Soon, the ear drums develop and baby catches its’ first hearing of momma’s voice; the first hint at a greater reality beyond the placenta and umbilical chord. The womb is not her final destination, though she does not know it yet. Occasionally, things from this outside world press themselves upon baby’s simple, small sphere: a police siren, a barking dog, bright light shining through the window, a loving rub from an expectant papa...all evidences of this greater reality bumping into baby's world. Yet, the details of that reality remain scarce...and the instances happen with rarity, so baby settles back into her safe, soft little world thinking that this is all there is for her. In the mean time, all of the cells in her body are growing, expanding, pressing, preparing for their 'real life' in the ultimate reality. All of the things she will need to exist in the real world are being formed in her. Her senses are coming in: sight and smell; her skin is filling in with fat cells to keep her warm. The womb is not her home and her body is making sure it's prepared for its final state of existence. And so baby grows...and grows...and grows... and soon she has grown so much that there is no longer any room left for her in her once soft and spacious womb. She has been fully matured and it’s time for her to leave. Contractions begin. It is a traumatizing experience; frightful in every sense of the word. She is squeezed down and out of everything she's ever known and everything she is familiar with. She's pressed out of a tiny tube...out and into the light. Steady hands grab her, and light floods into her small pupils. Her lungs breathe in real air for the first time, doing what they were always intended to do. She has entered into the world she was created for...a world much more marvelous than should could have ever conceived or imagined. She is...Alive.
So, that is the process that I have got to experience for the last 9 months (well, most of it anyway). Everything my daughter is experiencing in the womb is preparing her for her ‘real’ life...for existing in the ultimate reality. The time in the womb...though in her mind is the end and the only state of being (because it is all she ever known), is in fact, only the preparation process for what she was actually created for. Let us always remember that our time in this world is simply a time of preperation for our true state of being...for our ultimate reality...a reality far more marvelous than we could ever dream up or imagine. I can't wait to see what it's like on the other side!
"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him"
It starts with a seed...a spark. New life. Something miraculous and mysterious happens on the molecular level and new life comes into being. This life is simple and primitive in its’ first phase, but it quickly grows and progresses, accumulating new abilities. Soon, the ear drums develop and baby catches its’ first hearing of momma’s voice; the first hint at a greater reality beyond the placenta and umbilical chord. The womb is not her final destination, though she does not know it yet. Occasionally, things from this outside world press themselves upon baby’s simple, small sphere: a police siren, a barking dog, bright light shining through the window, a loving rub from an expectant papa...all evidences of this greater reality bumping into baby's world. Yet, the details of that reality remain scarce...and the instances happen with rarity, so baby settles back into her safe, soft little world thinking that this is all there is for her. In the mean time, all of the cells in her body are growing, expanding, pressing, preparing for their 'real life' in the ultimate reality. All of the things she will need to exist in the real world are being formed in her. Her senses are coming in: sight and smell; her skin is filling in with fat cells to keep her warm. The womb is not her home and her body is making sure it's prepared for its final state of existence. And so baby grows...and grows...and grows... and soon she has grown so much that there is no longer any room left for her in her once soft and spacious womb. She has been fully matured and it’s time for her to leave. Contractions begin. It is a traumatizing experience; frightful in every sense of the word. She is squeezed down and out of everything she's ever known and everything she is familiar with. She's pressed out of a tiny tube...out and into the light. Steady hands grab her, and light floods into her small pupils. Her lungs breathe in real air for the first time, doing what they were always intended to do. She has entered into the world she was created for...a world much more marvelous than should could have ever conceived or imagined. She is...Alive.
So, that is the process that I have got to experience for the last 9 months (well, most of it anyway). Everything my daughter is experiencing in the womb is preparing her for her ‘real’ life...for existing in the ultimate reality. The time in the womb...though in her mind is the end and the only state of being (because it is all she ever known), is in fact, only the preparation process for what she was actually created for. Let us always remember that our time in this world is simply a time of preperation for our true state of being...for our ultimate reality...a reality far more marvelous than we could ever dream up or imagine. I can't wait to see what it's like on the other side!
"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him"
Isn't my wife gorgeous?!
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