The other day I had the privilege of taking my adorable wife to our local clinic so that she could be tested for gestational diabetes. And it IS one of the great privileges of this life to be able to enjoy it walking beside her. Often I will chuckle and she will ask me, “what are you laughing at?” And often I will answer, “just you.” It is not a statement of condescension but rather a statement of incredulity. I love her tremendously and yet we are so different it is hard to believe that she agreed to partner with me. That God has chosen her as my help mate is something that I will be smiling about for eternity.

Anyway, our trip was short and as she sat with her small bag of Jelly Belly jelly beans reading the flavors to me I started to realize that we hadn’t properly prepared for this appointment. The doctor had informed her that she would need to bring twenty-eight beans for this particular test. She has a few allergies and it would be important that we select the flavors that are least likely to contain anything that will trigger those reactions. Additionally, while I could just grab the first twenty eight beans that came out of the bag that is not in my wife’s nature. It came to me that we probably should have selected our 28 beans prior to our departure. This is the kind of decision that my wife would consider heavily not just in terms of which beans will trigger her allergies, but which flavors she would prefer, and which flavors would complement versus those that would distract from the others. The time required to drive to the clinic proved insufficient for making these decisions and, as we are living in the days of COVID, I had to leave her at the door of the clinic to proceed on her own.

Later, as she related her story, I learned that there were two nurses in the clinic who had assisted her in this process. She dutifully proffered her bag of jelly beans and clearly one nurse was sympathetic to Sarah’s plight while the other was less so; the good cop and the bad cop. As she told me the story I imagined the good cop holding out her gloved hands as she patiently received each of Sarah’s decided beans while the bad cop forcefully pronounced, “you only have five minutes to get this done!” The whole event culminating in the bad cop saying, “just put them all in your mouth” and Sarah resolutely doing as she was told. I chuckled again as my wife explained to me that she thought five minutes would be enough time to “enjoy” 28 jelly beans. Of course she did.

As it turned out it was barely enough time to select them and then chew the whole mass into submission. As she asked, “what are you laughing at” I was amazed at her completely different understanding and conception of time than mine. Now please, this is not a moral judgment except in that she and I are different. I am an army officer and planner who trains army officers in the planning process. I once synchronized a one week collection plan down to two minute intervals. I would have plotted it down to the minute but Excel wouldn’t let me have enough columns and rows! How did I marry someone so different or more precisely how did I convince someone so different to marry me? And yet, her differences are so incredibly attractive to me and they never cease to surprise me in new and amusing ways.

Most of my family has heard that Sarah and I are expecting. But this may be new to some of my friends and I do apologize if you are hearing this news for the first time in this blog. We are in a high risk category and we are trying to temper our excitement with our desire not to “jinx” anything. Today, I find myself worrying about almost everything. I pray that our daughter is healthy, and smart, and beautiful. But most important I pray that Sarah and I are able to give her everything she needs to be prepared. Everyday, the world seems to be moving faster and things, often distant things, that I don’t understand have an impact on the very local nature of our day to day lives. Will I be able to prepare her for a world in which I struggle just to keep up? How will we prepare her for the times and the challenges that her generation will have? What will those challenges be?

This morning as I was reading through First Samuel I was struck by the story of Hannah and her son as contrasted to the story of Levi and his sons. Both Hannah and Levi were committed and devoted to the Lord and yet Hannah’s son grew up to be a man of character who understood the moral nature of his standing before God while it was written of Levi’s sons that they, “were worthless men. They did not know the Lord (1Sa 2:12, ESV).” Hannah had been barren and had prayed, “O Lord of hosts, if you will indeed look on the affliction of your servant and remember me and not forget your servant, but will give to your servant a son, then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life…(1Sa 1:11)”. She prayed so earnestly and passionately that her lips moved through her silent prayer that Eli, the priest, thought she was drunk. Her prayers were heard and God answered with the birth of Samuel. Her prayer of response was, “For this child I prayed, and the Lord has granted me my petition that I made to him. Therefore I have lent him to the Lord. As long as he lives, he is lent to the Lord (1Sa 1:27-28).” In other words her prayer was that the Lord would raise Him. For another child I have prayed. A child that will soon arrive.

I have no doubt that Levi prayed earnestly for his sons. I have no illusions that even if it were possible to be the “perfect” parent that the outcome is assured. But my prayer is that the Lord will use Sarah and I to raise His daughter that she will fear the Lord and come to love Him for what He has done for her. The salvation of her parents is assured I want her to know that, so that she will one day make a decision of her own will to place her trust in God for her salvation. What ever successes and failures that she has in this life, in those times that will be given to her, are insignificant in the absence of the one fact of her salvation.

Adam Clarke, commenting on the worthlessness of Eli’s sons, writes, “These men were the principal cause of all the ungodliness of Israel. Their most execrable conduct… caused the people to abhor the Lord’s offering. An impious priesthood is the grand cause of the transgressions and ruin of any nation…” Why should Christians live obedient lives unto God? Because once our salvation is secure it is not about us anymore. Our obedience becomes a testimony before our nation and our world. Our obedience is about what everyone around us sees, that at the very best they would ask about our hope and our faith and at worse that we would not be the cause that brings anyone to, “abhor the Lord’s offering.”

I have learned much about God’s nature by trying to imitate Him within the context of my marriage. More often than not it only reveals not that I am a miserable husband but how much my flesh gets in the way of being the husband that I desire to be. I am confident that I will learn much about God’s nature as I struggle to be a father. It will probably reveal more ways in which my flesh will get in the way. But as long as I continue to persevere in my faith in God’s goodness towards the goodness that He has promised me He will not be ashamed to call Himself my God (Heb 11:16). And as one of His own my obedience will not hinder my daughter from drawing near to Him as well.

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Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash