I feel like this journey has been helping me to grow in my understanding of some of the lyrics of the worship song “King of my Heart”. In particular I think of the day we finally got to sign the legal papers and the two embryos were finally ours. It was so easy to sing “You are good, good, oh Lord!”
We were at a conference we attend every two years. The last time I had been there I had found myself at a table with a half dozen guys and we ended up having this impromptu, transparent, honest almost “support group” meeting over lunch. Bizarrely, each of us had battled through miscarriages or infertility issues and as we were honest about our struggles and how we came to terms with our losses and dealt with those who didn’t know how to deal with us, it became one of the key moments in my grief / lament journey where I was able to really see positive movement.
And now, in this same place where I had had this amazing healing experience was where I was going to become an actual father.
Between spotty WIFI, lawyer’s vacation schedules, unknown last minute red tape and other hurdles I can’t remember the entire process had taken much longer than we had anticipated. However, finally, on the second last evening of the conference we had all the right paperwork in, and everything was set up to transfer them to a fertility clinic in our province. The final step was for us to hunt down a printer and print off a copy of the final draft of the legal agreement.
Well the final, final step was to find someone to witness for us, sign it together, take pictures of it with a smartphone and send it off. I got back with the papers just as the evening session was wrapping up and pulled a friend from that grieving circle I’d experienced last conference over to a table off to the side of the main meeting room where we all signed. He gave me a huge hug of congratulations, Alexis and I hugged and then I leaned back on a planter and we beamed at each other. There was so much joy radiating out of our entire beings. It was impossible not to resonate with “You are good, good, O Lord”.
I was so excited it was hard to fall asleep but for once I didn’t mind a little battle with insomnia, not with all the joy in my heart. When I did fall asleep, I slept hard and ended up getting up late. Alexis had already left for the morning session (our room was right across the hall from the main meeting room) when I got out of the shower and pulled my clothes on. Just as I had my hand on the door to leave, I heard a massive THUD and then the muffled sound system from the meeting room that I had been hearing in the background went totally silent.
The rest of that day, and many, many days in the days to come, it became nearly impossible to resonate with “You are good, good, O Lord …
Rusty
The Good Argentumware. 