Sometimes I forget that our family is “not normal”. I forget to see the beauty in our story, the miracle of our children. I can get bored and discontent with being a mom. I loose the vision of what God clearly called me to.

As a teenager, there was a lot of talk about discovering “God’s will for your life”. It was a big question. How was I suppose to figure this out? It felt overwhelming at times. There was a feeling of, I might get it wrong.

Fast forward to current day, looking back, I see that “God’s will” is not so easily missed or even complicated. Situations and opportunities come into our lives, we pray about them, realizing that God is ultimately the one who decides.

Sometimes we get to choose, sometimes God makes it so clear and we don’t get to choose but rather we submit to what he has chosen for us. He is a good father, a Holy God, he gets to be right, even when we don’t agree with what he chose.

In my life he chose to allow 2 healthy pregnancies and then then he closed that door. We prayed about having more children, we wanted it to be his will for us. Surely he’d want it to be his will too, right? Children, after all, are a blessing and God values children.

But God, in his goodness, valued me too. He could have blessed us with more biological children, but that is not how he chose to work in my life. Instead he made his will for me clear. Trust. Would I trust him? Would I love and worship him? Would I call him good and Holy despite not feeling his goodness?

This journey, of infertility, has wrecked me and redeemed me. I am not the same person I once was, praise God! The love that I now have for Jesus, my trust in God, my dependence on the Holy Spirit… our miscarriage and infertility was what God used to make that happen. Those months were the days of being undone and new thoughts were planted. A life shift happened for me and so much good fruit has happened in my life because of that sorrow.

Ultimately, his will was not for us to more biological children. He made it clear, for that I’m thankful. My husband and I both went for testing. We both received news that there were major hindrances to having more children.

By the time we finally received that news, it had been well over a year of testing and effort put in our behalf. We did charting temperatures, progesterone & estrogen creams, as well as a few months of clomid , a fertility medicine.

The very last of many fertility focused appointment, the one that laid our journey to rest, was for my husband. We found ourselves being told the data didn’t make sense, there was some medical confusion. The doctor said at this point, the thing that made the most sense was that there was blockage somewhere. Our next step would be “invasive” in order to know for sure. He said he couldn’t “officially” say we would never get pregnant again but as things were, we wouldn’t. He gave us the diagnosis of “secondary infertility”. It was a such a surreal moment, we BOTH had the door shut to birthing more children.

At this point we had already gotten involved with foster care, (read more about that story here). We sat in that doctor’s office, holding “our” 6 month old son, and were told that as of now another baby biological baby is not an option. We had already decided that if either of us had to anything “invasive”, that we’d be ok with releasing our pursuit of more biological children. We are not saying it would have been wrong to move forward with more treatment. But we, at this point, felt clear that God had called us to foster care and our dream of more biological children was already being replaced with the new dream that God placed in our hearts.

Regardless, the diagnosis was a loss of a dream for me. A miscarriage is a hard way to end your biological family. But I’m so thankful for God. He brings life and joy despite sorrow and death. You can read more about that story here.

As I think about God’s will, I realize more and more that he puts good passions and good desires within us. When we are willing to give those desires back to him, and tell him that he can use them in his way and on his time table, that is when we find ourselves in his will.

I desired more children. Wanting children is a good desire, but it can easily become an idol. I had to open my hand and release those desires. But now, 7 years later, I see that God didn’t want my desire for children to be satisfied with our two biological boys, because he knew there were four more children (and their biological families) who were meant to be part of our story.

I never expected this to by my life. I never expected being a mom to six kids, in a ten year time span, to be God’s will for my life. But he so gently wove this story together. Despite the sorrow, tears, and difficulties, God brought me to this place of being a mom to six. He did it in a way that has left me thankful for it, infertility and all.

I recently had the realization, as I read Hosea 2:15, that my wilderness has been my infertility. It’s been a hard place and yet God drew me into that hard place so that he could expose his great love to me there. And that is what made all those dark days, worth it.

If you continue to read on, Hosea 2:16 it says, “And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.” What was once a wilderness to me, our infertility, God has made a fruitful place, a hopeful place!

Only God can take death and make it life. It compels me to worship him! I’m so thankful that he cares enough to allow sorrow, and that in the sorrow he doesn’t leave us.

As you walk through your wilderness, I hope you will find yourself turning towards God with your questions and your emotions. I hope you will learn to hear his voice speaking tenderly to you.

To read more about foster care click here. If you are interested in reading more of how God has worked in our life, you might enjoy this post.

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