A Gift From the Lord

This passsage is dedicated to my friends, Maria and Dan Harrington, and Jenny and Eddie Gelsone, who are expecting babies soon. May you continue to be blessed!

I was pregnant with my second son. Very pregnant. I had just left the doctor’s office after having my prenatal checkup. I was having to visit him weekly now, because I was very close to my due date. I had hoped that he would tell me that he was admitting me to have the baby. But that did not happen.

I was big, and ready to have the baby. When he told me that it wasn’t quite time yet, I felt a huge letdown. My hormones were raging and my emotions on a roller coaster. So disappointedly, I went to a restaurant to have lunch before making the two hour drive back to my hometown.

Reading while I ate was a deeply ingrained habit of mine. My current reading project was to read my bible. I had read all of it except one book: the book of Psalms.

The reason that I had saved this book for the last is that much of it is poetry and I usually have trouble understanding poetry. I prefer a straight-forward chronological story.

I really dreaded opening my bible and beginning reading. Typically, I read three chapters a day. If the passage was particularly interesting, I read more. But, I didn’t usually read more of the Psalms. Getting through this book was tough for me. I just didn’t want to read that day. Nothing was really going my way and I just knew that once I opened this book, nothing would be different.

However,  I also am aware that we sometimes have a war going on privately within us. Whether it is the devil trying to keep us from the word of God or whether it is our flesh, or a combination of the two, we have to persevere in order to receive a blessing. And sometimes, when we feel the most reluctant to enter into the word, or attend church or pray, that is when we most need to do that which we don’t want to do. For many times, that is when the biggest blessings await us in exchange for simple obedience.

So, with this knowledge, accompanied by my reluctance, I opened my bible to the place where I had left off the last time: Psalms 127. This is what I read:

Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it; except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.
It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.
Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.
As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth.
Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

What a blessing for a woman with child to read! My anxiety was gone. I knew that I was receiving word that I was soon to deliver a blessing. What a beautiful gift from God on this day when I needed encouragement, both for my condition and for reading my bible. I would forever hold this particular Psalm dear to my heart.

I recommend that every man and woman who are expecting a baby to read this Psalm. Those of us who have older children need to read it regularly too, especially in times of frustration, as a reminder that the object of our frustration is indeed a reward from God.
Amen.



copyright 2011 by Kathy Robbins