On Sacred Motherhood, For My Son

I received a vision before you came: a haloed woman with a scared heart and a scar—
an opening right at the womb where life joins the rest of us.

As I drew her, ink gave her body and voice, and she spoke this same refrain to my trembling heart over and over again:

What if you were not afraid?

And as she spoke, I imagined you.
And later, when my own scar opened up again, I saw her there with me laid out on the table.
And then I saw you.
And for the first time in years, I was not afraid.

It is funny how these births happen, sweet boy.
How you are born, and I am born all over.

Your eyes squint at the brightness of the world;
and my vision of this life is flooded with light.
We hold you— raw, tender and new;
and I know Love holds me, too, for I am also raw, tender, and new.
You gape with wonder;
and I am awestruck at the glory.

Body, heart, and the whole of my personhood— reborn.

And I consider a God who “begets” us:
We who have His image but are also adopted.
As if He birthed us two times over.
As if He made us and chose us twice, to be sure we knew to Whom we belonged.
Born again.
Indeed.

We are born into this world and then back into His Reality, His Kingdom.
And then it seems we are recreated and transformed, and maybe even reborn, again and again as we walk and labor and love in this world.

Delivered further into God,
Nourished by His very body,
Carried in His tender embrace.

And now I hold you, son, rocking slow and hushed.
And I see the sacred motherhood within the crucified Savior before us here:
stretched out and broken and laboring— to bring about new life.

A Savior who gives birth to a new people and a glorious Kingdom and a reconciled world.

Listen to Me, O house of Jacob and all the remnant of Israel,
you whom I have upheld since your birth,
and have carried since you were born.
Even to your old age:
I Am.
And even to your gray hairs:
I Am.
I bear you;
I made you
and I will forgive you.
I will take you up and save you.
- Isaiah 46:3-4

A few photos of our newest member.

JT was born on August 8, 2019.