God is in the Midst of Her...

It was inexplicable and immediate. For so long, midwifery had been *it*, the thing I cared most about in this world, my love for Jesus incarnated. I tattooed “sage femme” under my breast, for crying out loud! In my soul, I WAS a midwife! And perhaps I still am; I do still and will always claim “wise woman;” I believe that is the Lord’s design. But being a midwife is no longer my greatest earthly identity. For almost 3 years I was first God’s child and Christ’s beloved, and secondly, I was a midwife. But today as I write this, I am first God’s child and Christ’s beloved, and secondly I am the woman who loves Jeremiah McWilliams.

This started playing out in my heart in July (probably about the time I first started writing this “Gestating Halley” series – it’s taken me this long to sort it all out). As of early July I had been dating Jeremiah for less than 3 months. (Heck, I’d KNOWN him for less than 3 months, period). It was quick. We hadn’t told each other yet that we were in love, but it happened soon after. I would sit in my mother’s kitchen in St. Louis and think out loud about my bewilderment. I told her numerous times I just couldn’t understand why working as a midwife’s apprentice wasn’t giving me the ultimate joy and fulfillment I expected. I also told her that for the life of me, I couldn’t “turn down” my desire to be with Jeremiah; I could not lessen it, I could not make it equivalent to my desire to attend births, and I could not mesh it nicely on the side. My desire to be with Jeremiah was greater, and it would not be squelched. My wonderfully intuitive mother listened to my ramblings with patience for several sessions. Then one day at the lunch table, she looked up at me and spoke truth that is still resonating: “You know, Halley, sometimes we have a hole in our hearts that we cannot fill, and until we are able to fill it with what it was meant for, we fill it with something else.” Suddenly, Clarity – that elusive but oh-so-gratifying angel – paid me a visit. “Are you saying that I had a Jeremiah-shaped hole in my heart that I was filling with midwifery?” I replied, flabbergasted. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

And so I told Julia in early August that I had to stop apprenticing with her for the time being, because I couldn't keep up with the crazy lifestyle I had assumed, and because I needed to figure a lot of stuff out. She was incredibly gracious and understanding, for which I am eternally grateful. It’s now mid-October and I’m still mulling that conversation with my mother over in my mind. It was so simple; it was so freeing; it was so true! It made a lot of sense then, and it makes even more sense now. I did not become a horrible, selfish person over the summer (as I wondered when I found myself hoping that no babies would be born on the precious nights I got to be with the man who understands me so easily and loves me so well). I do still have the willingness and the earnest desire to exhaust myself, inconvenience myself, and sacrifice myself for that which is dearest to my heart. But my deep love for birth is now in 3rd place, and at present, it’s a distant 3rd place. If you have been reading this entire story, I do not have to tell you that my passion for birth and mothering runs as deep as the Atlantic. And yet my love for Jeremiah has mightily overpowered it – there is no contest. So then, how deep and high and sure and true is my love for Jeremiah! It’s INCREDIBLE if you stop and think about it! :)

I want to be on-call for Jeremiah. I want to answer his 3am phone calls. I want to spend national holidays with him. I want a life with him! And I am more than willing – I am eager – to amend my dreams in order to blend them with his. He is my greatest dream, after all, and I will exhaust, inconvenience, and sacrifice myself for him. Jeremiah loves my dreams; he wants to see them all come true – it is for this reason I can securely put them in his hands. Jeremiah – the most amazing, selfless, incredible man in the whole world – wants to amend his own dreams in order to blend them with mine. We cherish each other’s hearts. We want to be together, and we are finding our way.

I feel certain in writing this that there will be at least one reader who will disapprove or even condemn me for this, perhaps in person, but more likely outside of my presence. They will say that I cannot let a man “take over” my dream of becoming a midwife, that I cannot change my plans “just because” I now have a man in my life. This perspective makes me sad. It is so misled, so ruthless, and so self-seeking. Recently I heard biblical love defined as “self-forgetfulness.” This term sums up well how I have come to feel about how my individual dreams and ambitions fit into a relationship. I can assuredly set my dreams – and therefore myself – gently to the side, forgetting my heart to an extent, because Jeremiah isn’t going to forget my heart. To the contrary, he loves my heart with great passion and tenderness, just as I love his. I will forget my dreams if I can see his fulfilled. I believe this is love. And as one, we kneel before the Cross with every longing of our hearts, and trust our Savior to knit us closer together and bring our hopes to fruition as He deems fit.

I also feel certain in writing this that most of you are my dear, dear friends, and want me to be happy and free and alive and well. (And I am! More than ever before in my life, I am!) I know you are the ones who, even if you hadn’t read this explanation of my heart’s overhauling, would still stand by me whether I was a midwife or not. Thank you for your kindness and unconditional friendship…makes me tear up to think of it! It is because I have come to believe that you love me for who I AM, and not for what I DO, that I can say that I am no longer going to be the least bit sheepish or apologetic about loving Jeremiah more than I love midwifery! I am going to REJOICE! REJOICE in the Lord always, I will say it again, REJOICE! (Philippians 4:4). Friends, I have found him whom my soul loves! (Song of Songs 3:4).

If I was going to rewrite Eric Church’s song “Love Your Love the Most” to reflect how I feel about Jeremiah in relation to how I feel about midwifery, it would go something like this:

“Yes I love tiny babies
And pregnant bellies too
I love a good sweet birth story, it rocks on Friday nights.
Hell yes I love my dreams, but I want you to know
Honey I love your love the most.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlCGnGLlu64

And, so we are at the end of my gestation. I have been born as Jeremiah's love, and it feels amazing to breathe outside the womb. I might tell you I was post-dates, but God would tell you this birth happened exactly when He ordained, just as my birth as a Christian happened, and just as my births as a midwife, a mother, a grandmother, etc will happen, if and when God wills. But for now, I am quite content and ridiculously happy being madly in love with Jeremiah McWilliams. I don't have to have all the rest worked out -- after all, I'm just a newborn ;)

A few things...

(1) I am devastated that Mizzou lost last night to OSU. Gosh it hurts my heart so bad! We were supposed to win and take over the #1 or #2 spot in the rankings, and go on to whoop some UT booty next week in Austin. We were supposed to be the brilliant, unstoppable Mizzou offense and dominate like we always do. It was supposed to be a night of victory, of celebration, of exhilaration. Instead we fell apart, Chase Daniel threw 3, THREE!, interceptions, and absolutely nothing went our way the whole game. Instead our offense was held to 23 points, had multiple 3-and-outs, and could not sustain a lead for more than minutes. Instead it was a night of pain, heartbreak, and very high blood pressure.

Today we are ranked #11. We are still a respectable team, and if we do win next week at #1 Texas by some miracle, we will be back in the top 5 hunting for that national championship. But it just wasn't supposed to be this way. I can't stop replaying all the "what ifs" in my head, over and over. I can't stop thinking that Chase Daniel's Heisman hopes are pretty much history. I can't stop hating the state of Oklahoma and their stupid orange cowboys. I told my mom I was sorry for telling that obnoxious OSU fan to shut up, but I'm not really all that sorry. (Let's face it, I'm not a lady). Every home MU game, I so look forward to the absolute joy and transcendence that comes from college football victory. There's just nothing like it. It makes you feel so fabulously alive when you're on top of the world...and it crushes your spirit when you get disappointed. It makes you bleed...black and gold blood for this girl. My loyalty to the Tigers is unshakable. It's like (1) Jesus, (2) birth, (3) MU football. I guess God just knew I needed a reminder that football is only the 3rd most important thing in the world... ;)

(2)Church today -- and lately in general -- has been pretty darn sweet. As Dave said at the beginning of his message today, "The prayer room is now the crying room." I love that The Crossing makes me feel that it is OK to cry about football. Anways, the series we've been going through is based loosely on the new book, "unChristian." This book (which is on my list with 500 others of those I need to read) presents the sobering research findings concerning how a new generation (those aged 18-41) perceives Christians. There are six troubling associations many people have with Christians (and honestly, who can blame them?): (1) judgmental, (2) hypocritical, (3) sold out politically, (4) sheltered/naive, (5) treat others as projects to "get saved," and (6) anti-homosexual.

Last week Keith gave an INCREDIBLE talk regarding the culture's perception (and unfortunately, the reality) that Christians are anti-homosexual. This has also been a personal issue for me -- I have two very close family members who are gay. I can't even explain how much it gets under my skin when I hear people, **especially Christians,** say, "Oh my God, that's so gay." It always makes me want to reply "Oh my God, that's so gluttony." "Oh my God, that's so coveting your neighbor's sheep." It makes me so incredibly ANGRY, not to mention embarassed, when I hear about Fred Phelps wielding his horrific signs that say "God hates fags" and other horrendous phrases. It makes me want to jump up and scream, "Those words and actions do NOT represent Christ!!!" It's sick, it's sick, it's sick. These hateful people claim to love JESUS. Jesus! The Friend of Sinners! HELLO?!?! Here is the thing, as Keith said so well -- we get angry with people who sin DIFFERENTLY than we do! No one attacks people who are greedy, no one tries to keep their children away from "those greedy people over there" -- because we consider greed to be some kind of "respectable sin" because everyone deals with it, when in fact the Bible says money is the root of evil! Homosexuality is a sin, yes. I'm not disputing that, and if you'd like to, we can talk about it sometime. But the point is that we (Christians at large) compromise the gospel when we focus on one sin to the exclusion of others. I think Billy Graham said it wonderfully: "Why do we focus on homosexuality as if it's the greatest sin? IDOLATRY is the greatest sin!" Guess who's coming to dinner? The poor, the sick, the blind, the lame. And the gays and the lesbians -- gasp. "And such were some of you." (1 Cor 6:11). Please don't say "gay" when you mean "stupid" in front of me...particularly if you consider yourself to be a sinner saved only by grace.

In church today, Dave preached about "getting people saved." About all the outreach, all the Bible tracks, all the surveys, all the talk about the 4 spiritual laws, and all the other superficial crap that makes me want to throw up in my mouth. Here's what the research from Barna Group shows in "unChristian" -- for every one person that responds positively to such evangelism efforts (and God bless them, I don't know how they find Jesus like that, but praise God regardless), but for every one such person, 3 to 10 others respond negatively and become MORE HOSTILE to the gospel message. Doesn't that make you sick to your stomach? It does for me. All that time, all that money...for essentially 1 step forward and 10 steps backwards. The take-home message of Dave's talk today was simple, something Young Life taught me well in high school -- sharing God's love with others has to be RELATIONAL and DEEP and motivated by a GENUINE LOVE for the other person. An agenda to "get someone saved" is perhaps the most unChristian concept I could ever imagine and it grieves me so deeply that people are being PUSHED AWAY FROM JESUS because of such superficial tactics. If you are a Christian reading this, I'll bet anything you would say your coming to Christ was not because of a radio ad or a track from a stranger, but because of a PERSON who KNEW and LOVED you.

(3) In other news, I am making a donation...




to locks of love!!!! 11 inches off!!!!