The Rock That is Higher
I’ve had a very busy few weeks! My first grandchild was born almost a month ago and I spent every day last week with him. I wondered if I’d remember how to take care of a baby or if it would feel brand new, like I’d never done it before.
It was like going back in time! I remembered it all and enjoyed every minute.
As a child, I preferred stuffed animals to baby dolls. I was never interested in babysitting and, being the youngest child in my family, I had very little experience with younger kids, and no experience with babies.
I still remember the feeling of holding my oldest daughter in my arms for the first time. Due to an emergency c-section I was foggy with morphine and kept mistaking her for my cat, Pearl.
The first night in the hospital my husband and I decided to have our baby stay in the nursery so that we could get some rest. We were just settling in when we heard a baby wailing somewhere down the hall. “Somebody’s not happy,” I said. “I wonder whose baby that is?”
The crying came nearer and nearer until it was right outside our door.
“I tried everything,” said the nurse as she stepped into the room holding my screaming baby. “Usually feeding helps, but I think she just wants her mama.”
Sadly, Mama was no more successful than the nurse had been. My daughter cried like that, for hours and hours every day, for four months. Colic.
It’s amazing how rattled a person can be by the sound of a screaming baby. I remember clinging to scripture during those months—holding onto words of comfort and courage. I scribbled verses on index cards and taped them to the refrigerator and the mirror and kept a stack of them with me wherever I went. I repeated them out loud again and again while my baby cried. I cried along with her sometimes. I felt a desperate need for unshakeable truth—something that went beyond feelings or circumstances, to keep me grounded.
What a gift those months were! They didn’t look like the diaper commercials I’d seen on tv that showed well-rested mothers, cheerfully taking care of happy babies. I was disheveled and my baby often was very unhappy. But it was a kind of training that helped me forever after.
Still, I’m thankful my grandson doesn’t have colic!
As I stood holding him a couple days ago, I saw a verse my daughter had taped to the mirror in his room.
“From the ends of the earth I call to You, I call as my heart grows faint; lead me to the rock that is higher than I.” ~Psalm 61:2
God’s word holds us. It gives us vision to see beyond where we’re currently standing, wherever that happens to be. It adds confidence to first-time mothers, and to all of us who lean on it.
Blessings to you in whatever stage of life you find yourself. God goes with you before, beside, and behind. Nothing you face is too big for Him. You are in good, strong hands. He is trustworthy.
Blessings to you,
~Amy