Bargaining with God

I've done it many times - I'm sure you have too -- praying that if the Lord would do XYZ in our life then we would do ABC.

When I was experiencing my infertility issues in my early 20's - I can remember each month begging the Lord to "let this be the month" and promising the Lord all kinds of things if it could only be true.  I look back at it now and can see my lack of faith - of trusting the Lord for he can see the "big picture" and that I was only caught up in my immediate pain.

While going to all the doctors trying to overcome my infertility - it came to light that while my mother was pregnant with me (in the late 1950's) she took a drug (diethylstilbestrol - known as DES) to help with stopping miscarrying me.  She had had 4 miscarriages before me.  And she trusted her doctors and believed that this drug was good and would help her carry me to full term.  What she did not know is the lasting effects that that drug would have on my health and fertility.  I recently started doing more reading on the drug - I had known it was the cause of my infertility - but did not have a clue on what other effects it had on me.

With the revelations I had learned, I found myself asking the Lord once again - why did you not just let me still get pregnant - all things are possible - and I had read of other DES daughters still being able to conceive - though having troubled pregnancies.   And the Lord showed me, that this drug would have effected the lives of my daughters and possibly granddaughters - and that I would not have been able to survive the gut wrenching guilt and pain of it.  That took my breath away.  Yes, I had gone through much pain when I was young and trying to conceive - but Jesus could see the future and was guarding my heart from something an even greater pain - the knowledge that I had passed on this infirmity to others.

I think when we are going through troubles - yes, we need to reach out to the Lord and ask for help - but we should stop all the bargaining.  The Father has a plan for our lives, and he is perfectly capable to work around the evils of this world to see his will come to pass.  And we need to learn to trust in His plan - His will.  Our prayers should be one of praying for graces to help us work through our problems - not for them to magically go away.  I am thankful he put a wonderful Catholic doctor in my life at that time who said that it may be time to look at other options and being an adoptive father himself - he shared with me the beauties of adopting a child.  This conversation lead my husband and myself on a whole new path and within in a year we adopted a 7 year old son who need our love so desperately.

The pain of never birthing a child lingered with me for years - but the Lord have me the graces to put them aside and to rejoice the love of our son and grandchildren.

Trusting in God is a must for us and one of faith.  My prayers for myself and you is that our faith may continue to grow - our love of God consumes our heart and the peace of knowing we are walking this world with him at our side.