I am Sarah
It is early Sunday morning and it’s Mother’s Day. Another year I am not a mother biologically or by adoption. Some years I am okay with it others like today, I am sad. This piece is 4 years in the making, yup, four years I have been writing it. The last time I added to it was late last summer. It is about my faith, my struggle of not being a mother and my infertility.
It’s is very disconcerting when you realize you are the bible character that you dislike deeply. The person whose faults you can list without batting your eyes. Your anger at times irrational, shocking — made Pastors want to throw you in a vat of Holy Water. This is me with Sarah.
On the surface, I am the strong black woman. I am the strong Christian woman waiting on the promises of God. Recently, I went to my annual gynecological visit. I requested to be put on birth control, the medication I take for Multiple Sclerosis is detrimental to a baby/fetus. I barely make it with medication, I don’t have the option of not taking medication in hopes of getting pregnant. While in the appointment, I tell the doctor my history, she examines me and goes you are mostly likely not getting pregnant because of fibroids and not age. She then requests a ton of tests. The results show, I am Halle Berry good for having a baby. My heart broke, my body with alien objects in it and a defective central nerve system crushed my greatest desire.
Sarah’s greatest desire was crushed by her body. Culturally, she was deemed less than, inadequate because her marriage produced no children. Yes, times have changed, however, Christian culture does rejoice in motherhood, especially those who produce a tribe. Back to Sarah. Sarah, Sarah, Sarah.
She is a woman which a lot is asked of. Sarah must leave her belief system because one day her husband decides I no longer believe in many gods, I believe in one God. That God has asked I leave my culture, family, home and I am going for it. Bye the way, he said we are going to have a kid. Sarah is post menopausal. Sarah is in her late 50s-early 60s. I am believing Sarah gave Abraham this face
when her husband told Sarah everything.
So Sarah is asked to go on this impossible journey. She goes because she truly has no choice (one generation later , Rebecca is given a choice to say no to Issac). What happens? Her bum husband gives her away to two kings cause he feared for his life. Yes, the father of faith pimped out his wife. In time, down the line, Sarah herself became a pimp of Hagar so Abraham could become a baby daddy. Sarah’s life is complicated and very messy. In all of this Sarah is supposed to have faith in this unseen God. God visits Sarah and Abraham and says I am going to give y’all that kid I promised you 20 odd years ago next year. Sarah straight up laughs in God’s face and says “I am OLD”. God responds to Sarah “why are you laughing? You doubt me? Bet.. I said what I said, next year you are going to be changing some diapers”
Fast forward a year, Sarah was Janet Jacksoned and had her miracle baby. She named him Issac. Laughter. Laughter that wasn’t bitter or ironic. Just good old fashioned joyous laughter.
“By faith even Sarah herself received the ability to conceive [a child], even [when she was long] past the normal age for it, because she considered Him who had given her the promise to be reliable and true [to His word].” Hebrews 11:11 AMP
Or this translation
“By faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised.” Hebrews 11:11 NKJV
In that year Sarah became a believer in the monotheistic God of her husband’s. She came to the conclusion His word is bond. I always believed it came back to Sarah remembering when her husband was playing at pimp, God was going about the business of saving her.
The Bible states “Delight yourself in the LORD, And He will give you the desires and petitions of your heart.” This verse in Psalm 37 has been gnawing at me. My desire since five was to be a mom. My body has said no.
So like Sarah, I am angry and sometimes bitter. When I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, my first thought and question “how will this effect my chances of having a child?”. My doctor at the time said “that is what you are worried about?”. Yes, because three months before I was diagnosed with trigeminal neuralgia. I take an anti seizure drug for TN, it has a 90% chance of damaging a baby/fetus. Like Sarah, I am not given a choice. This body has become a road block to having children. To be clear, I have no issue with adoption or fostering. I just wanted to experience what it would be like to give birth once. Like Sarah, my body is my enemy.
In studying and pondering Psalm 37:4, (Jewish and Christian commentary see this verse so differently as usual and neither has really helped my understanding). In studying Psalm 37:4, one must look at the following three verses “Commit your way to the LORD; Trust in Him also and He will do it. He will make your righteousness [your pursuit of right standing with God] like the light, And your judgment like [the shining of] the noonday [sun]. Be still before the LORD; wait patiently for Him and entrust yourself to Him;”. Unlike Sarah, I thought I did. I gave a lot of years to what I thought was doing the work of the Lord. I am Sarah, I am tired of waiting. I am Sarah, I laugh with ironic bitterness. Be still before Lord , there are days I can’t, my thoughts are never ending and there is no quiet. Wait patiently, doubts creep up as another one of my friends have a child and I pretend my heart is not broken some more. I am Sarah, I have learn to be stoic and stay this is the will of Lord while screaming, with no sound coming out, where is my promise??!!
When I found out I would not get better/healed from MS, I got angry and my first words to God with tears rolling down from my eyes “didn’t I give up my life for you?” Oh no. A human response and a forgiving God. I am Sarah because my life at many times is out of my control. Those words which I remember as I am studying Psalm 37:4, makes me question did I really delight in the Lord. I am Sarah, I have heard of the Lord.
As I wrestle daily not with if God is real, I have known since five years old the Cross, a crucified Jesus was truth. What I grapple with is scripture, it is a daily thing. What is directed at me? Can I take for me what is said to Sarah? So many people say to me “remember Sarah” “pray like Hannah” …you think I haven’t? Wailed fervently before the Lord? I am Sarah, I cling desperately to the Word of God being true.
Hebrews 11:11 says somewhere along the line Sarah considered God reliable and true or as another translation states, she judged him faithful. Something at sometime clicked in Sarah’s brain and heart. Something made her say Abraham’s God is my God. Was it that she was prevented from becoming a sexual get out of trouble key for Abraham twice? Did she know it was this monotheistic God who her husband spoke about who saved her? When did she say to God privately “I heard of you but now I see you”? When did she realize like Hagar, He is the God who sees? Who sees her anger, her bitterness, her loneliness, her disappointment in her life…her husband, her fears, her sadness, her fear of a wasted life. God saw it all and said to her wait one more year, I truly have this. I will never know when it clicked with Sarah, when she said it’s not about her circumstances… how she got to the point where her pain and desolation, her crushed hope was not blinding her, encompassing her because somewhere, somehow Sarah prevailed to see God.
I am Sarah.
