Dear Reader,
Last year, Mother’s Day was really difficult. My husband and I had been trying for over a year to have a baby. We knew that was the minimum time normally recommended by doctors before seeing a specialist, but even so, each month I wasn’t pregnant felt like another link in a heavy chain. I wondered what I would do if motherhood was not in God’s story for me. I resolved to be faithful with what He had already given me: a loving husband, a church community, and a passion for writing. And yet, I couldn’t stop the sadness I still felt.
After Mother’s Day, I bought a new pot to plant some cuttings from my ZZ plant that I had propagated. Usually it grows really well and fast, so I was excited to see the plant grow and fill my pretty new pot. I carefully watered it regularly, but week after week it remained the same. How was this plant staying stagnant, while its parent had exploded with growth?
Around the same time, I attended a house concert for the indie folk duo, Arbour Season, a husband and wife who travel the U.S. in their converted school bus with their two kids. I sat on the couch listening to the atmospheric acoustic guitar and perfectly layered harmonies, and for 30 minutes I forgot my sadness. Then they played a song called “Blue.” This song is about the unexpected beauty of the desert.
“Undone, broken, “ it starts, “traveled and open, she was mistaken for pictures not taken.” I got this image of a barren desert with nothing growing: harsh tones of brown and umber, a dead land. The chorus goes, “I’ve never seen the sky so blue.” Then I realized how brilliant the sky must appear when seen against the desert landscape.
This clear image suddenly struck me as a perfect picture of God’s character. Often, it’s in the darkest of times that we see God the most clearly. When mired in grief, He shows us beauty and good things in our lives. And somehow they shine all the more brilliantly for it. In that moment at the concert, I felt God reminding me of all the good and beautiful things in my life, reminding me how much he loved me.
The last part of the song describes the sunset and the moon rising over the desert: “Contrasting hues ‘til beneath the bright moon, I am washed, I am lost in blue.” If the sky is like God’s goodness, then—not only has He never left me—even in the brown, barren desert of my pain, He is present. I have always been “washed in blue,” covered by God’s goodness and presence.
A little over a month later, I found out that I was pregnant! Words cannot describe all the emotions: joy, relief…terror that I was not ready to be a mother. But mostly joy and awe at God’s faithfulness. On the Mother’s Day that had been so difficult, I was already expecting and of course had no idea.
Fast forward eight months, I was super pregnant—probably way too pregnant to be hunched over, trying to re-pot a bunch of plants! My little ZZ plant still had its two sad little shoots, but when I took it out of the pot I discovered something amazing. Beneath the soil was an intricate root system and FIVE new shoots ready to burst up through the dirt. That entire time, the plant had actually been flourishing; it was simply out of sight.
This is the way God often works. We can’t see everything He is doing. Like the people mentioned in Hebrews 11, we can act in faith, but we might never even see the fruit in our lifetimes. Perhaps he is strengthening our faith in times of sorrow. We trust that God is working beneath the soil, cultivating growth in us, even when it feels like we are stagnant.
The week of the previous Mother’s Day, when I went to the concert and bought the pot, God was growing a baby in me literally out of sight. He didn’t have to remind me of His goodness then in my time of sadness, but He did.
Mother’s Day is often a time of heartache for so many. I write this knowing that my pain pales in comparison to the loss that so many of my sisters have experienced. But I hope my story gives peace to anyone feeling the ache of grief in this season. God is good, and he is always with you, cultivating good things beneath the soil. May you experience God’s goodness.
You can listen to the song “Blue” by Arbour Season here.
Join the conversation
Share about a time in your life where God was growing something “beneath the soil.” What did that time teach you about God and His character?