None of us understand why any better than Abraham.

By Kate C.

Originally posted at Makin’ Babies. Shared by permission.

After recovering from the initial hardships of my heartbreaking decision and the loss of my baby, I felt like an outsider in my happy-go-lucky culture. I was drawn towards older women. Women like my grandmothers, at an age where loss is expected, and of a generation where infant loss was more commonplace.

I retold myself Grandmama’s story of kneeling on the hard tile of her bathroom floor and holding her best friend’s miscarried preemie in the palm of her hand like a pear, or the stories passed around my family about my great aunt who lost a baby within days of birth due to heart defects. When this aunt herself passed away, it felt strangely comforting, too. Death happens everywhere, to everybody. Not just to me and my baby. I craved a more familiar world where life is hard and bad things happen to good people.

I knew where to read for this. The Old Testament. I chose The Brick Testament for my text (sometimes you have to keep it light) and supplemented with a lecture series from the library.

I love The Old Testament. I do! I love it now for all the reasons I hated it as a sensitive, compassionate little girl. Life is so hard, people are so bad, and God is cruel, and just a little bit nuts. It’s crazy, and I love it.

This is my world after baby-loss. I can relate to these people with their 900-year lifespans and their half dozen wives and gaggles of concubines and their frequent burning of goats and stoning of naughty children. We’re not so different after all.

In this grief community there are a great many lost baby boys named Isaac. It’s obvious why. Isaac is the son that God demands Abraham sacrifice. No reason is given beyond the usual. “Prove you worship Me and only Me.”

At this point in my scholarly CD, the professor begins her metaphorical interpretation with, “now, we know that in modern times God doesn’t come down and ask any of us to sacrifice our own child!” *chuckle chuckle.*

Yeah. Chuckle. Chuckle. Good thing that doesn’t ever happen anymore.

Please visit Kate’s Blog, Makin’ Babies, to read the rest of her article.