Infertility Diaries

Is there a difference between the will of God and the fact that God is all knowing? What is the will of God? Is suffering part of God’s will, or is it due to the fall? How active is God’s role in suffering?
God works through suffering for our good, but does he cause it? Does it depend on the situation? Does God create life and death, or does he create the mechanism for life and death?


If God creates life…

Miscarriage.
He created our babies.
Did is choose for them to die? Or did he just know that they would?
He undoubtably has worked through the suffering, but did he specifically choose it? Or did they die due to the fact that we live in a fallen world?

Infertility.
If he chose to create their lives… and then chose for them to die, why does he now no longer see me fit to be a mother and create life now? Or does it have less to do with me, and more to do with when he wants the child to exist in the world? If he wants the child to exist later in the world, why bother choosing life and death the first two times? If he specifically chooses life, why are there higher rates of pregnancy at fertility clinics? What about the ethics of fertility treatment?

God’s purpose in suffering.
What good can come from this? Sometimes I feel those around me over analyze the effects of things to come after suffering in order to find meaning and closure in extreme suffering. I’m cautious to not read into things, but I also don’t want to deny work He may be doing. Either way, it’s often hard to comprehend how good could come out of this suffering. I try not to overanalyze my life… because it makes me feel terrible. What could be so wrong with me that God needs to cause this much suffering to reform me?

More questions.
How does one then make sense of those who want children but can never have them? Why would God tell us to be fruitful and multiply but never allow it? And what about thousands of years of church history, and still often believed and implied today, that ultimate version of Christian womanhood is being a mother? I guess it makes sense why this popular phrase when a woman is pregnant in Christian circles is so hard for me to hear… “You got this, God created your body to do this”. But what if He didn’t? Because not everyone who wants children can have them. According to a study I read recently, only a very small percentage of women in the world without children don’t want them. What about the millions of babies who die in the womb? What then does that phrase then imply about God or myself? I feel broken.

When a baby is born, people say “God is good.” They don’t tell you that when they die. Why do the majority of people tie the goodness of God to what he gives us? Or do they not realize what they’re implying and it’s just a common saying?


If God created the mechanism for life…

Could it be something different?
What if God is less active, but works though the events that happen? It’s my bias to assume this because I feel I can make more sense of it. It feels like an unpopular opinion though. What if God created male and female reproductive organs to be able to create life, but is less active in choosing when life and death occurs? We don’t know why baby Poppy died. We know baby boy died because he had trisomy 7. Why would God choose for a baby to be created when he creates them to be incompatible for life? Or instead, does this sort of genetic abnormality occur due to the fact that our bodies are broken from the fall?

The glaring difference in Christian discourse.
It’s interesting how all Christian literature I’ve read on miscarriage and infertility is vastly different. The Christian authors sometimes differ, but in general say that miscarriage is due to living in a fallen world, and it’s not a part of God’s intention, while He then works through it. The authors take a very different posture on infertility. The conversation is largely around trusting God in His timing. They say He is actively choosing whether to create life and when to not each month. The different mainstream conversation on the two topics feels confusing, when actually suffering through them both feels like the same thing.

My big question.
Is making sense of God’s will and how active He is in this a matter of theological differences that we will ultimately know the truth of when we arrive in heaven? Or are they questions and understanding that are foundational to the Christian faith and I really need to figure out?