Becoming a Midwife

My Calling - My Heart
Caramel Gray

“How lovely is your tabernacle, O Lord of hosts!
My soul longs, yes even faints for the courts of the Lord: my heart and flesh cry out for the living God.”
Psalm 84:1,2

Caramel and Thomas Gray

Often because of the quality of care, character and compassion midwives offer their communities, they are seen as leaders.  They have the opportunity to promote change for the good of others, themselves and the world they live in, especially as it pertains to birthing options and women's health.  They can also be used of God to promote the Gospel and its life-changing transformational Power in the lives of many they are called to serve.  Seeing change like this is inspiring and I am convinced that although great strides have been made, the birthing community is in need of more positive change.  It has been my experience that to see or invite the change we so desire in the world we live in, first one needs to carefully examine their own heart before the Lord.  Personally, I have found this process of self-examination to not be by sheer human will or effort, but solely by the work and person of the Holy Spirit.  God in His kindness reaches deep into our hearts and draws us out of darkness into His glorious light.    "For then you will have your delight in the Almighty.  And lift up your face to God. You will make your prayer to Him, He will hear you, And you will pay your vows.  You will also declare a thing for you and it will be established for you; So light will shine on your ways.” Job 22:26-28 

The Holy Spirit leads us into a relationship with Jesus, He brings us out of darkness and introduces us to the light of the World.  He imputes His grace to us, and empowers us as His children to live a life of sacrificial obedience.  He saves unto good works that He prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.  He restores our souls Psalm 23:3 and Job 33:26  He takes broken lives and brings them into accordance with His will, and they become fruitful lives, Galatians 5: 22-25  and are marked by a Holy Joy.  He equips us to be His servants and world changers.  He changes individual lives that corporately as the Body of Christ, can collectively exercise the gifts He gives for the common good of all.  I Corinthians 12:4-11  All the while He is not only changing us for the here and now, but is continually preparing us for eternity, (“So teach us how to count our days so that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”) Psalm 90:12  Until that great day, when we shall behold Him face to face (“As for me, I shall see your face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied when I awake in your likeness.”) Psalm 17:15.  He teaches us how to count our days and turn our hearts towards wisdom.  We were created to reflect His Glory and as His children we are called to shine like stars in a crooked and perverse generation.  Philippians 2:15  Our chief end and goal in life becomes that Christ is glorified and exalted.  What a Glorious Lord we serve, I am in awe of His goodness.  Midwives as Christ's servants reflect His glory in a special and particular way and were historically used of God to save His people Exodus 1:16-18.  Personally, I have experienced the kindness and care of God through them my own midwives.  This has awakened my heart to a greater calling as a daughter of the Most High God and He has used their lives to touch my own, giving me a desire to serve Him as a midwife myself.

So how has this tangibly worked its way out in my life, this calling to midwifery?  How has Christ turned my heart toward this calling?  I have shared that the lives of the midwives I know have greatly impacted my thought process; but also it has been my life experiences.  Daily, I am learning that hope for a better you, and a better society starts with our personal spiritual journeys.  Christ calls us back to Himself.  He woos us into fellowship with the One who knows all, sees all, and promises to restore all, and when He does this He brings us into relationship not only with Himself, but with others.  As this takes place He uses these relationships to define us and to shape us.  He created us for community, and the changes He desires in our lives and others, takes place organically, while in fellowship with other believers, and with the world around us.  Often we are completely unaware of the changes that are taking place in our hearts.  Sometimes we are more acutely aware.  Whatever the case or circumstances, change invariably takes place.  My personal journey towards the pursuit of midwifery has been a path marked by pain, healing, and much heart change.  Some of the ways the Lord has led my heart, and how He has revealed Himself to me while on this journey toward the calling of midwifery may seem small and insignificant to some, others are much more monumental.  I will share from both. 

As a young child and teen, I had a profound sense of my sin and God's holiness.  Unfortunately, as is often the case with many young people, I busied myself with activities seeking to stop the gnawing sense of dread and fear of coming to terms with my sinfulness.  How could I change?  I tried at times but with little success at gaining mastery over my sin.  In the midst of this time of turmoil I still sensed the Lord's presence in a very childlike way.  I would walk to Church by myself as a little girl and found it to be a place of love.  Sadly, these earlier years were eclipsed by “Self”.  My joy and contentment became in myself and my vain accomplishments as a teen.  I somehow knew these were not lasting, but rather fleeting and temporal.  I consoled myself with the lie that I was a 'pretty good girl'.  I was popular, had parents who thought highly of me, and thought I had a promising future as a young women.  I managed to drown out the small whispers of the Holy Spirit speaking to me ever so softly guiding me to repent and turn from my sinful ways.  I ignored the nudging’s of the Holy Spirit for reconciliation to this Holy God.  “Behold the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save; nor is His ear heavy, that it cannot hear.  But your iniquities have separated you from God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.”  Isaiah 59:1, 2  Youthful sin has a way of separating us from the fellowship we so desperately desire with our Holy God.

Later as a Young adult my sin became more overt.  I found myself even further alienated from the Lord, allowing myself to get involved sexually with my high school sweetheart.  I soon found myself pregnant and filled with shame and regret.  I was conflicted as to what to do and how to respond to this pregnancy.  Regretfully I chose to abort my child.  Immediately I was horrified that I had committed such a grievous sin, but Praise God for His divine mercy and steadfast love.  Where our hearts have been soiled, marred and muddied by sin, He provides cleansing, hope and redemption.  (“He brought me up from a horrible pit from the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock, and established my steps." Psalm 40:2)  No man or women could offer or provide in its place the redemption or acceptance of a loving compassionate Father.  When the divine takes place, and the Lord supernaturally opens our hearts to faith in Jesus Christ, we experience such radical healing.  Wounds, that we have incurred from the harsh realities of living in a fallen world, and our own sinfulness, we find start to heal in the most unexpected ways.  (Then your light shall break forth like the morning, Your healing shall spring forth speedily, And your righteousness shall go before you; The Glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you shall call upon the Lord and the Lord will answer; You shall cry, and He will say, Here I am.”  Isaiah 58:8, 9)

We find a new rest for our weary souls and an eternal peace floods our once wounded hearts.  Hearts that were once thorny and stony Mark 4:5 become hearts of flesh that are soft and supple to will of the Father Ezekiel 11:19-20   Such was my heart (troubled, stony) and such is it now (rested, restored).  My heart has been subdued by Christ and cleansed by His blood, and for this I will be eternally grateful.  I am reminded by the Psalmist, “The Lord binds up all our wounds and heals the broken hearted ones.”  When I came to faith in Christ, The Word preached was from II Samuel 12:1-15. The prophet Nathan confronts David for his adultery with Bathsheba and his murder of her husband Uriah. David is forced to recognize his sinfulness before the Lord.  I too was forced to come to terms with my own murderous actions.  The Lord delivered me of eternal guilt and shame, yet the pain and regret remained.  It would take many years to work through these issues.  While coming to Christ provided me with the assurance of God's love and forgiveness, the pain still remained in my heart over the loss of a child.  The pain seemed overwhelming at times.  I realize now I suppressed the pain and in many ways sought to deal with it in my own strength.  I knew I needed to surrender all the raging anger that was in my heart.  I had a lot of anger.  I was angry at myself, and angry at my boyfriend.  This would go on to affect my other relationships until one day through the wise counsel and confrontation of my husband I chose to deal with my pain in a more Biblical way and received some very wise and helpful counseling through the help of a biblical counselor.  My heart since that time, and through much prayer, has become much more subdued and submitted to the Lord and His direction for me.  I am reminded that having our hearts subdued before and by Christ is an easy, yet often painful process.  Again, we have a great teacher from the Psalmist as to what to do with the myriad of emotions that often flood our souls.  “Search me and try me and know my anxieties and see if there is any wicked way in me and lead me in the way of everlasting.” Psalm 139:23-24  Asking the Lord to search our hearts can be an easy process because the Lord does the searching, healing, and restoration.  Christ promises in His word to continually do so throughout our stay here on earth.  My experience of having my heart subdued before the Lord was painful because I was forced to look back with regret to those past choices that led my heart into troublesome situations in the first place.  Yet, in all this, He called me to “cast my cares upon Him because He cares for me.” I Peter 5:6

Again, painful because I will forever be regretful, and there will remain a sadness in my heart.  I will, however, rejoice at the reality that I look forward to one day seeing that child in heaven.  I rejoice and marvel at the genuine healing that my heart has experienced throughout this tragedy in my life, it was this very painful event that the Lord used to draw me to Himself and provided the unconditional Love, forgiveness, and acceptance my heart longed and so desperately ached for.  Not only has the Lord healed my heart, but He has done great things for me by blessing me with ten beautiful, precious children.  What wondrous love the Father pours out upon His children.  Our children have in a large part been the greatest gateway to my healing.  They are the joy of our lives.

Another defining factor for me in the calling of midwifery was my relationship with my grandmother.  When I was a little girl, some said, “I was an old soul.”  The oldest granddaughter of 26 grandchildren provided many opportunities to exercise my already forming maternal calling.  I spent many of my formative years with my grandmother learning the art of homemaking and what Biblical feminity looked like in its most seminal form. My own mother was instrumental in teaching me many of these skills, but it was my grandmother who introduced me to the Gospel.  Although my grandmother's life was marked by much pain and abuse at the hand of my grandfather, she maintained a deep faith in Christ and a fierce love for God, her children and grandchildren.  She was a beautiful women who reflected the character of Christ as His image bearer, and despite her harsh living conditions, she called forth beauty to all she came in contact with.  I had the privilege, as her granddaughter, to be the recipient of her warm, hopeful, and divinely optimistic attitude and nature.  As I age and seek to instill in my own five daughters and the lives of countless women the Lord in His sovereignty has placed in my path, my appreciation for my grandmother grows daily.  A very vivid memory I have her own personal birth stories, some were joyous others have more sad endings.  She had five live births, one still birth and three miscarriages.  She spoke with a deep joy in her voice of the births that resulted in a child to love, nurture, and care for.  Sadly, her voice was filled with pain when recollecting the births that would result in the death of a child.  Hopes and dreams were dashed, longings that only a mother has for a child that would never be fulfilled.  “A heart knows its own bitterness and stranger does not share its joy.” Proverbs 14:10.  I too became familiar with the pain my grandmother must have experienced, having suffered the loss of three miscarriages myself.  I did however have the love of many Godly women around me during this time, and saw firsthand the rich support and the importance of a community of ladies who possess genuine faith in Christ.  I can see how my grandmother would have benefited from the care of a midwife.  I am thankful for the ways the Lord used her in my life.  She taught me to love children and to honor the birth experience.

The midwives who delivered our children are a very integral part of my own birthing experiences; they had a profound impact on our family.  Their dedication and devotion to God was evident in the ways they conducted themselves by maintaining a high standard of excellence in the care they offered.  This, coupled with genuine compassion, was such a comfort throughout all my pregnancies.  The quality of care for myself, other women, and their precious babies seemed to be unmatched. When compared to obstetrical care I had personally experienced and observed, midwifery care excelled at providing a wonderful opportunity to see the Glory of God manifested in the lives of countless women, children and families.  When families are touched in such a ways, it can be life impacting and world changing.  We see change in worldviews about birth and individual birth experiences.  Midwifery care focuses on the Mother as a person and the baby as a new life given by God.  Such was my experience.  It was holistic in a Biblical sense, the care was not merely physical, it was soul care.  Often my midwives would pray with me after each appointment.  I was left with a calm assurance that God was indeed watching over my babies and was acutely aware of our every need.  He was using these midwives to be His instrument of care and attentiveness.  This attracted me to midwifery and stirred my heart to something greater and more eternal than myself.  I started to see midwifery as a way of serving others and serving my Lord.  My heart was, and is continuously, being transformed.  I was beginning to see the idea of becoming a midwife being birthed deep within my soul. 

So here I am today, reflecting on the past, thankful for the present and hopeful and excited for the future.  As I see the reality of becoming a midwife coming to fruition in my life I praise God for His work in my life, the Body of Christ, the love of a wonderful husband, the joy of raising godly seed, and now for the Charis family.  I see none of these as separate, but part of a bigger grander picture than I could have ever hoped or imagined. 

My heart is full.