Nadia Hartwig
Ever since I can remember, my dream has been to be a mom. Simultaneously, my whole life, I have believed in the sanctity of life. Naturally, these two aspects of my identity have overlapped and informed one another. Choosing my favorite baby names at the age of seven helped me see the humanity of every unborn child. Marching for life in D.C. only heightened my baby fever, and so forth. However, the greatest pinnacle of these two things has now arrived with the birth of my son this summer. God has used the experience of giving birth to give me a new perspective on what a precious gift the life of a child is and taught me three important things about what it means to love.
The first lesson on love that I learned through the pregnancy and birth of my son is the truth of the statement, “there is no love on Earth like the love of a parent for their child.” I spent nine months loving someone I could not even see. Without question, my life revolved around him. There is such immense joy in the fact that the tiny newborn in my arms is the same person I’ve loved the whole nine months, the same person I carried, labored, and birthed. And he is the same person I will continue to love for the rest of my life. Already, I have loved him his whole life, and I truly would do anything in the world for him. What a deep and beautiful understanding of our heavenly Father’s love I now have- His love for me, His love for my son, His love for you. God has known and loved us since the beginning of time, before we were even conceived, and He continues to love us forever (Psalm 139:13, John 17:24).
Besides finally understanding the joy of a parent’s love, I learned that one’s capacity for love grows when God gives you someone new to love. I always worried that having children would mean that I would care about all my other interests less, but this is not the case at all. When I had my baby, I continued to care about the same things I always have: art, books, learning, politics, cooking, etc., but their significance pales in comparison to the precious life that God has entrusted me to care for. Instead, He opened up bigger and deeper paths of love within me as a mother. We love because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). One of God’s greatest gifts in life is the capacity to love one another, whether our neighbor, spouse, friend, teacher, or child. Through motherhood, I have learned that God matches His gift of people to love and the gift of the ability to love in a masterful, perfect way. God desires every person, including the tiniest of babies, to be fully loved by us as He loves them, even though our love is imperfect until Christ’s return. It is one of the miracles of life that God provides within mothers, a new capacity for love with which to love their children.
I once heard Michelle at a presentation define love as an action, specifically sacrificial actions as we seek to mirror Christ’s perfect love through His sacrifice on the cross for us. Oftentimes, the sacrifices we make for one another feel burdensome, and while this is sometimes true as a mother as well, I have been overwhelmed by the new love I have experienced where the sacrifices I make do not even feel like sacrifices at all! Such a natural, God-given love is planted within the mother-child relationship that, even though it is tainted by sin, it still bears the image of the parent-child relationship that God seeks with us. It has given me a new perspective on how much Christ loves us. I despise needles, but when some post-birth complications required numerous shots, not for a moment did I question if it was worth it. Joyfully holding my son in my arms, while what had previously been one of my worst fears occurred, showed me the power of love given by God.
Yet another example from motherhood of sacrificial love I have found joy in is breastfeeding! Nursing a newborn is no walk in the park and is frequently accompanied by great discomfort and exhaustion, but the beautiful bond and special moments it creates with my baby remind me that motherhood is a gift where I have the privilege of caring for and nourishing him despite the pain.Love is a gift from God, a gift perfectly shown through the sacrificial death of His Son on the cross for us. Becoming a mother has deepened my understanding of and appreciation for what love truly is, how we are called to love others, and the joy of loving my child. And I continue to be awed by the parallels of the relationship between God and us and mother and child.
Learning the love of a parent for his or her child, how God grows one’s capacity for love, and the joy found in the sacrificial nature of love, affirms that every child conceived in this world is a precious gift from the Lord and full of miracles. I have always believed in the sanctity of life, but there is a special understanding I developed when I actually got to live out God’s beautiful plan for life through having a child. I thank the Lord every day for my son and for teaching me about His love for us by granting me such an enormous love for my son. May God be with all those expecting a baby and help them to see the joy and love abounding in the special relationship He has created between mother and child, and may we continue to learn about His love for us as we grow in our love towards each other.