A Journey Through Infertility

My husband and I are both from large families with six children in each. We married very young in 1987 and looked forward to having a large family of our own someday. Three years into our marriage, we both met Jesus, and my desire to have children flourished

overnight. Within four months, we learned we were expecting. Fast forward 12 years to 1999, after four ectopic pregnancies with no answers and no resolutions,

we lost all hope.

We began to pray earnestly how the Lord would direct us to have children by whatever means He chose. Unbeknownst to me (and in answer to my private prayer), Jim had been talking with a couple in our church who struggled with infertility. They directed him to a team of medical specialists in reproductive science. He introduced me to the idea with an initial consultation appointment, but as we discussed it prayerfully, it raised many questions and ethical concerns. The temptation to brush off the unknown because of fear was huge, but through the quiet prodding of the Holy Spirit, we pursued knowledge and wise counsel and prayed earnestly for guidance and wisdom.

The most formidable obstacle would be the affordability of infertility specialists for two full-time Christian workers living in one of the most expensive economies in the US. As we sat in our initial consultation and large dollar amounts got tossed around, I could not envision any of this coming to fruition. Jim, however, calmly assured me as we left the doctor's office that if God wanted us to pursue children in this way, He could certainly provide. I remained skeptical and filled with unbelief. As we arrived home from our consultation appointment that very day, I retrieved the mail and saw a letter from a lawyer - the letter that contained astounding news that I would be collecting an inheritance from an aunt who died earlier that year. This inheritance totaled the larger amounts the doctor suggested we might need to get the process started. This was in November, and by April of 2001, we began the process of IVF (in vitro fertilization). In those few months, we were able to work through the moral dilemmas. The major moral objections that arose when faced with overcoming infertility and their Biblical answers were for us as follows:

1) "Life is indiscriminately destroyed in the process of IVF." No, it CAN be, but the married couple seeking to preserve life has control over how many eggs are fertilized and how many are transferred to the woman. As a Christian, there would be absolutely no destruction of embryos, no selective abortion, and always, at all costs and at every turn, giving opportunity for life. Otherwise the door would be shut. Psalm 139:13-16 guided our thoughts on this matter. Life begins at conception. We transferred every single fertilized egg and gave every baby conceived the opportunity to survive. We were prepared for a very large family if that was what God designed for us, and we were prepared for none.

2) "Intervention for infertility is entirely unnatural." If we dispose of every medical process that is unnatural, we get rid of most medicine, preventions, remedies, and healing. It becomes unnatural when it is not between one man and one woman who are married, and the egg and sperm are not from the aforementioned. God gave mankind the earth to subdue (Gen. 1:28), and Jesus himself went about healing all manner of various diseases (Luke 4:40), likely including infertility. James 5:13-15 encourages us to pray for healing. Healing can come through miracles, and sometimes those miracles come about with the aid of medical intervention.

3) "Perhaps God doesn't want you to have children." Infertility was not part of God's good creation before the fall. It is a part of the disease and heartache that came about after the fall. There are many conditions and disabilities in life that we seek to overcome. So when God commands, "Be fruitful and multiply," there is nothing wrong with seeking to fulfill this command. The Scripture consistently portrays God's compassion for the barren, as we see in the Bible narratives of Rachel and Hannah. It also often tells of the insatiable desire for children and the deep grief childlessness provokes (Gen. 30:1, 1 Sam. 1:5-11, Prov. 30:16). We find many examples in Scripture of married couples who overcame infertility and how God was pleased to intervene: Sarai, Rachel, Elizabeth, Hannah, and even Ruth, who had no children until she married Boaz. The wait was long and difficult, but the lessons learned along the way were precious. Their faith in God and His work in their life was the theme and where God's glory shone the brightest. God has not changed.

Fast forward again to 2020 and hindsight: our eldest child, a son, was born on February 1, 2002 after our first try with IVF. In the following seven years, God saw fit to give us four more sons, as we remained faithful to our promise to preserve life. We have seen God's hand through every step of the process, as we prayed and sought His glory and His best for our lives. At the outset of this whole journey God gave us Psalm 84:11: "For the Lord God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory; no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly." We clung to that hope before the prospect of any children and even in these years that have ensued.

Not every childless couple pursues or receives children, and the reasons are varied and innumerable. Sometimes the Giver simply gives Himself and that is enough. It is more than enough. Walking through the journey of infertility can be what brings us to this glorious revelation. I know with all my heart that God is always good in every situation and that His fingerprints are everywhere when we are truly seeking Him. Every couple is led along a different path: some pursue medical intervention, some adopt, some remain satisfied never having children and sometimes never knowing why. This is simply our story that we are glad to share with the hope and prayer that we might encourage others, and to lovingly dispel the thinking that the course we prayerfully chose could not have been God's will.