I’m writing this to myself, and to any woman out there whose journey to motherhood hasn’t looked at all like you would have expected. Maybe you’ve struggled with infertility, loss, or failed adoption. Maybe you don’t have as many children as you anticipated. Maybe you’re waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and still clinging onto hope.

I’m more than 11 years into these years of “trying to conceive.” Other than when I’ve been pregnant and postpartum, we’ve been trying to have children. I am so grateful for my one living child who is making a mess right beside me as I jot down these thoughts. However, I don’t think our family is complete, and I struggle on a daily basis to trust God’s timing in all of this. Seven years of unexplained infertility. Our first pregnancy brought our daughter – such a gift! Then an early miscarriage. Then a third trimester stillbirth. And now we wait. In a few months I’ll turn 42, and in the natural world, time is against us.

But somehow, I hold tightly to the belief that God is for us, believing that God’s timing for my children’s existence is exactly what God intends. Our daughter came into our lives later than anticipated, but we trust God’s divine purposes for her life. Our son’s life was not wasted. Noah’s life and his story have and will reached many people’s hearts with a greater understanding of faith. Whoever God has for our family in the future is exactly right. And if God has no more children for us, we trust God.

It’s not easy to trust God while we wait. It’s not easy to experience months and years of not being able to conceive. But after all these years, I can still say that God is good, and He knows what He’s doing.

This past month as I’ve felt discouraged, I’ve been reminded over and over again that God is in the middle of the details, His timing is right, and He hasn’t forgotten me.

“You’ve gotten pregnant naturally three times, we believe God can do it again,” my mom reminded me.

“God plans for our children to be born and to live at an exact time,” my friend said.

“I’m praying for you,” another said.

“I had my children well into my 40s, and I encourage you to go for it,” a new friend told me.

“Don’t be afraid, Zechariah, your prayers [for a child, later in life] have been heard,” preached the pastor. (See my new blog post Your Prayers Have Been Heard.)

Friends, the road to bearing children is long and discouraging for many of us.

This morning I read Mark 5, thinking about how Jesus cared enough about the “woman with the issue of blood” to stop in the middle of an urgent situation to heal her body and encourage her with His words. He cares enough about you and me to let us read that woman’s story… and He cares enough about you and me to intervene in our situations as well.

I also pause to remember that Ephesians 2:10 says that we are “…created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.” Esther 4:14 reminds us that God places people in positions in life for “such as time as this.”

Today let’s choose to trust that God is orchestrating our lives, our children’s lives, and our grandchildren’s lives. Today let’s choose to believe that God is lining up the good works He plans along with the times in which His people will live. Today let’s choose to believe that God has it all figured out, and we can trust Him.