My sister just had a baby. He is precious and perfect; waking up to the world and its wonder, his eyes hesitant to open, his throat full of infant song.
I loved him immediately, just like I knew I would. He belongs here. He fits right into his mama’s arms.
I want him to have the best life, and I think he will–because he has amazing parents and because I’m hoping for it. I think that’s why newborn babies are always such a wonder–it’s because their lives are a huge blank slate. Everything is in front of them. You can see it in their sleepy eyes and their quizzical expressions when they dream. They are mystery wrapped up in wonder. We meet a tiny, inscrutable stranger and welcome him like a celebrity. He can do no wrong. We are just getting to know him, after all.
Along the line of new babies, I’ve always pondered how the Old Testament treats birth and babyhood. Historically there were midwives and birthing stools–Exodus is clear on how the Hebrew ladies did their thing–and surely plenty of rest and extra raisin cakes for the hungry mom. Nursing was a common sight back in the day, for there was no alternative. The first thing Moses’ adoptive mom said when she pulled him out of the watery basket was, “go get someone who can feed this baby!” Thank heavens it was Moses’ own birth mother, an immediate comfort to the hungry baby, her familiar voice and softness holding him again.
Isaiah compares the affection of the Father for his children to a nursing mama:
“I will give Jerusalem a river of peace and the wealth of nations like a flowing stream; you will nurse and be carried in her arms and dandled on her knees. As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.”
Isaiah 66:12, 13
I can see my sister whispering to her baby, her lips brushing his head, inhaling his feathery little noggin. A mama kissing and loving her infant, gently rocking him, swaddling, changing, feeding. God feels this way about us, his people. He is motherly in his affection, tenderly and endlessly picking us up, dusting us off.
But there is another thing about babies we conveniently forget, charmed by the new baby smell and miracle of life. And I suppose we forget it about ourselves, too.
It is this: we are born with a wicked condition–a broken, evil heart. Our will from birth is betrayal. Our original credo: to know good and evil.
Not to be satisfied in our Creator, but to challenge Him. To question Him, again and again, if He really loves us.
King David cried out, “surely in sin my mother conceived me!”–not that his mother committed sin in the act of conceiving, but that as humans we are steeped in sin from the get-go, incapable of pleasing God in any fashion. It was a crushing blow to the psalmist when he realized it. A revelation of my wickedness before a holy God.
Maybe we are not so precious as we think.
This is how God dealt with sinners according to the Israelites–He gave them rules.
After giving birth, there will be a time of uncleanliness plus time to abstain from sexual relations.
After giving birth, the male child is to be circumcised, specifically on the eighth day.
After giving birth, the parents are to bring a sacrifice to the altar to make atonement for the mother’s bleeding.
These were serious rules, not some hokey-pokey game. I’m afraid I cringed when I would read these non-negotiables in Leviticus in my read-the-Bible-in-a-year plan. Why did God have to make having a new baby seem so ugly? It might’ve served some obscure purpose back then, but how is it relevant now?
Neighbors would know if you followed God’s family planning rule or slipped up after a few weeks (40 days for a boy, 80 days for a girl). Circumcision wasn’t an elective, simple procedure with Tylenol and sugar water waiting on the other side. It was a costly thing to come up with a lamb and a dove. Even Jesus’ parents had to settle for two doves.
These were some serious terms that forced a parent to answer more serious questions.
How committed, really, are you to raising a sinner? To acknowledge the weight of responsibility before God? What is this trade-off, this parenthood experience?
The old rules weren’t to pour rain on the celebration of new life, but to remind the new family of the seriousness of raising a sinner. Yes, you’ll inhale that newborn scent, but it comes at a hefty price–that which is cursed. Surely we are steeped in sin from the get-go!
How wonderful Jesus became the lamb for us, blood spilled to cover my sin, the sacrifice that ended a million sacrifices and gave us peace with God.
I’m thankful for the Word and its parallels to every part of my life: that physical babies are beautiful, unique gifts–but an even better birth to celebrate is new life in Jesus.
The old Jewish rules that seemed so explicit and harsh are now freedom-producing spiritual truths:
Postpartum recovery is a healing time; post-rebirth, there also seems to be a period or periods of abstinence where a believer might remove herself from the world to get her feet solidly planted on the ground. We don’t do these things because we are rule-bound, dogmatic legalists, but because it proves to be beneficial, refreshing, and life-giving.
The circumcision now is evident as the Holy Spirit serving as a seal of our redemption, but there is also a continual circumcision of the heart–His pruning to make us more fruitful. It’s still often painful, as flesh-denying goes–but the world recognizes us as God’s people through this radical spiritual “circumcision”. We are set apart, not forever dabbling in petty sin or swimming downstream with culture. We belong to Him, and people know it.
And we no longer take animals for the priests to butcher, but we offer our lives now as a living sacrifice. This means the stuff of everyday–the coffee-drinking, husband-loving, paycheck-making, child-raising, neighbor-loving life. The I-want-to-sit-down-and-close-my-eyes-but-have-to-bathe-and-feed-another-human-being life. The-God-you’re-going-to-have-to-help-me-out-here-because-I’m-at-my-wit’s-end life.
And so I’ve wondered over the years at baby dedications at local churches through the years. All those precious little people, nursed, swaddled, dandled on their mama’s knees, dressed up in their prettiest. It only tells half the story.
Each of my babies was born and invited to a special service within a month of their birth, but I could never hop on stage, smile the smile and accept the prayers and cupcakes.
I never knew why I felt this way–only that it felt too ceremonial and I was disturbed by how easily the church ladies marked it on the calendar. I mostly remember making uncomfortable jokes with whomever shared our pew that day–welp, guess we’re just raising little heathens!
But truly, I knew we were blessed to be raising even heathens. Sometimes–and especially when we had babies–I couldn’t even be nice to my husband on a Sunday morning. It was enough, letting my yes be yes, my no be no, and not faking a hyper-spirituality to the applause of church ladies.
I’ve learned it is better to gain an understanding of why we do things before we jump in and assume we’re doing what God wants.
Tell me–isn’t it solemn to spiritually mirror the life of the early Israelites? The set-apartness, the awareness?
What is more honorable, to dress the baby up one day and make public promises, your hand on a Bible? You can make those church ladies happy today and send the baby to daycare in the morning–back to business as usual.
Or is it to allow oneself to be reminded, day to day, that our children are in dire need of a Savior? That even though we struggle, it’s also a joy to partake in spiritual abstinence, circumcision, sacrifice–because by living this set-apart life our kids begin to taste freedom in Christ.
What a gift from the Father–to know He adores babies and adores us! Even more, what a wonder–that He provided a substitute for our sin problem, and in crushing His own precious son He delivered us from life under the Law. He redeemed us so we might become His children.
And how incredible, that he gives us our own delightful, precious babes so we might help them grow up, far as the curse is found.
