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My husband and I disagree about pursuing infertility treatments.
Husband: God has given us doctors for a reason. They can help heal us, working through Him to accomplish His plans and purposes. (In other words, let’s try fertility medications or IUI or IVF.)
Me: Why would we try to force my body to get pregnant if it’s not something that would happen “naturally”? If God wanted me to have a child, then surely He would give me one naturally. Plus, is IVF or even taking fertility meds “right”? I don’t want to put my body through that or even have to consider the hard questions involved. (In other words, let’s just avoid the whole ethical and moral debate of this and wait for pregnancy to happen naturally…or pursue adoption.)
Let’s just say we’re pretty set in our opinions.
And these two opinions are a bit hard to reconcile…are they not? My husband would never try to convince me to do something of this magnitude that I wasn’t sure about (not to mention something that is just plain hard on a woman’s body), and I would never try to convince my husband that we need to adopt if he’s not 110% on board.
So what do you do when you disagree on something….so, well, big?
Pray, of course. Pray that God would make my husband realize that waiting longer or adoption is clearly the “better” choice.
(Just kidding.)
Really, I’ve been praying that God would open up one of our hearts to the “other” option. And in the meantime, there’s nothing we can do but wait. Wait. Story of an infertile woman’s life, right?
And keep praying about the whole “opening up one of our hearts” thing.
You can probably guess where this is headed.
The story of Naaman
(Well, okay, maybe you wouldn’t have guessed this was headed to the Biblical story of Naaman.)
Anyway, in re-reading the Old Testament this summer, I came across this story. If you don’t recall it, check out 2 Kings 5.
Brief recap:
Naaman was a “great man” and a “valiant soldier,” but he had leprosy. (By the way, I think even us “Bible readers” forget how terrible leprosy really was. Check out this description of it from the Enduring Word Commentary):
“Ancient leprosy began as small, red spots on the skin. Before too long the spots got bigger, and started to turn white, with sort of a shiny, or scaly appearance. Pretty soon the spots spread over the whole body and hair began to fall out – first from the head, then even from the eyebrows. As things got worse, fingernails and toenails become loose; they start to rot and eventually fell off. Then the joints of fingers and toes began to rot and fall off piece by piece. Gums began to shrink and they couldn’t hold the teeth anymore, so each of them was lost. Leprosy kept eating away at the face until literally the nose, the palate, and even the eyes rotted – and the victim wasted away until death.”
enduring word commentary
Anyway. Now that you have that bright and cheery picture in your mind, back to Naaman. He had leprosy, and he was told by his young Israelite servant girl that he should go to the king of Israel to be cured. Long story short, the king didn’t cure him, but Elisha heard about it and sent for him. Elisha told Naaman that he would be healed if he washed himself in the Jordan seven times.
And here’s where the story gets interesting: Naaman went away angry.
My reaction: How could he possibly be angry when he had just been offered healing of this terrible and debilitating disease?
Simple: God’s way of healing wasn’t what Naaman expected or wanted. Personally, I think he was also a little afraid of what people would think of this remedy, given that it required him to wash in a river like the Jordan. He says in verses 10-11:
“I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy. Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?” So he turned and went off in a rage.
2 kings 5:11-12
How insane is it that Naaman focused only on the how of the healing rather than on the healing itself? (Remember how terrible leprosy was?) Naaman was outraged because God’s method of healing was not what he expected — it required him to do something he didn’t want to do. How dare God ask him to bathe in the Jordan in Israel rather than in the “better” rivers of the Damascus? Or why even require him do anything? Why wouldn’t Elisha just wave his hand for Naaman to be cured?!
God’s way
And that’s when I start to wonder if maybe I’m guilty of telling God how to heal me, too.
God, if you really wanted me to have children, you would just wave your hand here and allow me to get pregnant naturally — why would you make me take medications or undergo something like IUI or IVF?
God, there’s no way you’d ever heal me through medications or treatments! That’s ridiculous and absurd. I don’t even know if it’s “right.” Surely I would fall pregnant naturally if it was your will…and if not, adoption must be right.
Am I pulling a Naaman? When fertility specialists recommend I try Clomid or IUI or IVF and I walk away outraged and upset, could this be God offering me a way to healing that I’m too angry to accept?
Maybe. I don’t claim to have all of the answers, and I’m still not entirely sure. But one thing I have realized: I immediately ruled out IVF from the start because it wasn’t what I thought was right. I wasn’t trying to listen to God; I was making decisions based on what I wanted or didn’t want to do.
I recognize now that God sometimes works in ways that don’t seem “right” to us or to the world, in ways that require us to humble ourselves before Him. And if you didn’t get to the end of the story, Naaman’s servants talk some sense into him: They told him that if Elisha would’ve asked Naaman to do something that looked “great,” he would’ve done it in an instant. Humbled, Naaman went to the Jordan and was healed.
Is God trying to humble you, too?
Just to be clear: I am by no means telling you what God wants you to do in your particular situation — His plan is not the same for every person. His plan for me (and you) may indeed be to wait. Or it may be to adopt. Or maybe it’s to do IVF. This isn’t an argument about what is the “right” thing to do.
But it is a challenge to ask yourself whether or not your convictions are from God…or from yourself. Are you doing what you want to do…or what God is asking you to do? Maybe you — like me — need to stop ruling out options because it’s not what you had in mind. Maybe you need to be reminded to listen to God’s calling and way of healing…especially if it’s not what you expected.
