Five Daughters

We are days away, perhaps hours away, from welcoming our sixth child into the world. She will be our fifth daughter. As much as I love each and every one of my girls, I am certain and happy that she will be her own person. If babies came out as repeats every now and then, new life would feel less new. A kink in the machine, a mistake of the maker. It deserves a moment of silent worship to realize this has never been the case in the history of the world. The fingerprint belonging solely to one human is quite the artistic feat. 

Waiting to meet this entirely original Boerckel woman has been all-consuming. Every tightening of my belly has me fluffing up my hospital bag and re-shaving my legs. I speed-waddle with alien energy and eat hot chicken wings, in an attempt to push her outside the cozy womb. I normally try not to obnoxiously insert myself into conversations, but these days I bring up the due date to random DMV attendants and other people who couldn’t care less. Everything seems to hinge on meeting her.

We call it nesting and maternal instinct. Hollywood makes pocketfuls of moolah because of the riotous stuff we do with baby on the brain. A mother’s adrenaline and anticipation make for good entertainment. However, instead of mere instinct, are we actually copying something larger, like the delight of our God in creation? Just before he breathed out saplings and wombats and rainforests, was his heart trembling with joy? Was God giddy, ever chuckling, when he made mustaches on monkeys or one of the eight carnivorous plants? Genesis 1 can feel repetitive and dull if we read God’s response of “very good” to what he’s made as though he is a bored-to-tears production manager at a toothpaste factory, whose job is quality control. 

My bet is that God loved birthing the universe and still loves creating, due to the simple observation that our world is no silent motion picture. He has filled every empty space with color and form. We could have lived a forestless existence, but he granted us the Redwoods. We didn’t require fall-colors and the smell of apple pies baking in the oven to live, but we enjoy them every autumn anyhow. Although I can’t explain chemistry or math past third-grade, I know it is quietly supporting the physical world in ways I depend on daily. 

It’s not only the unique stripe patterns of the zebra that make me think we worship a creator happy with what he’s made. It’s also his commitment to us after we were made and rejected him. Although recipients of everything, we have a history of treating him like the molding hot dish in the recesses of our refrigerator. We would think this rude rejection would usher forth only wrath and abandonment. Or at best, apathy. But he reacts unlike anything we’ve known because in addition to creating the mountain goat and porous pink corral, he also created a book. In this book, from its’ beginning to end, he promises to complete the work he began. Even when it requires blood. 

When my daughter is screaming her lungs out in the world for the first time, the nurses will encourage skin-to-skin contact. They know babies need their mother’s warmth and scent to thrive. In addition to delighting in creating us, God delights to keep us. Not at arm’s length, but near.