Life. Beginning and endings.

Psalm 139:13–16

13 For you created my inmost being;v

you knit me togetherw in my mother’s womb.x

14 I praise youy because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; 

your works are wonderful,z

I know that full well. 

15 My frame was not hidden from you 

when I was madea in the secret place, 

when I was woven togetherb in the depths of the earth.c

16 Your eyes saw my unformed body; 

all the days ordainedd for me were written in your book 

before one of them came to be. 

Life. Beginnings and endings. I've been thinking about these a lot lately. Right now I am sitting at my grandmother's bedside, wondering when she will draw her last breath. It could be the next one. It could be in a few hours. Or tomorrow. But we know it will be soon. And we have been preparing our hearts for this time.

And at the same time that we are preparing for my grandmother's passing, we are preparing for my grandson's arrival to the world. The shower to celebrate his imminent arrival is in a few short days. To say that I am excited about his arrival would be a gross understatement. I have bought really every baby thing there is to be had and planned activities to do with him that will take until he starts college to accomplish. Yeah, it's going to be wonderful.

My husband and I built our family by adoption. Both of our girls came to be ours with the help of a wonderful adoption attorney and two brave and loving birthmothers. I have grown up believing in God and the gospel of Jesus Christ, but it wasn't until my girls came into my life that I had a deeper understanding of the miracle of God's perfect ways. It wasn't a random accident that these beautiful girls are ours. That they didn't end up with other parents. God saw and he knew. As he always does.

And now, as I watch my oldest daughter grow our precious grandson, day by day, marveling with every new milestone ("Hey mom, the book says he grew fingernails this week!") and every fuzzy but completely perfect ultrasound photograph, I am in awe of God once again. Those cells did not randomly come together. My daughter's body knowing how to make a perfect human was not an accident. Those cells are the results of the perfect blueprint that God has for my grandson. For the son of Lauren and Robbie, and no one else. A friend said to me this week that she didn't know how someone could witness the miracle of pregnancy and birth and not believe in God. I completely agree.

I am having similar thoughts sitting beside my grandmother in her final moments. Only more along the lines of how do people who don't believe in God get through these moments? If we thought she wasn't going to a better place? If we thought this was just the end? If we thought there wasn't a Jesus that paid the price for all our sins? If we had no hope? I have such peace in knowing that God is ahead and THE head of all of this. He has this all written out in a beautiful plan and is at the end, victorious. I have peace knowing that she will be rejoined with my grandfather after 71 years of marriage and 3.5 years apart. Every day of her 92 years has a been a thread in God's perfectly woven plan.

I have peace knowing that I am also involved in this perfect plan. I am also a thread. My grandson will be a thread. We are all threads. And I am looking forward to seeing what God has planned for us all.