May-June 1997
PERSPECTIVE
A Father's Day Gift
God still makes miracles happen.
by Michael Warren
As I write this, I do not yet know the name of my son. I saw him for the first time only a short while ago, on a monochrome screen, flailing his little arms and legs.
The ultrasound image reveals only the sketchy outline of a human being, and for the next few months I am left to fill in the details with my imagination.
Will he have LuAnne's green eyes and her passion? Will he possess his father's skill at basketball? (I certainly hope not.)
LuAnne has spent the past weeks on a tireless and joyful campaign of shopping, painting and sewing. She has created a world for our son in dusty shades of tan and blue that will be filled with scenes from Noah's ark.
She has set about this business as though it were her great calling in life, and I'm beginning to recognize it as exactly that. It's a wild time around the Warren household, and fixin' to get wilder.
I grant that every child is a miracle and that expectant parents must feel a sense of wonder as they wait. Creating life, after all, has always been God's work.
Giving Up Hope
But six months ago, the sight of a baby was enough to send my wife into anguished tears. Three years after the verdict of infertility and the costly failure of attempting treatment, I had given up any expectation of having our own children.
LuAnne's hope never died, though at times I wished it would have, if only to save her from the continuing agony of disappointment. For me, the first strong desire to be a parent emerged out of imagining what I had lost.
Then came the unexpected. It turns out that God managed a miracle without the help of Pergonal. The head of the fertility clinic, who told us it would be impossible for us to conceive on our own, didn't want to hear about it when LuAnne told him it was the result of answered prayer. So it goes.
Like John the Baptist's father, I feel struck dumb by the experience. Me, a father? How is this possible?
Before the Big Event
My interaction with infants has been pretty slim up to this point. I can't recall ever volunteering to hold a baby. But I've been trying to make up for lost time.
In the past several months, I have taken advantage of baby-holding opportunities, hoping to squeeze in a bit of practice before the main event.
Until now, parenting issues interested me only as a topic of theoretical debate. I fancy myself as a take-no-guff, lay-down-the-law kind of parent. (Of course, you'd never suspect this by observing my dog, who is the most indulged and poorly disciplined creature on the block.)
These days I pester friends about the really urgent matters: How much and how often do infants eat? Does every 2-year-old throw tantrums? How much television do you let your kids watch? How many times can a child really watch The Lion King? 100? 1,000? How do you survive it?
By the time this article finds its way into print, I will have learned how to change diapers and will have taken sides in the cloth vs. disposables debate.
Undoubtedly, I will have become proficient in the delicate art of baby holding. And by the time you read this, my son will have a name.
In the meantime, like my own dad once did, I pray to God for strength and wisdom. I pray that my Father in heaven will make me the kind of father who reflects his faithfulness and love.
And this Father's Day, I thank him for his unexpected gift.