- Psalm 139:13-14
I couldn't tell you how many times I have turned to this verse in seasons of uncertainty. Too many to count. I can only tell you about the time I first came across it and how it changed my perspective on my life and the life of my then tiny baby daughter, Sienna Rose.
At just weeks old, Sienna required open heart surgery. She was in congestive heart failure caused by two very large holes in her heart - a ventricular septal defect and an atrial septal defect. A week prior to the surgery, we had called 911 because she had turned blue during a feeding and stopped breathing. The surgery was scary but necessary in order to save her life so we were grateful that we had what seemed to be a relatively simple solution to healing her body: stitch up the holes and she will be Whole.
This in and of itself would have been considered a major challenge but, the surgery was only the beginning. The day that she was removed from the vent, the day before we were to be discharged from the hospital, the hospital's geneticist gave us the crushing news that our daughter has Smith-Magenis Syndrome. While describing that Smith-Magenis Syndrome is a microdeletion in the 17th chromosome that results in lifelong global developmental delays, sleep deficits and behavioral and medical issues, she also very matter-of-factly laid out the cause: "These things are random occurrences and unfortunately you are just unlucky. Most of the time, Mother Nature is very good about weeding out these genetic errors through miscarriage. But, in some cases that doesn't happen and the result is a child with special needs."
Thinking of my precious daughter as an error that my body should have known to expel immediately made me angry at myself and at "Mother Nature". Unlucky and random were not words that belonged in the same sentence as the birth of my firstborn child, whom I considered to be a gift from God, until this point. The news flattened me and I spiraled into a deep depression.
Several weeks, or maybe months, later, I turned on Joyce Meyer's program after my sister suggested I watch it. Psalm 139 was the topic of one of her first teachings I had ever seen. Learning that God is no respector of persons, this verse told me that Sienna was created just as He intended. The child who I had come to see as broken and incomplete was being portrayed by God's Word as a Wonderful Work. She is not a scientific mistake. Her life is rich with Purpose and Meaning. And, by the way....so is mine.
This was a huge revelation for me and the start of a major transformation in me. Did I even know that I had a purpose prior to discovering that she had one? If I did, I clearly had not searched very deeply for it or cared much enough to find it. But, now, the realization of her purpose has led me into a passionate search for mine. And while the questions have not all been answered, I do know that my purpose is greater than myself. It is to be as outstretched as far as I can reach, to be connected to the hurting world and to love just as He loved: unconditionally and universally. Admittedly, I am a work in progress and Sienna's future is uncertain. Sometimes, I even catch myself describing the syndrome just as it was described to me and I have to remind myself of what the scripture says. I am so grateful that, on the days I worry about her or I question my own life, I can turn to Psalm 139 for strength and comfort. The following passage comes from the front of a congratulatory card we received shortly after her birth and it describes Psalm 139 beautifully:
JUST THINK
Your DAUGHTER is here not by chance,
but by God's choosing.
His hand formed her
and made her the person she is.
He compares her to no one else -
she is one of a kind.
She will lack nothing
that His grace can't give her.
He has allowed her to be here
at this time in history
to fulfill His special purpose
for this generation.
My prayer is that we may all come to know that God has a purpose for each one of our lives and that we may have the courage and the faith to pursue it.
