Waiting patiently and expectantly:

I’ve been getting so many messages on waiting for the past 2 days that it is obvious to me that God wants me to understand why we go through this waiting process and how to deal with it.  First I read about it in Joy.ce’s book Bat.tlefie.ld of the mi.nd, then I heard a message from her yesterday on TV and then this morning I read about waiting in my Bible study.  Now I have blogged about waiting quite a bit recently, but obviously this is a topic that I need to revisit often…

Psalm 130:5-6 (NIV):  “⁵I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope.  ⁶ My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning.”

Let me start with the first message from Joy.ce on waiting patiently and she says that:  “Patience is the ability to keep a good attitude while waiting.  Waiting is part of life.  Many people don’t “wait well”, and yet we actually spend more time in our lives waiting than we do receiving.  We need to learn to enjoy where we are on our way to where we are going!

Hebrews 10:36 (NIV):  “³⁶ You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.”  This scripture tells us that without patience and endurance we will not receive the promises of God and look what Hebrews 6:12 (NIV) says:  “¹² We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.”

The proud man runs in the strength of his own flesh and tries to make things happen in his own timing.  Pride says, “I’m ready now!”  Humility says, “God knows best, and He will not be late!”  A humble man waits patiently; he actually has a “reverential fear” of moving in the strength of his own flesh.  But a proud man tries one thing after another, all to no avail.

Proverbs 16:25 (NIV):  “²⁵There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.”

We must learn that sometimes in the spiritual realm a straight line is not the shortest distance between us and where we want to be.  It may just be the shortest distance to destruction!  We must learn to be patient and wait on the Lord, even if it seems that He is taking us in a roundabout way to get to our desired destination.

There are multitudes of unhappy, unfulfilled Christians in the world simply because they are busy trying to make something happen, instead of waiting patiently for God to bring things to pass in His own time and His own way.  When you are trying to wait on God, the devil will pound your mind continuously demanding that you “do something.”  He wants to move you in fleshly zeal because he knows that the flesh profits nothing. 

John 6:63 (NIV):  “⁶³ The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.”

Romans 13:14 (Amp):  “¹⁴But clothe yourself with the Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah), and make no provision for [indulging] the flesh [put a stop to thinking about the evil cravings of your physical nature] to [gratify its] desires (lusts).”

Impatience is a sign of pride, and the only way to answer pride is humility.

1 Peter 5:6 (Amp):  “⁶Therefore humble yourselves [demote, lower yourselves in your own estimation] under the mighty hand of God, that in due time He may exalt you,”

This phrase “lower yourself in your own estimation” does not mean to think badly of yourself.  It simply means, “don’t think you can solve all your problems on your own.”  Instead of pridefully taking matters in our own hands, we must humble ourselves under God’s mighty hand.  When he knows that the time is right, He will exalt us and lift us up.

As we wait on God and refuse to move in fleshly zeal, there is a “dying to self” that takes place.  We begin to die to our own ways and our own timing and to become alive to God’s will and way for us.  We should always be promptly obedient to do whatever God tells us to do, but we should have a godly fear of fleshly pride.  Remember it is pride that is at the root of impatience.  The proud man says, “please don’t make me wait for anything; I deserve everything immediately.”

When you are tempted to become frustrated and impatient, I recommend that you begin to say, “Lord, I want Your will in Your timing.  I do not want to be ahead of You, nor do I want to be behind you.  Help me, Father, to wait patiently on You!”

I have previously blogged about waiting expectantly here, but in the other message of Joy.ce there was more on that topic and I feel I need to share that with you as well.

Joy.ce said:  “We have the wrong idea about waiting.  We think it’s a passive action, that we should do nothing while we wait.

Actually it’s one of the most spiritually active times in your life.  If you study the word wait in Greek you will discover that it means to be expecting, looking for, longing for, with an outstretched hand and outstretched heart for all the goodness of God to show up in your life.

The truth of the matter is that when we get our breakthrough, God has been working in our life for a long time already.  Just because you don’t see anything or don’t feel anything, it doesn’t mean that God is not working.  God is working in our lives as long as we believe and pray.   We have to learn to look in the spirit; we have to learn to see with a spiritual eye.

Psalm 62:1 (Amp):  “¹FOR GOD alone my soul waits in silence; from Him comes my salvation.”

Who are you waiting on?  The government?  Your friends?  God did not create you for dependency on a bunch of other people and a bunch of things, but He wants us to depend on Him and he wants us to let Him work within us and to do a greater thing than what we possibly can imagine.
 
Joy.ce read a book from An.drew Mur.ray called: The belie.vers se.cret on wait.ing on God.  She learnt from that book that we have to live in a ready state.  I’m ready God!  You have to believe that today is the day!  Today is the day of my breakthrough!  You don’t want to be in a state of:  Well, who knows when I’ll get a job.  Who knows – I guess I’ll lose my house…  The enemy loves it when we get into agreement with him.  When we expect bad things we open the door for the devil. When we expect good things we open the door for God.

Waiting on God is not a passive, lazy thing, but it is in your heart aggressively expecting God.  It is to live with that enthusiasm that today something good is going to happen to me!  Today I’m going to have favour where ever I go!  Today my phone is going to ring with good news!  Today is my day!  Today I’m going to feel better than I did yesterday!  Today God’s healing power is working in me!  We must be aggressively expecting God to provide abundantly for all that we need.  Andrew Murray says we ought to live with a Holy expectancy.

See it is not disrespectful to say, “God, I’m expecting you to fulfil every promise that you’ve been giving me through Your Word.  I’m expecting You.”  God likes that!

Lamentations 3:25 (NIV):  “²⁵The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him;”

What gives you the right to go to God?  You have a need and you have the Word (the Bible).”

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2010 in hindsight:

Last year was rough. One of the toughest ever, but I think also one of the most memorable. So much happened and although I felt at times that I would not survive it, I did! I don’t want to complain in this post, because you all know by know what my hardships were. Instead I want to marvel at God – how absolutely awsome He is and what He did for us.

When I think back to the beginning of the year I couldn’t wait to get my hysteroscopy over and done with, to remove the polyp and get going with my FET. The operation was really easy and I healed well. I had read up a lot about intralipids and I just had this feeling that the intralipids was what I needed to get pregnant and even though my FS did not believe it would work I was able to convince him that it could not hurt to try it.

In February we went ahead with a natural FET – no medication before hand as the FS explained to me that high levels of oestrogen was causing the polyps. I had a perfect follicle and lining and I was triggered when the follicle was big enough. I had 9 embryo’s left from my previous IVF. With my previous IVF they transferred three 8 cell embryo’s on day 3 and the rest were all frozen. There were 2 more 8 cell embryo’s frozen, some 6 cells, some 4 cells and even a 2 cell. I knew not all were good enough, but I had hoped that I would at least be able to do 2 FET’s. On ET day I was told only 2 survived the thaw out of the 9. Those 2 were only 3 cells each and bad quality – the worst quality they rate at my clinic. So it was no surprise that even though I had the intralipids for the first time I didn’t get pregnant. Intralipids cannot fix bad quality embryo’s. It was still a shock and a big disappointment to me to get the news of a BFN only a few days before my birthday. The interesting thing was that this time my beta was 2. Previously I always got a beta of <5 on the report. I don’t know whether it meant something or not, it was still a BFN, but it was certainly the first time that I knew some HCG was in my body.

I went to see my FS about 2 weeks later and he suggested that we do a mini IVF. For 3 reasons: 1. He didn’t want to give me too strong medication as it could cause another polyp, 2. I stimmed well, I made 14 eggs with both previous IVF’s which my FS found that to be too much anyway, and 3. My embryo’s did not do well with the freezing and thawing process and that was another reason not to get too many embryo’s. Initially we said the FET’s would be our last chance, but when the FS suggested the mini IVF, and the costs were quite a bit less than a normal IVF, we decided to make a plan and go ahead with it.

I started writing in the beginning of the year, but I was not comfortable to share it with anyone. It did not come easy, but I managed to write down some stuff that was incredibly hard to admit to myself let alone anyone else. Some time in March I felt compelled to start this blog, but the writing style and topics were so different to what I wrote about previously. This time it was not hard to write at all. It came easy and I loved it. I think most of it did not come from me, but was inspired by the Holy Spirit, because every time I try to write something about other stuff, it’s hard again, and just does not seem to work…

At first when I got my BFP I found it strange to have battled infertility for 10.5 years and suddenly only a month after I started my blog I’m pregnant. How’s that for timing? I cannot believe that it was coincidence. Another thing that I realized much later was that just after I started my blog, Shumi started to get sick. I just didn’t realize it at the time. In the first week of April Shumi started to get nosebleeds, not a lot and not too often, but enough for me to take him to the vet. I remember this as it was around his birthday which is the 5th of April. The vet mentioned that it could be cancer, but I refused to even entertain the thought. The bleeding stopped after the visit to the vet and I didn’t think about it again until a few months later. My mom had also just stopped her radiation treatment and we were all hopeful that she was completely healed.

Our pregnancy was off course the highlight of the year – something that was just a dream come true and a absolute miracle to us. I cannot tell you in words the joy we felt in knowing that eventually I was pregnant. The thought of miscarriage did not even cross my mind. I always thought that God would protect me from miscarriage – we battled so long to get pregnant, I just assumed that everything would go well afterwards, that we deserved a problem free pregnancy. Or in the least that God would not take away the miracle that He gave us in the first place. I was so wrong in my thinking!

But I did miscarry and shortly afterwards Shumi got sick again and was diagnosed with cancer, my mom found out she had to go for Chemo therapy, because the PET scan was inconclusive and they could not say whether she had cancer or not, so it was best to be cautious and treat her for cancer…

That was when I felt the bottom had dropped out completely. I had lost our miracle baby and the closest thing to a child of our own was our beloved dog Shumi, who was terminally ill, and more than 1 vet told us there is nothing they can do for him, and all of that together with my mom’s illness was just about too much to handle. I felt like I was going to lose my mind, and I had so many questions regarding why this was happening to us. One day I read an article in the “Joy” magazine about Jo.hn G La.ke Mini.stries after I begged God to give me answers to all my questions. That led me to listen to their course “The Di.vine Hea.ling Tech.nician” and that opened my eyes to a whole different side of God, and Jesus Christ and my view on Christianity. God also led me to some other resources that confirmed what I learnt there, and if you look back to my previous posts you will see that I mention them all.

So many of the things I believed were proven wrong. I learnt that God does not cause or even allow illness, or infertility or miscarriages. I learnt that the person to blame was the devil, not God. I learnt that I was doing a lot of stuff wrong and that my wrong actions allowed these bad things to happen. I learnt to trust God completely, and to stop trusting in myself, medicine and doctors. I’m not saying it’s wrong to trust in medicine or doctors, but that in certain instances they will still fail you, and then there is nothing else you can trust in but God, and that was what I had to do. I had to learn to be patient, to be at peace, to stop worrying and find rest with God. I learnt there is power in the Word of God, and the words we speak and the thoughts we think. If those words or thoughts are negative, then it will influence your life negatively, and if you are positive it will influence your life positively. I learnt to see and appreciate the small miracles from day to day. I learnt to accept and receive God’s blessings and love, to stay close to Him and let Him comfort me. I learnt to start expecting good things to happen, and not to get discouraged when they don’t happen as quickly as I would like it to happen. I learnt to be obedient to God and do what He requires from me.

I was really impatient in the beginning when I learnt about God’s healing power – I wanted instant healing, like you read about in the Bible, but I learnt that it does not always happen instantly. I believe it works differently for everybody, because we don’t always understand or learn our lessons quickly. When I did not see results quickly I tried to get help from others, but it seems God wanted me to deal with this on my own. I get the idea He wants me to grow and learn from this, and not get anyone else to fix it for me. At the moment we haven’t had a breakthrough yet, but I’m expecting it any day now.

My mom will probably go for another PET scan soon, and I’m hoping that this time there will be no doubt that she is completely healed from her cancer. She still has some IBS symptoms, she was admitted to hospital about a week before Christmas with terrible pain, but it turned out to be the after effects of the barium enema and nothing serious. She tells me she feels better every day.

I’m expecting a pregnancy every month, so far it hasn’t happened, but it also hasn’t discouraged me from hoping that this month will be it. What I have found is that my cycles are getting longer again and my lutual phase is longer, the spotting that I had before AF arrives is getting less again, my CM is becoming more like egg white consistency again and I have no more pain assocated with the adenomyosis like previous months. I can feel the inside of my pelvic area is more sensitive during ovulation, so I’m assuming it’s ovulation pains, which I normally also never feel.

Shumi is much better – he has no more snot, and his eye looks good, but he has had quite a bit of nose bleeds again. There is still some swelling on top of his nose and his nose is still mostly blocked, but he has a lot of energy, he eats well and looks well. It is almost 6 months after the vet said that he will only live a “couple” of months.

So in summary: It was a hard year, with intensely sad moments that I did not know how to cope with or survive at the time, but I have learnt and grown so much and God has been such a rock for me to lean on. I have felt His intense love for me, I realised that He hurts just as much as we do in the difficult moments, and that He just wants all that is good for us.   So I cannot say that 2010 was just a bad year – it was also a good year! But I’m not so brave to say that I would do it again though!

Psalm 50:14-15(NIV): “¹⁴ Sacrifice thank- offerings to God, fulfil your vows to the Most High, ¹⁵ and call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honour me.”

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Common misconceptions from the book of Job:

I got this e-book from Pastor A, who we saw for healing a while back:  Are you rea.dy for your Hea.ling? By Dr Fr.ed Chil.ds.  I’m still reading it, but there is a very good chapter about Job in there and I would like to quote from it.  You see I’ve been thinking about all the stuff that went wrong recently and wondering why and what can I do about it.  I cannot compare my life at all with Job, but it’s been really hard to deal with for me, and I need to get some clarity about it all.  This helped me a lot:

In the book Dr Fr.ed Chil.ds says that:  Job had limited knowledge of God and there are five reasons for that:

1. “Job had no written Word of God so he had no references to teach him about God.  Job had no Bible.
2. Living east of Palestine in the days of Isaac and Jacob means that Job was not a member of the chosen family.  As Ephesians 2:12 (NIV) says:  “¹² remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world.”
3. Job had no preacher or prophet to instruct him.
4. Job had no covenant because he was not of Abrahams seed.
5. Job did not have the Holy Gost to lead or guide him.  Job was spiritually dead.

 How did Job acquire his knowledge of God?

Job learned about God through both his conscience and through creation (or nature).  Job lived in the days of Isaac and Jacob who had a promise of which he had no part.  Like all humans he had a conscience that allowed him to differentiate between what was right and wrong.  Job learned a limited amount about God through God dealing with his conscience.  Job was also capable of discovering certain principles of God simply by observing creation, or nature.

Romans 1:19-20 (NIV)  tells us that even without God’s word, man can still learn about God through the things we observe in nature or creation:  “¹⁹ since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  ²⁰ For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities— his eternal power and divine nature— have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”

Nonetheless we can still learn to some degree.  For example, 1 Corinthians 11:14 (NIV) says:  “¹⁴ Does not the very nature of things teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a disgrace to him?”   If we can learn the length of a man’s hair from observing nature, then so could Job.  But it’s only correct to state that Job’s understanding of God was less than complete and accurate.  Neither conscience nor nature provided Job with much light or knowledge about God, but it was all he had. 

So let us use the New Testament or greater light to interpret the book of Job.  The only New Testament scripture pertaining to Job is James 5:11 (KJV) which says:  “¹¹Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.”

Notice first what James does not say.  James never speaks of Job’s suffering, but tells us to be inspired by Job’s patience and endurance and by something called the end of the Lord.  New Testament patience is defined as remaining constant during external pressure or circumstance.  Job was patient.  He never stopped worshipping God nor did he curse God.  That was what the devil wanted Job to do and Job did not yield to it. What then do we see about the end of the Lord?  It reveals that He is pitiful (compassionate) and of tender mercy.  The end of the Lord tells us that if we endure He will bring us back to the top.  The lives of Moses, Caleb, Daniel, Joseph, Esther, Ruth, and David do not inspire us because of how they suffered, but how they ended up!

Interestingly, God never addressed Job’s sufferings

Take note that not one time does God address the suffering of Job.  The reason is both astounding and simple:  the book of Job is not about suffering.  It is about how the Lord brings deliverance, redemption, and restoration to all who endure.  The message of the book of Job is not about how Job suffered, but how a man with no Bible, no prophet, no preacher, no promises, no covenant, and was spiritually dead (Job was not born again) had his health, wealth, and family relationships restored back to him.  We (on the other hand) have the Bible, prophets, preachers, promises, covenant, and the Holy Ghost living inside and guiding us.  The first and oldest book of the Bible was not written about suffering, but of restoration.

Our misconceptions and Job’s 5 mistakes:

There are 5 implausible things that Job and his friends say in the debate.  Sadly many preachers still use them to teach others about God.  Remember this debate rages between 4 men who have little to no knowledge about God.  Pastors, theologians, and Bible scholars for years have used these 36 debate chapters to define God and yet these men had very little knowledge of God.

How did these 4 men come to their conclusions?  Men will always arrive at erroneous conclusions when they interpret God in light of their circumstances void of the Bible.  The study of this debate will serve to illuminate the mistakes and wrong perceptions that men have of God when they interpret God through their circumstances and not through His Word.

Mistake # 1:  Job 1:21 (NIV) says:  “²¹ Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall depart. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised.”

Job’s wrong conclusion:  Since the Lord gave it, then He has the right to take it away.  But is that really right?  Let us view it through understanding of New Testament light.  Luke 9: 56 (KJV) says:  “⁵⁶For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them…” John 10:10 (NIV) says:  “¹⁰ The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

How many times have you heard this scripture quoted at a funeral or from behind a pulpit, crediting God for the loss or tragedy that has taken place?  Why is it that we continue to repeat Job’s wrong conclusion?  Errors like this occur when we use Job’s shortage of knowledge and call it light rather than using light to explain Job’s lack of knowledge.  God adds and multiplies, Satan subtracts and divides.  God is not a taker, but a giver.  When things come to our lives that add no sorrow we know the source is God.  As Proverbs 10:22 (NIV) says:  “²²The blessing of the LORD brings wealth, and he adds no trouble to it.”

Mistake # 2:  Job 5: 17-18 (NIV) says:  “¹⁷Blessed is the man whom God corrects; so do not despise the discipline of the Almighty.  ¹⁸ For he wounds, but he also binds up; he injures, but his hands also heal.”

Job’s wrong conclusion:  God uses calamity and suffering to direct or bring good to our lives.  How many times have you heard someone ask the question after hearing about someone’s tragedy…”I wonder if that was the hand of God trying to save them or bring them back from the world?”  Let us again view it through the understanding of New Testament light.  2 Timothy 3:16 (NIV) says:  “¹⁶ All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,” God does not need to stoop to copy the devil’s tactics and ways to correct or instruct our lives.  God uses His Word, His Spirit, His ministry, and His saints to correct or instruct those He loves.  Ephesians 4:11-12(NIV) edifies us saying:  “¹¹ It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, ¹² to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up” God uses the Word, Spirit, and even ministry for correction and perfection, not calamity and hard times.

Mistake # 3:  Job 23: 8-9 (NIV) says:  “ ⁸ But if I go to the east, he is not there; if I go to the west, I do not find him.  ⁹ When he is at work in the north, I do not see him; when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.”

Job’s wrong conclusion:  Job’s lack of knowledge when negative circumstance surrounded his life mad him conclude that he did not know where God was or even how to find Him.  But New Testament light refutes that.  Hebrews 13:5 (NIV) assures us that:  “⁵ …Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”  We know when we face the storms of life we do not need to find God because He is already here with us, even within true believers.  All we need to do is call on or recognize His presence.  The Word says He is always here.  There are even Old Testament confirmations from those who walked in times of more enlightenment than the days of Job.  Deuteronomy 4:30-31 (NIV) says that:  “³⁰ When you are in distress and all these things have happened to you, then in later days you will return to the LORD your God and obey him.  ³¹ For the LORD your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon or destroy you or forget the covenant with your forefathers, which he confirmed to them by oath.”  Job never read the words of the Psalmist which declared in Psalm 139:7-13 (NIV):  “⁷Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?  ⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.  ⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, ¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.  ¹¹If I say, Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me, ¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.  ¹³For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.”   We can justify that Job existed in the days before the Bible and the covenant.  What we can’t justify is our continued ignorance by repeating job’s mistakes in this age when a study of the Word of God plainly reveals Job’s mistakes about God.

Mistake # 4:  Job 2:10 (NIV) says:  “¹⁰ He replied, You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble? In all this, Job did not sin in what he said.”

Job’s wrong conclusion:  Not only does God tempt us with good, but evil also.  New testament light corrects that faulty view of God.  James 1:13 (NIV) says:  “¹³ When tempted, no-one should say, God is tempting me. For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone;” When evil comes into your life, don’t even think or say that God brought it.  Since Satan is the personification of evil, it is impossible for God to use Satan to tempt us. 

Mistake # 5:  Job 1:7-8 (NIV) says:  “⁷ The LORD said to Satan, Where have you come from? Satan answered the LORD, from roaming through the earth and going to and fro in it.  ⁸ Then the LORD said to Satan, Have you considered my servant Job? There is no-one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.”  This is probably the worst misunderstanding of God in the life and Book of Job.  Bible scholars and ministers still today make this false assumption of God and base it on a faulty understanding of the book of Job.

Job’s wrong conclusion:  God calls Satan’s attention to Job’s life of love and devotion and then gives him permission to attack Job.  The Hebrew translation says:  “Hath thou set thy heart upon my servant Job?”  God was not goading Satan into attacking Job’s life.  God was letting Satan know that He as God was aware that Satan had his eye on Job.  God, who seldom interferes in the affairs of man, did not stop the attack.  However it is God Who has the keys to death, so He reminds Satan of his limits.  If Job’s suffering did not happen because of God and Satan working in collusion, then why did it happen?  1 Peter 5:8 (NIV) says:  “⁸ Be self- controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.”  Notice the similarity of Satan’s actions in Job and in 1 Peter.  He goes back and forth seeking whom he may devour.  If Satan has to seek for someone to devour, apparently there are those he can and those he can’t devour.  God’s hand of protection is a covenant promise for His people, so it’s possible there was never a hedge around Job.  If Job did have a hedge of protection there is another explanation of why it was down.  There is a law in Proverbs 23:7 (KJV) that says:  “ ⁷ For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he:…”  What we think shapes what we believe, and what we believe is what we become.  Job admits in Job 3:25 (NIV):  “²⁵ What I feared has come upon me; what I dreaded has happened to me.”  Fear will attract the devil.  Job received exactly what he had faith for.  The only difference between fear and faith is whose words you have faith in.  If we believe the words of God and what He has said, we receive what we believe by faith.  If we believe the words of Satan through the pessimist, we open the door for Satan to bring into our hearts and lives the things that we fear.  Fear is faith working in reverse, or faith that Satan perverts.”

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Some revelations:

Last night in bed I was thinking that I’m supposed to be 12 weeks now, but I’m not because we’ve lost our baby.  Then I thought that the sister at the hospital said that 2 samples were sent away for genetic testing and I remembered that originally my pregnancy started out as a twin pregnancy… Suddenly I felt sad, because up to now I’ve been mourning one baby, but we actually lost two.  We were so grateful for the one embryo with a heartbeat that we completely forgot that there was an empty sac, or blighted ovum as well, that did not make it to 7 weeks.  I feel it’s not right to dismiss that one, because we did not see a heartbeat there, it was still a potential baby that did not make it.  I think I must acknowledge that it was a twin pregnancy and that we lost twins here, even though we didn’t lose them at the same time… 

I paged back in my diary this morning and I came upon an entry I wrote on 28 February this year.  It was the night before I tested after we did the FET.  I had a strong suspicion that it would be negative again, because I knew the quality of our embryo’s were not good at all. I thought back to something that Joyce Meyer often says:  “we must do what is right and not how we feel”.  I’ve heard her say that during numerous sermons, and that’s what I made my mind up to do then and what I’ve been trying to do lately.

I decided that:  “I will be friendly and not sad when I’m around other people.  I will smile and ask other people how they are doing.  I will help others and not feel sorry for myself.  I will go on with my life, make the best of it and be thankful for all the blessings I receive from God.   I will not allow my emotions to control me.  I will not be angry with God, and I will not throw a temper tantrum because I cannot get my way.”

It was not too difficult to act that way then, because it was the 3^rd failed IVF, but also like I said I expected it – I could see on the sister’s face on day of ET that the embryo’s were not good at all.  She had a look of pity in her eyes and she could not make eye contact with me when I asked about the embryos.  She and the doctor talked about the number of cells (3), but avoided the discussion of quality; the doctor only talked about fragmentation and said the one had very little fragmentation.  I believe they wanted me to protect me and not tell me the bad news straight out and that they did not want me to be without hope.  I phoned later and asked the other sister what grade they were and she said grade 5 – the worst grade my clinic gives. 

Now it’s way more difficult to act that way, but I’m trying my best.  Sometimes I force myself to do something that I really don’t want to do, because I know it’s what God wants from me, and I must say I haven’t regretted any of it at all so far.  He knows what’s best for us…

This morning I got a strong feeling that I must trust God’s timing.  I thought back over our infertility history and I remembered that we actually wanted to do our first IVF in Aug 2001, we made a plan to get the money for the IVF then, but when we got to our FS he said that maybe we should try a IUI one more time.  We hastily accepted as we were not ready for IVF yet.  I think God stopped us from doing IVF at that stage, and when the IUI failed we were not even tempted to try IVF.  Later in 2007 we did do our first IVF and it failed, but we were both so traumatized by the negative result, that we didn’t see another FS for 18 months.  Again I think that God organized it so that we would wait for further IVF’s. 

By the time I was ready again I started to read about Intralipid drips and found that it helped for some people with multiple failed IVF’s.  I just knew that I had to get that with my IVF’s, but it took some convincing to get my FS to give it to me (I tried from my first appointment with them) – You see it’s a very controversial treatment, and not all FS’s believes it works.  Eventually I convinced my FS and I got the first one with my FET, but like I said earlier the quality was very poor, and nothing can improve poor embryo quality, so that one did not work.  But the second cycle with intralipids did work, unfortunately I miscarried. 

From my research I found that intralipids were only first used for IVF’s in 2006 in the USA, but it took quite some time, before others started using it as well.  It’s only since early last year that Vita.lab (one of the biggest and most successful infertility clinics here in South Africa – I’m not with them) has been using it here and where I heard of it for the first time. 

So I’ve been thinking that God has stalled us with our IVF treatments for a specific reason – so that I could get Intralipid treatment with my IVF’s.  I also believe all the failed cycles last year were necessary to convince my FS that I indeed have an implantation problem, so that I could convince him to give me the Intralipid drips.

So now I must just trust God that He knows best and that I will get pregnant again, but this time at the right time, so that I can have my healthy baby.

I’m finding strength in these scriptures today as they have to do with God’s timing:  Isaiah 30:18 (Amp):  “¹⁸And therefore the Lord [earnestly] waits [expecting, looking, and longing] to be gracious to you; and therefore He lifts Himself up, that He may have mercy on you and show loving-kindness to you. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed (happy, fortunate, to be envied) are all those who [earnestly] wait for Him, who expect and look and long for Him [for His victory, His favor, His love, His peace, His joy, and His matchless, unbroken companionship]!”

Isaiah 40:31 (Amp):  “³¹But those who wait for the Lord [who expect, look for, and hope in Him] shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up [close to God] as eagles [mount up to the sun]; they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint or become tired.”

 Habakkuk 2:3 (TLB):  “But these things I plan won’t happen right away.  Slowly steadily surely the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled.   If it seems slow, do not despair, for these things will surely come to pass.  Just be patient!  They will not be overdue a single day!”

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