It was a snowy winter day when I stumbled across a post on social media. A friend and sister from long ago posted a picture of a sonogram and above it were the words, “I’m so crafty, I made a baby!” I hope you’ll forgive me when I tell you my first thought was not a nice one. And when I realized my heart was being ugly, I tried to figure out why this seemingly sweet and exciting post was so hard for me. Was I jealous? My husband, Dan, and I had our two little bolts of light whom we loved and adored more than we ever knew we could. My family had ventured to Ethiopia to adopt our children. I had certainly earned my motherhood “stripes” having lived in Ethiopia with my own mother and two babies for five months. It was an adventure, and I loved the way we were blessed to do it. Truth be told, the thought of having another baby right then would have been terrifying. No, the reason I was struggling so much was because of pride. My good and godly sister was able to do something I never could, though I tried for many years - she made a baby.

As a Christian, my effectiveness is directly tied to my involvement in achieving God’s desired effect. The Bible is full of illustrations revealing the small role an individual’s life can play in God’s plan; we are all different parts of one body with Christ as our head (1 Cor. 12:12-31, Eph. 4:11-16), and we are stones in God’s temple with Christ as our cornerstone (1 Cor.3:10-16, 1 Pet. 2:4-5).