New Life

Photo by Jacalyn Beales on Unsplash

I’ve heard Your whisper…

A request that I release my grip and let go,
giving You my plans. My vision. My expectations.
I want to hold them tightly, and tears fall as I grieve their loss.

But now I wake, a dream fresh on my mind.
It catches my attention, as I so rarely recall them.
In the dream, I’m pregnant.
Pondering this, I again hear Your whisper…
This time telling me You want to bring New Life.

A metaphorical pregnancy of my own
coinciding with the start of Advent.
I reflect on Mary’s “Yes.”
The release of her own plans. Her dreams. Her vision.
All the while, her body grew,
physically stretching to accommodate,
and then embrace New Life.

You want to offer me New Life, too.
But I know You’re asking me to grow. To stretch.
Perhaps in ways that will be uncomfortable. Or even painful.
You’ll call me to push past the point where I feel like breaking
so I’ll be forced to rely on You and Your strength.
Breaking me down, You will build me up.

I sit in mass
reading along with the Responsorial Psalm:
“Then we will no more withdraw from you;
give us new life,
and we will call upon your name!”
(Psalm 80:18)

But am I strong enough?
Dare I ask for this New Life
when it requires that I lay down my own dreams, my own vision?
When I know it will require that I stretch and grow?

But Your Spirit reminds me…
Throughout it all I can choose where to focus my gaze.
Will I look only at the dreams I am releasing,
feeling crushed by the pain of heartache and loss?
Or will I instead focus on the miracle of New Life,
allowing the hope and joy it brings to lift me up …

And perhaps, it’s as simple - and as complicated - as that,
a choice that is mine alone to make: 

The direction on which I focus
may ultimately determine whether I can speak the words,
“Give me New Life, Lord. And I will call upon Your name.”

(By the way, for not one moment did I interpret that pregnancy dream to mean God wanted me to have another baby! 😉)


This post is part of a blog hop by Spoken Women, an online community of Catholic women nurturing their creative callings. Click here to view the next post in this series "Joyful Waiting."

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(blessed by these words? feel free to share, so you can bless others.)