Grief on Mother’s Day

My husband and I have two little ones we believe are in heaven. We never met either of them. I carried each one in my womb for only a few short weeks and then the Lord took them home.

I remember it well, staring at the ultrasound screen, hoping, praying to see that beating heart, only to be informed by the technician that it had stopped. 

Each baby was small, but I could see the form of his or her head and body. Each one was my son or daughter; yet each was a baby I would never hold.

As painful as those two miscarriages were, I can’t imagine the pain of a mother who has actually held her little one, only to lose him or her in the end. I can’t imagine what you must think and feel on Mother’s Day.

But many godly men and women throughout history can relate to your experience. Their writings—the encouragement they received from God’s Word—are compiled in a book called From Grief to Glory: Spiritual Journeys of Mourning Parents.

One of these men was John Bunyan, author of Pilgrim’s Progress. He and his wife, Elizabeth, suffered the loss of two children. Considering their eternal future, he wrote:

“God comforted Rachel concerning her children that Herod murdered because of the birth of Christ. He bids her not to cry with the promise that her children would come again from the land of the enemy, from death. And I think this should be mentioned, not only for her and their sakes, but to comfort all those that either have had, or yet may have, their children suffer…. None of these things happen without the determinate counsel of God. He has ordained the sufferings of little children as well as that of persons more in years. And it is easy to think that God can as well foresee which of his elect shall suffer…in their infancy, as which of them shall then die a natural death. He has saints small in age as well as in esteem. And although I desire not to see these days again, yet it will please me to see those little ones…standing in their white robes with the elders of their people, before the throne, singing unto the Lamb.”

I pray this picture of your child’s joy in heaven may fill your heart with comfort and hope this Mother’s Day.