The Idea of "Unplanned Pregnancy" (And Surprise Birthday Parties, John the Baptist, and Spring)

You know...this year, I really really thought about it, and decided it would be good for my life to have winter end this year.... It may even help the farmers. And it'll lift everyone's spirits to see some flowers, and have a blue sky, so...you know what, let's plan on having Spring this year! Lets see...2023....about March, maybe?

 Let's start in March, we don't want to wait too late in the year because we want to be sure to make it to our family camping trip in June. And if we don't have spring this year it, may be hard to make it through the roads without a snowplow attachment....

As a child, I thought the term "planned pregnancy" was ridiculous. Like "planned spring." Grownups were at it again, overestimating the importance of their Ideas of How Everything Ought to Be. 

Just like their lofty declarations "no pushing or shoving on the playground." We'll just wait till they were busy talking and us kids who knew what life was really like, could get into a rousing game of tag.

When I heard the term "surprise baby", somewhere around 9 or so, I thought it was a compliment. That a kid had the cleverness and chutzpah to surprise their parents with their arrival. Like a surprise birthday party, with all the glee and joy and shocked faces that that entails. I knew a few families, who "thought they were done", and who had a surprise baby. In my childhood mental framework, those kids were like John the Baptist, showing up with angels and prophecies of greatness.

I felt like surprise babies got extra points.

So I used it like a compliment. 

 I still remember, doing laundry with my mom, as she folded clothes and tried to explain to me not to use that term, because people may feel hurt. I was confused. She explained people may feel sad that their parents didn't plan to have them.

But God makes the babies, I thought. So why give a heck whether dim ol' mom and dad were up to speed. They'll figure out what's happening soon enough, and have a few months to get a stroller and the bottles and the baby toys.

God makes the babies. He planned it. So why are these grownups taking so much credit?

I know a bit more about biology now than I did at 9. But that simple fact of my child brain, is true:

God wills every human soul, fashions and places each one into each human body He knits together. 

Sunday after Sunday, reciting "...conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary...."

Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Born of Mary.

And so is every baby. We are conceived of the Holy Spirit, and born of (perhaps dim) parents. 

Every human is God's idea. Each of us is made in the heart of God. We are, individually, uniquely, conceived of in His mind, and hand-crafted by His hand.

We are each of us, specifically, willed by God. 

Ruhi looks at family pictures taken more than 2 years ago, and says "Where am I?!" 

I open my mouth to tell her she wasn't born yet, and I hear Ana's little voice piping in "Ruhi, you were in duh mind of God"

Hi? I believe God express mailed me to this residence.