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Birthing & Zion
Message #54
Date: Oct 06 1999 11:16:04 EDT
From: "Greater Things" <Greater_Things-owner@listbot.com>
Subject: Birthing & Zion
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SUBJECT: Birthing & Zion
www.GreaterThings.com/Essays/birthing&zion.htm
True to the encouraging words I have heard so many times from others over
so many years, finally getting married and now expecting a child has been
an incredible blessing, bringing positive changes and growth into my life.
Cheri and I are planning to have our child at home with the assistance of
a midwife. Being in our last trimester now, we have been taking weekly
Bradley Method classes which focus on "husband coached child birth."
Preparing together to bring this new life into the world has been a great
bonding experience for us, and has directed our hearts in love toward this
pending first addition to our family.
I have been awed at how studious and mindful my dear wife has been to read
up on how to best prepare for childbirth, implementing the knowledge she
is gaining by way of optimal healthy diet, commensurate exercising,
emotional bonding, proper skin care, etc.
We enjoy the time spent together going on a daily walk, doing the
butterfly stretch, doing the relaxation techniques, preparing the nightly
women's tea, applying wheat germ oil on her belly and breasts prior to
retiring to bed to prevent stretch marks, and reading a chapter together
from a birthing book.
She started a couple of weeks ago reading children's stories aloud to the
growing fetus.
If she had her way, we would already have a name picked out, one if it is
a boy, and another if it is a girl.
We are gradually gearing up for this wonderful, spiritual, bonding, and
natural process of bringing a child into this world.
The more we learn (and my education is but a small part of what Cheri has
been acquiring on the subject), the more grateful and confident we are for
the decision we made to have this child at home, with a midwife, and
without drugs.
Doctors are to birthing what lifeguards are to swimming. It is good they
are there for threatening situations, but for the most part, a midwife and
knowledgeable parents are more than ample to take care of this beautiful
process.
Last Tuesday evening, during our Bradley class, I was struck with a
thought while listening to one of the couples who is taking the class with
us, whose pregnancy is considered "high risk" -- no thanks to doctors who
administered Petosin (sp?) and created the subsequent trauma by performing
a C-section. They shared the story of the encounter they had with their
doctor when they told him that they were looking into having a
midwife-assisted natural birth.
The scare tactics employed and the authoritarian approach the doctor used
reminded me so much of the same mentality I see in religion, particularly
in Mormonism, which says, "follow the prophet," he knows what is best.
You don't know enough to trust your own judgement.
The doctor was not the least bit impressed with this couple that were
considering taking a less allopathic approach. He frowned on what he
viewed as tremendous risk-taking. Doctors are the ones who know, the ones
you should trust, according to him. They have been trained to take care
of these things. He did not like the idea of them taking responsibility
and seeking to become sufficiently educated themselves so as to be able to
choose a midwife who is more of a birth assistant than a "knock-em-out,
drag-em-out" physician.
As this couple recounted the conversation they had, I was making the
comparison in my mind to what I have observed in religion.
In the scriptures, the Lord compares the coming forth of Zion, the kingdom
of God, to a manchild being born of a woman, who represents the church of
Christ (by its core definition, which has to do with the heart, not its
ecclesiastical definition, which has to do with an outward ordinance
alone). Prophecy speaks several times of the birthing pangs associated
with this birthing.
So having learned so much lately about the difference between
midwife-assisted childbirth and doctor administered delivery, I have been
set to pondering upon the metaphorical lessons that might be contained in
this difference as it pertains to the birthing of Zion.
In my mind, home birth is to hospital birth what home school is to public
education.
Home birth is to hospital birth what home church is to structured
religious attendance.
The more responsibility we take for our own salvation -- between us and
the Lord -- the closer we resemble the godly nature.
The less responsibility we take for our own salvation -- putting it on the
shoulders of other men, who are fallible -- the more we play into a
controlling, dictatorial collusion.
One leads to freedom. The other to captivity.
Bringing this back to the childbirth-Zionbirth analogy, this is why the
scriptures speak so adamantly about the need to be alert, to be vigilant,
to be watchful, to learn of the Lord, to feast upon his words, to dig deep
so that we might establish our foundation upon the rock of Jesus Christ.
The more educated we become about the pending birth of Zion, the more
prepared we become to pass through this transition that will soon come
upon us, and the more glorious will be our experience.
No wonder the Lord uses such reprimanding tones when he speaks of the
drunkenness of Ephraim, which people of God are supposed to be his
vigilant watchmen.
The differences between a drugged up mother having a doctor pull a baby
out of her, and a natural-birth mother bringing forth a sparkling alert
child are like night and day -- both for the mother and for the child.
Awake, awake put on thy strength, O Zion!
How can Zion put on strength if the mother is drugged, overcome with
deliriousness?
So the incessant cry to the Lord's people to stop depending so much upon
"the prophet" and seek instead to each become a prophet unto the Lord, is
an invitation to be fully prepared for a glorious delivery of Zion -- the
best route by far for both mother and child.
That it may it be so is my humble prayer.
Sincerely,
Sterling D. Allan
http://www.GreaterThings.com
