Spiritual Mamas and Midwives
I shared in my last post about my love for Sarah Bessey's Jesus Feminist. I get lost in how she weaves Biblical truth with personal narrative, how she feeds new life into stories I've skimmed before and gently questions social norms with the full, warm embrace of a crunchy granola mother hen. This far-off sister has impacted me greatly, so it's only fitting that the analogy in her book that compels me most is one of spiritual mamas and midwives.
"It's an imperfect metaphor, but in a way, it's like they helped give birth to some new part of me," Bessey writes. "Maybe they were the midwives—by their lives, their faith, their obedience, their work, their prayers—for the work that God has birthed in me and through me, and countless others. And I rise up and call blessed the women who have mothered—nurtured, nourished, sourced, watched over—my spiritual journey...Our Bible pages, our church history, our lives our filled with puzzle pieces of the midwifery of the Kingdom."
As a woman who has experienced not one, but two challenging, probably-would-have-killed-me-100-years-ago births, I resonate deeply with the analogy of a spiritual midwife. I am fascinated with the mysteries of the birth process—how science is still unable to explain what starts a heartbeat or triggers the labor pains, what instinct tells the baby to turn down or to rotate her head just so. Birth is wild and peculiar and hard, for each woman in her own way. And so is our spiritual journey. God works through His Word and our people and circumstances, weaving the complex fabric of our experience to train us up into His image. There are peaks and valleys and rivers we think will drown us as we try to cross. And along the way, there are the women.
As Christians, we join a legacy of the women of God. It starts with Eve and disperses around the globe in powerful, though often silent or silenced ways, to affect great change. I raise a glass to the women I will never meet who paved roads I hardly notice along my way, but I want to make a specific point today to honor the nurturers who have grown and guided me along my own dusty roads, the many women in my life who have been spiritual mamas and midwives to me.
Some, in addition to my mother, subtlety shaped my childhood self, the framework of womanhood from which my identity developed. There was my trio of aunts—Aunt Joy, the first feminist I knew, who was quick to elevate the contributions of women; Aunt Debbie whose patience and creativity charmed even the most unruly child; and Aunt Shelley, who asked all the questions, daring to be seen as silly for the sake of deeper understanding.
Mitzi was the first truly committed friend in my life, one who willingly fought all the way through a disagreement to come to a resolution, never playing mean girl mind games, but always challenging actions that fell out of step with the Bible we were learning to love together.
As I began to come into my own, reckoning with my faith and womanhood, I had Amy. This woman had memorized entire books of the Bible. She was the first to model for me what it meant to love Jesus with my full mind, as well as my heart.
Some mamas and midwives popped into my life for the briefest moment. I discover the impact of these women every so often, when I've quoted them for the dozenth time in conversation. Like Lindsay, my Bible study leader in college, who showed me how to rejoice in the blessings enjoyed by my church sisters without competition or bitterness.
Still others bear witness to the more profound transformations, like Lara and Chrissie, who shepherded me from squirrelly student to engaged ministry partner during the early days of the Shoreline church plant.
And I owe so very much to Jenni and Beth, who lived with me in the trenches during those transitional, post-college years. These were the women who attended the birth of my marriage, hands bloody with the mess of a broken, bruised heart struggling to let go of past hurt, lean into an uncertain future, and pursue love even when it was so hard.
Even now, there are all the women in my community whose counsel I'm sure I won't fully appreciate until much later. And My sister Christina—so often my kindred spirit and life-line, who speaks a powerful word in season—she is a balm to my soul.
Where would I be without the women?
At times in my journey I have longed for more grandmotherly figures—women with riches of personal history from which to offer wisdom—and yet when I think on it, I am profoundly grateful for these Kingdom midwives (and oh so many others) who were willing to roll up their sleeves and embrace the earthy, miraculous work of life that God is birthing in me. It is God who began a good work in me and will see it through to completion, but I salute the women who have attended my labor along the way. Thank you for doing the quiet work of our faith alongside me.