PERFECT TIMING
Watermark: Cradling Hope
By Zsa Zsa Palagyi
The 700 Club
CBN.com
– LISA RYAN: Let me ask you about a season
in your marriage that might have been a little more painful.
CHRISTY NOCKELS: We started trying to have a family
in 1999–it was January of ’99–and we didn’t really
think through things. I think I was pretty much controlling over it–you
know, I had all the days counted out, and this is when we should get pregnant,
and he’ll be this age when we do this, and I’ll be this age.
We lost that first baby at 7 weeks, and it was very painful physically,
actually. I had to go into the emergency room, and Nathan drove all night
in an ice storm to get back to me. I was just terrified. I just couldn’t
imagine. My doctor in Houston was not very understanding and wasn’t
really explaining anything to me. He was like, 'Oh, this is common. One
out of every three pregnancies is a miscarriage' and was just really matter-of-fact
about it.
LISA RYAN: So many women experience miscarriage and
yet we talk about it so little. It’s like what your doctor did, 'Oh,
it happens. It’s natural. It’s really for the best' and then
almost go on like nothing happened. Yet you’re dealing with a huge
loss–loss of a dream, loss of that knowledge of life within you–and
there’s a grieving that has to take place.
CHRISTY
NOCKELS: It was so hard for me. I think I had a harder time with
it, with the first one, because I really think it was all so new anyway
to Nathan that I don’t think it really hit him as hard as it did
me the first time. Then it took us a little while to get pregnant again,
but again I was just, 'OK, we’re going to try again. We’re going
to get pregnant.' I got pregnant in July of ’99 and lost that baby
in late September. That one really hit Nathan.
NATHAN NOCKELS: It was kind of like out of bounds and
out of my hands. I felt like all I could do was pray. All I could do was
to tell God, 'God, help us through this. I don't know what to do.' It
was a really dark time, but at the same time it is strange because I look
back on that and I remember that being a very spiritually enlightening,
very bright light time. I think it was because everything was stripped
away, just like that, and there was nothing except for us and God.
CHRISTY NOCKELS: We’ve experienced grief for the
first time and learned about that process, but I think through grief,
God just showed me some places in my life that I needed to surrender.
I needed to surrender control over timing and when we were going to have
a child. Now I look at Noah and I think I’d never have Noah. God’s
timing is perfect and ours isn’t. He’s in control of when our
bodies don’t do what they’re supposed to and our fragile little
bodies don’t work. He’s in control of that. I look at Noah and
he’s just such a blessing.
LISA RYAN: What has God taught you about Himself and
about yourselves through Noah, through this little tiny person?
NATHAN NOCKELS: He’s moving out of baby and getting
into toddler, and we’re getting into discipline stuff for the first
time. It’s just scary. We get irritated with him, like, 'Noah, you
need to listen to Mommy and Daddy the first time. Listen the first time.'
We can just hear God saying, 'Nathan and Christy, I just need you to listen
(laughter), to obey the first time.'
LISA RYAN: The first time.
NATHAN
NOCKELS: The first time (laughter).
LISA RYAN: Obedience, kids.
NATHAN NOCKLES: Oh yeah.
LISA RYAN: You see the heart of God when you begin to
parent.
CHRISTY NOCKELS: It’s just like the unconditional
love thing. It’s like you start understanding that. We can’t
possibly have the unconditional love that He has, obviously, but I do
know that there’s nothing that Noah could do to make me love him
any less. I know how God feels about me, probably for the first time.
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