The Grace Between

Waiting has a way of making us question things we never thought we would. We begin to wonder if God hears us. If He’s working, if He’s forgotten, or if somehow we’ve missed what He was trying to tell us all along.

Some of the hardest prayers we pray are often the ones we’ve prayed so many times that you almost stop expecting an answer. The prayers whispered day after day, month after month, year after year, wondering if God is listening or if He’s simply being quiet.

I don’t think anyone minds waiting when they know exactly how long it will last. It’s the waiting without a timeline that tests our faith. The kind where the prayers keep coming, but the answers don’t seem to.

There have been seasons in my life when God’s voice felt unmistakably clear. And then there have been seasons when heaven felt painfully quiet. Not because I stopped praying, but because I couldn’t see Him moving the way I expected.

Silence has a way of making us assume nothing is happening. However, I’ve learned that some of God’s greatest work happens underground where roots are growing long before anything begins to bloom. Faith often grows the same way.

 One of the greatest misconceptions about faith is believing that if God is quiet, He must also be absent. I’ve believed that before. Not because I stopped trusting Him, but because I couldn’t see Him working. Looking back now, I realize His silence was never His absence. He was doing some of His deepest work in places I couldn’t yet see. He was letting the roots grow stronger deep underground in preparation for His promise!

For as long as I can remember I wanted to be a mom. Even when I was not old enough to have my own children, I was the one who gravitated to the babies and toddlers, offering to babysit or just play with them whenever I got the chance. I always had a love for little ones and could not wait for the day I had one of my own. I would often imagine what my future would look like. Before I ever met my husband, I had imagined the day I’d hold my very own baby in my arms. 

With that dream also came fear. It was a quiet fear I rarely ever talked about. Actually the only one I ever expressed this fear to was my husband once we were married. The fear of “what if it never happens for me?” 

For years that fear lingered in the back of my mind. Quiet at times but always there. Then one day that quiet fear became more than just a fear, it became a possibility. 

I remember working at a hospital as a registration clerk in 2016, and one night I had an intense pain like I’d never felt before. A pain so intense, I was doubled over crying. Mind you, I had broken my arm before, gotten in a wreck and picked shards of glass out of my limbs and scalp, and never once cried from pain. An ER doctor came to check on me and told me to go see an OBGYN first thing in the morning. I followed his advice and found his hunch to be accurate. What I had experienced was an ovarian cyst rupturing. With this news came the diagnosis of PCOS and the explanation it comes with many related issues, one of which being the difficulty of getting pregnant. I remember hearing the words that pregnancy might not come easily, and suddenly all of the plans I had imagined for my life felt uncertain.

That quiet fear suddenly became louder! I remember asking for prayer every chance I could. Praying myself. And finally giving it to God and trusting He would heal me or make a way. 

Then in 2020 I married my husband. I expressed these fears to him and was met with assurance that it was all in the Father’s hands and that we would be ok no matter what His plan. We decided to begin trying and after a year, realized we may need some help. Then the once possibility of hardship became even more of a realistic expectation. I remember the percentages given to us. 8% chance with IUI and 42% with IVF. Less than half a chance with the best possible option. 

I prayed. I hoped. I cried. I wrestled with questions I didn’t know how to answer. There were moments when I wondered why something that felt so deeply placed on my heart seemed so far out of reach. I remember praying what Hannah prayed that if I was blessed with a child I would dedicate my life as well as his to Lord.

Yet, even in that waiting, God was doing something I couldn’t fully see at the time. While I was focused on the answer I was longing for, He was gently teaching me to trust His heart and His plan even when I couldn’t understand His timing.

After the initial shock and disappointment wore off, my grief turned into praise. Praise for the “even if.” My prayer became less of one of despair and instead one of hope! I prayed “Lord even if the answer is no, even if the answer is not yet, I will praise You and trust in You”. I was reminded of the words in Daniel 3:17-18 “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us… But even if He does not… we will not serve your gods.” This echoed the cry of my heart: “Lord, even if the answer is no… I’ll still praise You.”

 I had hoped for a child that I’d given life to, but my hope shifted from what God would do to who God is. I realized my peace couldn’t depend on whether my prayer was answered the way I wanted it to be. It had to rest in the unchanging character of the One I was praying to.

Somewhere in the waiting, God gently reminded me that He is still good when the answer is yes. He is still good when the answer is wait. And He is still good even if the answer looks different than I imagined. The miracle I was praying for still mattered. My desire to become a mother never disappeared. But I no longer wanted my joy to be held hostage by the outcome. I wanted my heart to be anchored in the One who was holding me through it all.

Then the day I had been praying and hoping for finally came. I was about to begin medication for our first IUI cycle, and as part of the routine, I had to take a pregnancy test to confirm I wasn’t pregnant before starting treatment. It felt like I was just checking another box to move us in the direction of the plan we thought God had led us to that could possibly help us become parents.

I came to realize, in God’s faithfulness and perfect timing, the test that I had in every way expected to be negative flashed positive. I almost screamed out. I took another to be safe (and another a few hours later). The desire of my heart had been heard and answered. Flash forward four years later we have a happy, healthy almost three-year-old and a sweet little nine-month-old who fill our home and lives with more joy than we could have ever imagined. They are daily reminders of God’s kindness and faithfulness in our story.

I am not naive to the fact that this is not everyone’s ending to their story. Some of you are still waiting. Some have walked through unimaginable loss. Others have received answers that look very different from the ones they hoped for. If that’s your story, I don’t want you to hear mine as a promise that if you just wait long enough, God will always answer the way He answered me. The miracle in my story isn’t proof that God is more faithful to me than He is to you. His faithfulness was never found in the positive test. It was found in His presence through every negative one. And whether your story ends like mine or unfolds in a completely different way, I still believe the same God who carried me in the waiting is carrying you, too.

Through my waiting and prayer, I reminded myself of what was said in Scripture. “Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines… yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation,” Habakkuk 3:17-18, and “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases… The Lord is good to those who wait for Him…” Lamentations 3:22-26. 

These scriptures especially reminded me of something I still have to remind myself at times today. God’s faithfulness isn’t measured by whether or not our prayers are answered the way we hope. It is not determined by my circumstances. His faithfulness is rooted in His unchanging character. 

If you are in an “in-between” season, I want to remind you not to mistake God’s silence for His absence. Remember the statement from the beginning of this post, “Roots grow in the dark long before anything blooms above the surface. The same is often true of our faith” Even when you can’t see Him moving, He is still working. Even when you don’t understand His timing, He is still worthy of your trust.

My story isn’t really about a positive pregnancy test, but instead of a faithful Father who met me in every season of waiting and wanting and taught me that His presence was all I really needed. The answered prayer was a beautiful blessing and a testimony I can now share today, but His nearness in the waiting is the true testimony because it changed my heart long before it changed my circumstances. 

Wherever you find yourself today, the waiting, the grieving, the hoping, the healing, or somewhere in-between, I pray you’ll remember this: There is grace here too. 

Where are you seeing God’s grace in your own “in-between” season? What is one prayer you’re still trusting God with? 

I’d love to hear your story in the comments. My prayer is that as we share our journeys, we’ll remind one another that God’s faithfulness isn’t found only in the breakthrough; it’s found in His presence every step of the way.