Ecclesiastes and Epidurals: A Message About Labor

This week Pastor Don is preparing a sermon for Labor Day weekend based on the hopeless rantings of the author of Ecclesiastes. He says he loves them. I roll my eyes. They hit a little too close to home. As someone who grew up under the rules of "suck it up" and "don't be a quitter" I rely on a nearby brown paper bag to get me through the reading. I'm not supposed to have these thoughts...these thoughts about meaning, frustrations about workload, despair over final results. Suck it up and work hard, Mr. Ecclesiastes.

It's a simple equation we have derived in response to the raging laments of this tortured writer; work hard and everything else will work itself out. Yet under the muscle of this 'go hard or go home' social construction my bones ache from the beatings of a world that serves up a double shot of ambiguity every time the punch card hits the clock. Most truthfully it speaks to the thoughts that shape my heart in any given moment. The "what-are-we-doing's?" The "Is-this-even-worth-it's?" The perpetual humming accompanying my life singing, "what is this Labor of my Life even for?"

About six months into my pregnancy with Fiona, John and I began taking birthing classes. It gave us a great sense of confidence going into the moment when the climax of labor would begin and new life would be brought into this world. Of course when the actual moment arrived we quickly realized the entire class was a lie. This was most clearly expressed with John pacing around the hospital room randomly blurting out to no one in particular that, "This isn't what they said would happen!!"

It wasn't much of a surprise when labor was much more painful than a clothing pin on the ear. We weren't completely mislead. But we did plan on having breaks in the pain. We weren't ready for constant contractions that spiked off the medical screens only to slow down for a few moments before spiking up again. "You'll have breaks, they said"...but I never did. The contractions kept coming and I kept waiting. Thirteen exhausting hours into labor I gave up on the existence of the blissful minute of rest I was promised and anxiously awaited a needle being shoved into my spine.

In spite of my personal disappointment for not being able to "suck it up" and "push through" the pain of labor, the next five hours were the most meaningful hours of my entire life. In the sanctuary of the hospital room, John and I held hands, shared a set of head phones, and listened to music while we tearfully awaited the arrival of new life.

It was in my surrender that Fiona arrived into this world. My surrender to my own pain, my surrender to the doctors who finally told me she had to be pulled out with forceps (my first introduction to her personality), my surrender to the illusion of control. But it was also in my surrender that I found meaning in my labor; a steady patience with the process, and a space to recognize the miracle that was taking place.

In our culture, surrender is often synonymous with giving up, yet, it is my experience that it is our work of surrender which brings us to the birthing room where true labor begins and new life is born. God labors through the work of our surrender. The meaning is not in what our work is able to produce but what God's labor is able to birth through the presence of our being and our connection to the Divine. This is the labor God calls us to as Christians; a labor of patient openness, of faithful rest, and of hopeful attentiveness to the coming of New Life.