One of my favorite stories from the Bible is the Parable of the Persistent Widow.
“The Parable of the Persistent Widow”
“18 Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. 2 He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. 3 And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’ Check out our Baby Celebration post.
4 “For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, 5 yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!’”
6 And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7 And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
As an infertile woman, I have often been the persistent widow. After sixteen years of marriage and infertility, I can’t imagine how many times I have asked God for a pregnancy. I’m sure after all of these years He became like the judge! It took eight years of praying before our son came home from Guatemala, so I know about waiting and praying with persistence.
There is still a longing in many women to carry a child, and even though I absolutely without a doubt, love being a mom to my son, I still wanted to experience a pregnancy. I’m a curious person, and love to try new things, so I always felt like I was missing out on feeling a baby move in my belly, or experience the miracle of birth. So, I continued to pray continuously that God would allow me to experience a pregnancy at some point. (Read about our IVF Success)!
It wasn’t until our 20 week ultrasound that God revealed to us that we had prayed presistently. After the tech took about 40 different pictures, she printed out ten of them and handed them to us on our way to our gender reveal lunch.
We were so excited, that we didn’t pay much attention when she kept apologizing for a word that was on our one ultrasound picture. She said, “I’m so sorry that there is that word on the one picture. I’ve worked here seven years and have never had that happen before.” While I know the picture is somewhat blurry, the word is clearly “Persistence.” It is our word from the Lord that He truly does answer persistent prayer, and I wanted to share this story with our readers so that you will never stop praying. Never give up, never quit hoping, and never stop praying.
While I’m sure there is a technical explanation for the word, I’ll never doubt in my heart that it is God’s word for my family. Because of this experience, I know that sixteen years is not too long to pray for something! Be persistent!
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