The Moment Death Begins

By Matt Williams

Most of my listeners have heard that my wife and I have just gone through a miscarriage. It is painful, surreal, sobering, and most of all hopeful. That last descriptor may come as a shock to those who don’t know Christ. For those who do, we know our hope is in Him, not our circumstances. That is our joy, peace, and future glory. It is not a wishing hope but a realization of the truth that we will one day see Him face to face.

Having this kind of hope has several advantages. First of all, tragedy never destroys, because we are more than conquerors. Secondly, after going through such a tragedy of a lost life on earth we are free to think beyond ourselves and look for opportunities to serve others. Thirdly, it prepares us for the next stage God has for us, we become more Christ-like when we hide ourselves in the shadow of His wings.

“…for the righteous falls seven times and rises again, but the wicked stumble in times of calamity.” Proverbs 24:6

Praise be to God for his imputed righteousness that allows us to rise again after calamity.

There is a lot that can be learned in books and conversation but there is knowledge that is hidden that can only be found through experience. Going through the pregnancy with our first son and up until now, much has been revealed to me by being a father, mainly a greater understanding of how God loves his children. The loss of our second child was no different in regards to knowledge revealed to me through experience. One of those truths is what I want to share with you.

My wife and I didn’t just have a miscarriage, we had a missed miscarriage. What is a missed miscarriage? I didn’t know either. It is where the mother’s body doesn’t show symptoms or notice that the child has died in the womb. How then do the doctor and family discover that the life of the child is gone? There are several things to look for when confirming there is life in the womb. One of them is the baby’s heartbeat, and the second is the blood flowing through the small baby. Our baby at 6 weeks had a heartbeat of 130 beats per minute, at only 6 weeks! Our baby also had blood flow and everything was looking good. Our baby had life, growing, beating, flowing blood through the body, and then our baby did not. At our next doctor’s appointment, when we were becoming excited to soon learn what the sex of our baby was, we discovered that God had stopped forming the baby in the womb, the growing had stopped, the beating had ceased, and the wind was knocked out of us as we realized we would never meet our child here on earth.

The dichotomy of this pregnancy is so important for every person to understand. When a mother becomes pregnant, there is another life in her body. There is separate DNA, which can be obtained by taking the blood of the mother. The mother has the baby’s DNA in her blood when she is pregnant! So much so that the mother can have blood drawn, and the lab can determine the sex of the baby from the mother’s blood. Simply amazing. There is life, there is a heartbeat, there is separate DNA, there is blood flowing, there is growth! When that life is gone, there is no longer a heartbeat, there is no blood flow, and there is no more growth. There is still DNA and there is still a body.

The distinction between life and death is clear and unambiguous for everyone that is involved. For the parents, the moment of realization brings grief, heartache, and sorrow. For the doctor, the verbiage changes from “baby” to “the pregnancy”, perhaps to soften the blow somehow for the parents. The messaging communicated to the parents is changed from creating the best environment for the baby through diet, exercise, and vitamins, to the different options to remove the baby’s body that no longer has life. It is clear that the latter reality is a lifeless body, a clump of cells, not much different than what you would find in a grave site.

What is the difference? That is the question I have for those who say that women who are pregnant do not have life inside of them. What is the difference? Think about it. Stop reading and contemplate this question. After a miscarriage, we can describe the latter scenario as nothing but tissue. The tissue no longer has a soul, a heartbeat, or blood flow. I agree that the child who has died already in the womb is now a body with no life, nothing but tissue. But what do you call the former scenario? What else can it be called but life? How do you get around that? It is not just life that is the extension of the mother’s own life, but life that is separate though dependent on the mother. That new life, that baby, has separate DNA that can be found in the mother’s blood, the mother’s body is as much of the baby’s as the baby is of the mother’s. This baby has a heartbeat and blood flowing, enabling growth and duplication of cells. What else can that be called but life? Consider the simple chart below. What is it that is happening before the scenario of death? If the second scenario is death, then what comes before that must be life.

What is this first scenario called? You must answer this. You will not escape the guilt by abstaining. What else can it be but life?  There are those who have hardened their hearts, doctors, mothers, who know it is called life and have chosen to commit murder despite having this knowledge. But I pray and I do pray, that this post would reach those who are in the dark to this truth. That a pregnant woman is holding in her body the most beautiful and precious blessing in this world, life itself.

Image by drippycat from Pixabay