Leonard and I recently emerged out of the twilight zone that is being first-time parents of a newborn. We are alive (but barely); we know what it feels like to operate on a handful of hours’ sleep night after night; our egos have been battered. But we have now learnt precious and humbling lessons. Was it worth it? My answer depends on how much sleep I’ve gotten the night before.
We are generally an upbeat and high-energy couple, but the intensity and relentlessness of looking after our little daughter in the first three months took everything out of us. Recalling the nappy changes at 3 a.m., our newborn’s piercing shrieks, and our bone-deep exhaustion, this period pushed us—and our marriage—to the limit. Late nights bleeding into early mornings, restless sleeps, and the constant motion from the nappy change, to the soothing, to the feeding, to the dishes, to the laundry, and back to the top. It felt like both of us had to pump out 100% of our energy, no reserves, throughout the twenty-four-hour day, just to deliver the 50% required by each parent to keep our little bub alive. Rinse and repeat the next day.
It is true that character is forged through fire. Reflecting on the early hazy days, I marvel at how God was using this very precious and unique experience to teach us multi-faceted lessons in humility.
The Weight of Responsibility
Holding our baby girl in my arms for the first time, I recall being overwhelmed at how helpless she was, and the weight of responsibility set before us. Our baby literally could not survive the night without our care. Leonard and I have never prayed so persistently for one thing as we have for God to protect our little one, both physically and spiritually.
Newborns are the perfect image of helplessness—they only have a handful of defence mechanisms, like startling and crying. If we forget to layer them properly, sleep through a feed, or experience a momentary lapse of concentration, they suffer. It is humbling to consider that God would orchestrate life so that these precious vulnerable lifeforms would be looked after by tired, cranky, forgetful parents.
Despite being tasked with this responsibility, we also grew in our conviction and assurance that it is God who gives and sustains life. Truly, we may do our part, and do it to the best of our abilities; we may diligently feed, clothe and protect her, but it is God who gives her every breath (Gen 2:7), and is able to look after her ultimately, from her first to her last days.
A Constant Practical Denial of Self
This heavy responsibility is bearable, until you discover how often and persistently it squeezes your own time and options, leaving you with less of everything for yourself. I felt this acutely during the newborn stage. A baby doesn’t know that you’re in the middle of your deep sleep—the first you’ve had in ages—when she cries out for you. It doesn’t occur to her that you haven’t had a shower in a few days, or you really want to unwind with the television, or you’re in the middle of an important conversation. She is helpless and she needs you—right this second!
Every Christian, regardless of whether you are, or will ever be, a parent, has had to exercise Jesus’ instructions to deny yourself and pick up your cross (Matt 16:24). However, I found that being a parent to a newborn raised this to a different level. It is visceral, physical, practical, and repeated. I imagine it would be similar caring for a loved one with chronic illness or a disability. The number of times I have had to drag myself out of bed, at all hours of the day and night, regardless of how I felt, has challenged my tendencies to look for and indulge in my own comfort and security.
In an odd way, I also relished this refinement that God was putting us through. Surely this exhausting period of selflessly looking after someone has been shaping us into our glorious selves, where we look not to our own interests, but those of others (Php 2:4). My hope is that God’s spirit will be so actively working in me that to die to myself will become second nature, not only for my immediate family, but anyone with whom I come into contact. I have already felt such fruit growing in me, in the short span of three months of my little girl’s life so far. In so many moments of my parenting, most of them little or unassuming, I’ve seen God’s power made perfect in my weakness, acting to grow me amidst the weakness of my finite body and self-serving tendencies (2 Cor 12:9).
God as a Baby
Another lesson in humility has come not from looking at own newborn, but to another, born 2 000 years ago. It boggles my mind that at one point in history Mary and Joseph had to parent our Lord Jesus out of his newborn stage; that the powerful, star-slinging and world-building God of Life would condescend to come in this form, in a position of ultimate vulnerability, where every cry had to be addressed, milk burped, nappy changed.
What God is this? My personal experience has made me appreciate more deeply what Jesus put on to be ‘born in the likeness of man’ (Php 2:7). He put on vulnerability and total dependence, just like any other baby. He became susceptible to every disease, to the plots of despotic kings, and to his parents’ forgetfulness.
For unto us, a child is born—you can be sure these familiar words will resound much deeper in the Zou household this upcoming Christmas.
