Welcome to the Church and Family Life podcast. Today we're going to talk about a heartbreaking situation—miscarriages. I have my fellow elder Trent Moody and Jason with us to talk about this. We want to deal with the pain of a miscarriage. We want to give some general principles for help, and we want to talk a little bit about what happens to an infant in death.

I hope the discussion is helpful. Discussion is helpful. How many times has it happened when somebody in church or in your own family that life changes in a moment. One sentence, one sentence, and you know, your wife was pregnant, you're excited about it, the giddiness talking about names and, you know, decorating the baby's room and buying another car to fit this baby. And then she's bleeding and confirmed, you've miscarried.

So the sorrows of miscarriage, you know, of course, are known by most of the people in our churches. If you lived in the 17th century, you know, 25 to 30 percent of your children were going to die in infancy or childbirth, and then another 18 percent would die by the time they're five years old. And This is particularly sensitive to us. We at our church have had several miscarriages over the last few months, so we're feeling the sorrows, the tears of some of our people. So I think the first thing that we want to do is just acknowledge the pain of losing a baby.

We believe they are babies, so that connects us more deeply. Pete I was hoping to start us out in Romans chapter 12, because something gives us the Christian ethic on this. Romans 12 verse 10, Paul writes, Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love. And then in verse 12—no, excuse me, verse 15, he says, I rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. So part of being kindly affectionate to one another and exhibiting brotherly love towards one another is to rejoice with brethren when they're rejoicing and to weep with brethren when they're weeping.

And so I think we want to start there. It's a highly emotional time when you have a baby die during a pregnancy that comes to an end that way. And I want to weep with mothers who are weeping. Amen. Our compassion needs to be poured out in real, tangible ways.

Not only are we praying for them but showing and demonstrating love to them. In one sense, it's heartwarming because we see ladies in our churches that do grieve heavily over their loss of a child, but it's warming because they love children. And in that sense, it is an encouragement to me. And yet, at the same time, we grieve very heavily at their loss. And in my life, out of 10 children, We only had one that we know of, and that was through an ectopic pregnancy that ruptured.

And that was a sad time for our family. But we knew that the Lord was even in that very difficult time, and we still praised Him in the midst of it. We don't say, brush it off. The Bible tells us that we grow, And we want to weep with those who weep and groan. In the same way that the Lord Jesus, He groaned when Lazarus died.

He knew He was going to raise him from the dead, but He really entered into the pain and the sorrow. And that's why, like, when we have our prayer meetings, and if it's known that somebody had a miscarriage, you're going to hear a prayer for that family. We had several miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies, really hard, really hard days, a lot of tears in our family for that. And yet we saw how God used all of it, but it didn't dry our tears at the time. Ecclesiastes 3 starts this way, to everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven.

Then verse 4, a time to weep, and a time to laugh, a time to mourn, and a time to dance. So, miscarriages are the time to mourn and the time to weep. Thessalonians, Paul says, we do not grieve as those who have no hope. But you do not translate that into we do not grieve. Christians grieve, there is a grieving.

It's a fundamentally different kind of grieving because we do have a hope. But that doesn't mean... There's sort of a twisted view of the sovereignty of God that says, because it happened under God's sovereignty means we shouldn't be sad about it. But that is a twisted view. That is not the counsel of Scripture.

Pete We have a high priest that sympathizes with our weaknesses. He, and we see, just like what you mentioned, we see the Lord grieving, we see him weeping, and I want to be like my Lord, you know, when I see others in those difficult times. The notion that if you had more faith, you wouldn't grieve is repugnant and unbiblical. Yeah, the Bible is so realistic. There's a time to gain and there's a time to lose.

And God walks with us. Let's talk about some of the truths that you have to hang on during a time like that. And I'll just start out with the most obvious. It's not for nothing that it happened, because all things work together for good to those who love God and who are called according to His purpose. And in the tears, you can always know that nothing can derail God's plan.

I think our theology instructs us very clearly that God, the Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord. And knowing that though, does not, it should not, kind of like what you were saying earlier, Jason, it should not turn us into just dead, rigid stoics when this comes about. Our theology does inform us though, and it helps us through that grieving process. And we actually can just rest there. Because, you know, one of the temptations of mankind is to think that we have the right to understand and to know everything.

But you know, there's a passage in Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy 29, 29, that the secret things belong to the Lord our God. And there are certain things that we're not going to know. It is in the secret things of the Lord. It's in His secret providence. And that's where we have to be people who walk by faith and not by sight.

Hey, one thing we know is that God knew that baby in the womb. Jeremiah 1.5, Lamentations 3.33, that David says, You, Lord, knit me together in my mother's womb. I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. And the souls of all human beings belong to God, and the souls will return to him. But God knew your baby in the womb.

Praise the Lord. That's one thing you can know. The everlasting God who's full of tender mercies knew your baby in your womb. Hang on to that. Right.

Yeah, and there are certain things about God, just the attributes of God that we have to hang on to in the midst of suffering and difficulty and loss. You know, some of the things I encourage myself with, my family with, and others with, we know things about God. God is faithful. The Bible says that. The Lord is faithful.

We know that the Lord is loving. He is kind. He is good. Everything He does is right. He's holy.

He can do no wrong. And I think about in 1 Peter there, it speaks about God caring for us, for He cares for you. Your suffering is not for naught, and you're not walking through any suffering that you experience alone, for God cares for you. So much so that He makes promises, many promises. Here are some promises to hang on to, He will help you.

John 14, 16, He is the helper. He comes alongside to help. Here's another truth. He walks with you through the valley of the shadow of death, Psalm 23. Here's another promise.

He hears your cries, Psalm 186. There are so many promises There are so many promises that we have in times of trial. He walks with us, Psalm 139. David says, You've hemmed me in behind and before you've laid your hand upon me, you can't go anywhere where He is not." There are so many promises. And I think when there's a miscarriage, a loss of a child, an infancy.

The promises of God are so critical. Hang on to the promises, or lest you be washed away in sorrow. Trent, you referenced Job 1, but I want to read it. This comes at the end of the first chapter when Job's 10 adult children have been killed, no explanation. And this is what we read in Job 1, starting in verse 20, Then Job arose, tore his robe, and shaved his head, and he fell to the ground and worshiped.

And he said, Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I shall return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. And all this Job did not sin, nor charge God with wrong." Miscarriage is a time of temptation to think that when the Lord gives, he's good, but when he takes away, that comes into question. It actually does not come into question.

God is just as good when he takes away as he is when he gives. He's doing things in our lives that sometimes we don't understand and sometimes that hurt, but He's doing them to stretch us, grow us. All these things are good. All these things are perfectly wise. What was said of Jesus in the New Testament, you do all things well.

God does all things well. So there is a temptation to sin with our words when God takes away, but He's just as good then as when He gives. You know, I was really struck with something a young man shared with me, a quote, and I'm going to butcher the quote, but I'll give you the gist of it. He said, if we had the wisdom of God five years ago, we would have prayed to be in our present circumstance now, no matter what that is. And I've really been meditating upon that.

If we had the wisdom of God, no matter what our circumstances are, that wouldn't have been our prayer, because God, He does all things well. And the difficulty there is to view our circumstances as being, whether good or bad, especially when it's bad, that God is somehow displeased with us. But we have to understand that actually God's greatest concern is that our faith would be purified. And we know that our faith is purified through difficulty and through trials. But in the midst of that, we can trust God that He does all things well.

Does that mean these things don't sting, they don't hurt in the time that we're actually, doesn't mean that at all. Right. There's a sense that we also always have to recognize we were never in control of our fertility in the first place. God opens the womb, He closes the womb, and He does according to His will, and nothing can hold back His hand. So, this is why I think what you quoted is so good.

The Lord gave, the Lord takes away. This was a reality from the very beginning of the pregnancy. And God uses our suffering in our lives. We have to remember that God is near the brokenhearted. God always grows His children in suffering.

And the one who suffered the most suffered with us. He's the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And So I just think we have to remember the whole doctrine of suffering, even though we are suffering. It doesn't take away all the sting, but it helps us to understand what's going on. Right.

You know, there's such a theological truth there regarding the Father with the Son. He did not keep his Son back from suffering. In fact, that was part of his plan for his Son. And God the Father loves God the Son with perfect, eternal love. And so it does not negate His love for us when we suffer.

We actually have to understand that Christ was fully loved by the Father in the midst of the most intense suffering ever known to man. And we're right in, we enter into that great love in the midst of our suffering. Because a man shared with me years ago regarding Psalm 23, yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, he said, what makes a shadow? He says, light makes a shadow. And he walks with you through the darkness of the valley of the shadow of death.

And that was just such a help for me. Yeah. Let's talk about what happens to those who die in infancy. This is a very difficult question, but I just want to start out by throwing out what some of the saints of old believed. For me, what they said about infancy and death, That carries a lot of weight.

Of course, there are so many things we could say about this, but let me just jam through this for a second. Job believed that if he had died as an infant, he would have gone to glory. Job believed that in Job 3, 11 and 12, and in verse 17. And Job, he says, I wish I had died as an infant and I would have been in glory. That's what Job believed, if he was an infant, if he had never been born.

Let's talk about Moses. Moses talks about children with no knowledge of good and evil in Deuteronomy 1.39. I don't know exactly what that means, but he says, moreover, your little ones and your children, they have no knowledge of good and evil. And one of the things that we just might consider is that your children don't sin in the exact same way that Adam sinned. Children have sins.

Your children don't replicate the sin of Adam. They're affected by the sin of Adam, But children in infancy don't sin in the way that Adam sinned. And I think maybe there's a distinction. The third is David. And this one is really critical to me.

Charles Spurgeon speaks of this quite a bit, and his view is that children who die in infancy go to heaven. That's my view. But David, when his child dies, he says that he would see the baby again. He believed that baby was in heaven. And the Shunammite woman as well, in 2 Samuel 12, the baby had died and she was asked, is it well?

She says, it's well with the boy. She believed, I think that that implies that she believed that baby was in the arms of the Lord. So, we have several instances where it seems like the saints of old believed that children would go to heaven. Pete Slauson So, I'll take the debate and take the other side of this. I've never been satisfied with any of those.

I'm not satisfied with what you just said now. Our confession says, elect children who die in infancy, go to heaven. I think that's such a prudent thing. Now, Spurgeon and Metropolitan Tabernacle changed that to take the word elect so that it was infants who die in infancy. Right.

Exactly. And I think it's so much more prudent to have elect children who die in infancy. I think the Bible leaves it very unclear. I think we can know that God handles every miscarriage with perfect goodness and perfect wisdom, and really doesn't reveal to us the things that are on His side of the equation here. So, I know many people who hold that view.

I don't hold that view. It doesn't bother me that I can't bottom out on that. There are so many things that God knows and keeps to himself that I'm not disturbed by not knowing that. I think we have to be careful that it's not an unwitting denial of the doctrine of election. Meaning, well, they haven't committed sins outside the womb, And so somehow they're not by nature children of wrath.

So I think sometimes that position is actually held in a way that actually denies election. Like Pelagianism. Yeah. Pelagianism, which denies the fallen will. Yeah.

And I've heard it both ways. I've heard some... And I agree with you, Jason, with everything that you said. Some people would say that only elect children die. Some people have even gone as far as saying that the children that die in infancy are elect.

Again, we're not given that answer in the Scriptures. And so... That's a fine answer to me, if that's what it ends up being. Yeah. I'll be happy with it.

Here's the fact, all of us will be very satisfied with what God has done, because He does all things well. Everything He does is right. No one will be in heaven thinking, man, it should have been different. It will all be made right. Not only will it be made right, but it will be made right in our understanding, and we'll be able to rest there and rejoice there.

We will know that he did what was good. Trent and I were just corresponding about this earlier today. And one of the things that I said to him is, I'm content in the character of God. I know that God is wise. He's all wise.

He's merciful. He's the Creator. He's the Savior. And from what I know about God, God has a tender heart toward children. Yeah.

That's what I know about God. We're not kinder than God. No. Yeah. So I don't think we can nail this down perfectly.

There are these shadows, but then there are rocks to hang onto, pillars to take hold of to keep us from drifting into unnecessary sorrow or bitterness or lack of trust in God. The reality is, we don't know why hardly anything happens in the earth, but God does. Right. We think we know a lot. Yeah.

And There's so much. I will think, well, here's why God did this. Well, I'm pretty confident we'll get to have it, and we'll see. Ooh, he was doing that for a different reason. Yeah.

You know, I was reading this morning, just in my personal time in Isaiah 28, And I was struck with something where, in the end of this chapter, Isaiah writes these things. He says, give ear and hear my voice, listen and hear my speech. Does the plowman keep plowing all day to sow? Does he keep turning his soil and breaking the clods? When he has leveled its surface, does he not sew the black cumin and scatter the cumin?" He goes on and he's talking about these farming practices, and he speaks about how he deals with each type of seed differently.

Some of them are threshed with a stick, Some of them are ground with a cartwheel. He's using these different things. And he says, this also comes from the Lord of Hosts who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in guidance. And Derek Thomas makes this comment on this that I felt was very helpful for me. He says, the end of this chapter, it ends with a great promise.

He said, a ploughman does not keep on and on plowing indefinitely. He sows in order to reap. And so, spiritual discipline is what this has been all about. He says, those who see the Father's hand in it will profit. It involves hardship.

It is unpleasant and painful. God's discipline is revealed in a variety of ways. Like a farmer, he plows and he sows. He deals differently with particular children in order to produce the appropriate harvests of grace. He may rebuke us as we read his word.

He may use sickness or pain or tribulation. Sometimes he even uses Satan himself. Paul's thorn in the flesh, he said, was a messenger of Satan. That is the lesson of the book of Job as well. To those who have eyes to see behind a frowning providence, there hides a smiling face.

Our lives, even when under a type of discipline, are ordered by God, who is wonderful in counsel and magnificent in wisdom. And I don't want to relate this to the sense that every loss of a child is discipline per se, but God uses difficulties in ways that form us and conform us into the image of His will, and where we can rest in this truth that God is wonderful in counsel and magnificent in wisdom. You know, just personal experience for Janet, for my wife Janet, our first six pregnancies all ended in a healthy birth. And I just assumed, well, miscarriages aren't something that we have, but then, as both of us are getting older every time we have a birth. A woman's body, often childbearing years come to a conclusion, maybe with a few miscarriages at the end.

So after six healthy births, and me assuming miscarriages just aren't going to be part of our lives. We had two miscarriages at the end. Of course, that's radically different than wanting a baby for a decade and having miscarriage after miscarriage at the beginning. But all this to say, hey, if you're watching this, you might not have experienced one yet, but towards the end of a woman's childbearing years, this is not uncommon. You may very well experience this.

So, it's a good thing to think through. Amen. Well, brothers, thank you so much. It's a tenderizing discussion. I want to end with Job 42, too.

I know that you can do everything and that no purpose of yours can be withheld from you. I think that we can all hang on to that and say, Lord, blessed be the name of the Lord. Amen. Yeah. Okay.

Well, thank you for joining us. Appreciate the discussion. And thank you for joining us on the Church and Family Life podcast. Hope you can join us next time. Com.