About Lucas

33 weeks and 4 days. That's how long my grandson, Lucas (Luke for short) has been alive. He's not born yet, but he already has a personality, has the genes of his Mom and Dad in the cells of his body, has the blood of his ancestors, including me, flowing through his heart and blood vessels. He probably doesn't have many deep thoughts yet....just, "Wow, its nice and warm in here; I wonder what's next?"

He is already a person, has been for some time, and I can't wait to meet him. But it is scary to see a grandson born into this world. I wonder, did my grandparents feel that way when I was born, or was the world safer to them than this world is to me?

I think I was so naive when Luke's Dad, Jason, was born, the thought never occurred to me that I was part of bringing a baby into a dangerous world. Maybe the optimism that pervades a 24 year old father is God's way of keeping us from thinking too much....if we thought TOO much we would never have children.

But now, at age 58, and after seeing all that has happened in the last decade, all the blurring of the safe boundaries we in this country thought existed (talk about naive), after experiencing the runaway train that is leaving transcendant beliefs behind and is heading for unabashed selfcenteredness, after wondering how God has it all figured out when so much is so messed up, I am not nearly so optimistic as I was 34 years ago.

Fortunately, its not about me and my comfort. Fortunately, there is a God. There is a God who ordained that Lucas would be conceived, who loves Luke more than I can no matter how deep my love for him, who already knows the days of his life, who has already died to redeem him from this corrupt and fallen world, who will give Mom and Dad the strength to love him as only parents can, to take pleasure in his simplest success, to discipline him when he needs it, to make sure he is loved but to make sure he is not inclined to think he is entitled to anything besides the opportunity to join us all in the labor to find purpose and sustenance.

I can't wait to see him, to put aside the dreads I have for this world, to love him in a manner that I have never experienced before...not more than my children, for that would not be possible, but not less, either, for he is part of one of them broken off to root and grow on his own, to learn his own lessons about how life is to be lived, about how he is to relate to his Creator, to come to his own realization of his inadequacy without the Father to make him complete--to fill the hole in his soul that only God can fill.

I can't wait, but I hope I have to for another 6 weeks and 3 days. After all, I'm a neonatologist and I don't like prematurity.