After a grueling trek across the country, by donkey or by foot, Mary gave birth. 

After a grueling trek across the country by airplane and by car, I also gave birth. Theodore arrived almost eight weeks before his due date and — though the circumstances surrounding my labor were different than Mary’s — our son’s birth was in its own way unexpected, traumatic and miraculous. 

We had just returned from an early November visit to my parents five states away. At breakfast time the next morning, I started timing regular contractions. By the time we gathered a few things together, dropped our toddler daughter off with a sitter and arrived at the hospital, I was doubled over in labor. 

Teddy was coming, and coming now. 

Through IV, doctors gave me magnesium to slow the contractions and steroids to strengthen his lungs. The steroids needed six hours to be fully effective — and my labor would never delay that long — but maybe the magnesium would buy us a couple of hours, the doctor said.  

Many people prayed. By the grace of God, Teddy waited not two hours but seven to make his appearance. 

From birth he needed only minimal assistance with breathing and was weaned from his CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine completely several days later. In the next two weeks, he passed through miles of development, moving from an incubator to a crib and learning to coordinate sucking and swallowing. Just before he hit 35 weeks’ gestation, the doctors released him to come home. 

Now he is here with us, and I am amazed to see this tiny person, who should still be floating in amniotic fluid in the safety of my womb, doing all the things a baby must do to live in the great world. 

I had thought he would be a Christmas baby. I had looked forward to waiting through the quiet days of Advent for him to arrive, thinking — as Mary must have thought — contemplative thoughts about nurturing and motherhood. 

God never gave me that chance. 

Like all the best gifts God has given me, God gave Teddy in an unexpected way at an unexpected time — and, for good measure, double wrapped the package with a season of stretching and growth. 

For two and a half weeks, Ivan and I scrambled and stretched to meet the needs of our two babies — a 2-year-old and a newborn — in two different places an hour apart. There were hours spent rushing between hospital and home, interrupted nights in a busy hospital, the agony of our little family separated, our daughter missing her mom. 

But, along with hard gifts, God gave grace. 

And I wonder: Were those quiet days of Mary’s waiting a myth in my head? Mary’s pregnancy and delivery were nothing like what she must have expected and hoped for. 

Pregnancy carried her through tremendous stress, through ostracism from loved ones. The circumstances of her son’s birth were less than ideal. Did she have an experienced midwife to coach her, or did she push out her baby with only her husband — who had never seen a birth in his life — to help her? Whatever the case, she must have concentrated — like me — on nothing but her baby, straining every muscle to deliver him safely into the world. And like me — after he came out red and squalling, after she felt his chest warm against hers — she must have loved him. 

Did she realize she would love him deeply, love him always, respect him as a man-to-be, not because he was the Messiah but because he was her son?

To hold God, to hold a human baby — what does it matter? To a mother, both are miraculous. 

To see the tiny mouth open, expectant, like a bird. To feel the first sharp nibbles on a breast and to know that this tiny baby somehow knows that you are his mother and knows where and how to get his milk. We both experienced this miracle. 

Mary’s gift, like mine, was double- wrapped. She knew the miracle of holding her baby, of holding the Messiah. Later she felt the piercing of a sword to her heart at what her child must endure. She would gladly have died for him. Instead, he died for her. I think there is nothing in the world that could break a mother’s heart like that. 

Maybe God’s best gifts are always unexpected, always miraculous, always traumatic. Even the gift of a son to his mother.