Labor Pains of the New Birth
by Joe Leavell
I have watched my wife Rebekah give birth to each of our four children. This woman is the strongest person I know! Not only did she have all our children naturally with no epidural, she also had each of them at home.
With our first, I kind of objected because I didn't know the data, but I figured, "Hey! You're the one having the baby, not me!" After seeing the facts that it can be quite safe, and being assured by our midwife of her training and expertise, I began to relax a little bit about our child being born outside of a hospital. The fact that it was much cheaper to have a home birth may have done a bit of work on swaying my sentiments as well!
That first one, though, man… Rebekah had back labor. According to her, having experienced labor with and without back labor, there is a marked difference in the intensity of the pain with it. Now, I don't know about you, but my back has gone out only a few times. The first time it went out, I could barely get my legs under me and not throw up. It was excruciatingly painful! Now I'm trying to imagine that level of pain while giving birth as the baby is using my spine as leverage to try and push its way out.
Needless to say, she was in an extremely high level of pain and, after enduring this for several hours, was at the point of exhaustion. I was acting as her birthing coach, but I was clueless as to what to say or do to ease her pain, despite having attended birthing classes with her.
Our midwife was right there alongside us through it all, monitoring the progress, and noticed something that was subtle but critical.
"You're making it worse," the midwife stated, as kindly and gently as possible. This is EXACTLY the kind of thing you want to hear when you're moving past the tipping point of desperation.
"Wha? What do you mean?" My wife slowly responded after her contraction subsided.
"You're clenching up so much with each contraction. The baby is trying to get out, but when you tighten everything that way, you're keeping the baby from coming and making things harder. Baby wants to come out! You need to help your baby. Work with the contractions instead of against them." Our midwife was so caring and compassionate in her tone. She'd had her own children as well, but she had to be truthful to do the job she was there to do.
"So wha… what do I do? I can't… I don't know what to do," she breathed.
What Rebekah had to accomplish was no easier task than asking her to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. She had to figure out a way to relax her body in the middle of ever-growing contractions that she felt not only through her entire body but through her back, which was spasming with unbelievable pain throughout her entire nervous system.
"It's too much… I can't… I just can't do it." Her words were heavy, and the hopelessness in her voice was growing as she faced this daunting task.
Her nervous husband grew more nervous by the minute, not knowing how much of this she could take. As a first-time dad, I didn't know what was typical, and worst-case scenarios began going through my mind. I must have prayed a hundred times, both silently and out loud.
After a few very agonizing contractions, my courageous young wife began to do the impossible. Rather than fighting her body to survive, she began to work with her body, despite the unspeakable pain. When a new contraction would hit, she would relax her body in a way that I still cannot even understand.
It wasn't very long after that before our midwife asked if she was ready to start pushing, and very soon our brand-new baby boy was born. Both Mom and baby Philip were healthy as she held him in her arms. Labor gave way to joy and instant relief from all that pain.
A Spiritual Birthing Story
Now, men don't usually go around telling stories about their wife's labor. There are many details here I know I'm missing, details carved forever in Rebekah's mind that I may have forgotten. But this is more than just a birthing story. Labor pains are the story of the new birth.
Some of you are going through a spiritual contraction right now and are in unspeakable pain, crying out to God, "I can't… I can't do it anymore."
In Romans 8, the Apostle Paul is encouraging believers who are struggling. He tells them there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ. In plain terms, that means if you belong to Jesus, God isn't holding your failures over your head. You're not on trial. Instead, we're His children, close enough to Him to cry out "Abba, Father," which is something like calling Him "Dad" instead of a formal, distant title.
That closeness, that adoption into God's own family, is the gender reveal of the new birth! If you are a believer, you're a child of God!
Paul anticipates an objection here. See, the Romans he's writing to had been facing an incredible amount of persecution. They had lost homes, been put in jail, and many had been thrown to the lions in the arena or used as literal human torches to light the emperor's parties. If anyone had a right to ask "where's the good part," it was them.
So there is great hope in knowing that one day we will have this awaited heavenly home, but in this life, each believer goes through a spiritual kind of labor pain that accompanies salvation. It is the process of being changed from who we used to be into the image of Christ.
In the middle of it, Paul writes these words:
"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies." (Romans 8:18-23)
Here's where I want to be careful, because illustrations can get confusing fast. In this picture, you're not just standing in for the mother in labor. In a sense, you're also the one being born. The person you used to be before Christ got hold of your heart is giving way, through all this labor and pain, to who you're actually becoming. The eternal, whole, fully alive version of you that God is bringing to birth. When Paul says creation is groaning in labor pains, and that we ourselves groan as we wait for our adoption and the full redemption of our bodies, he means this pain we feel now is producing something real. That something is you, made new.
Remember, Paul isn't describing some peaceful Hallmark depiction of childbirth. He's acknowledging that God's work of bringing about the new birth in us is difficult and very painful.
The agony of childbirth is the right description.
Fighting Against God Makes It Harder
There truly was a purpose to the painful contractions my wife was enduring. They were working to expand her cervix and move the baby into position. But in her efforts to just hang on, she ended up having a more difficult time than was necessary. Many believers who are struggling do something very similar.
I think of the one who spent years white-knuckling his way through a painful marriage, drinking more each time a hard conversation loomed. Every time the pressure built, instead of letting the Spirit move him through it, he braced against it, numbed it, tried to survive it on his own strength. The difficulty and pain didn't go away. It just became more intolerable to bear, and it took longer to pass. That's what fighting the contraction looks like.
Not every case of "making it worse" is about sin. Sometimes it's simply doubt. You're in the middle of a contraction that won't let up, and the thought creeps in: Has God forgotten me? Is He even paying attention? Does He love me anymore? That doubt tightens you up just as much as any addiction or escape does, not because you're doing something wrong, but because a weak, fearful faith has a way of making you clench up too. Rather than cooperating with the work of the Spirit, we fight Him, working to protect ourselves from anything that He is using to bring out the image of Christ in our lives.
The invitation then isn't simply "stop sinning." It's more, "You can rest in the middle of the pain. Even here, even now."
While it's understandable that we struggle, we only make it harder on ourselves when we tightly grip to escape the pain. Yet, as kindly and lovingly as I can say it to the one who is fighting God: "You're making it worse." That baby is coming! God will keep His promise to finish the work He is doing in our life.
Rather than clenching your heart, it is an act of faith to learn to rest in the middle of the agonizing experience and allow the Spirit to bring you just a little closer to Christ.
For our last two children, my wife did chiropractic care, which made a world of difference, and her body also learned what to do. By our last child, the hardest, most intense part of her labor lasted less than an hour before the midwife was like, "You ready to push?" Both my wife and I were amazed at how much learning to work with her body, rather than against it, had improved the process. I mean… it was still childbirth, but it was night and day from our first experience.
Don't Let Anyone Minimize the Pain
A few verses later, Scripture tells us the amazing truth that God will work all things for good for those who love Him! But God never minimizes the groanings of giving birth. Think about it. The analogy of the pains of this life isn't a little sliver or a scraped knee. It's having a baby!
Like any pregnancy, coming to Christ brings graces and genuine excitement and anticipation. There's the moment you first hear the heartbeat, when you see evidence that your faith is alive. The joy of sharing with the world about your new birth in baptism. Joining a church. Being able to read your Bible with understanding eyes and seeing answered prayer. These are no less incredible than the wonder of seeing your baby on an ultrasound. All of the joys and excitement of our faith are worth celebrating as we anticipate our final destination in God's presence, when our new creation is fully born.
Sometimes well-meaning people use these blessings to try to minimize the labor pains. I imagine saying to my wife in those moments, "You had a baby shower! Don't you remember how great that was? You should just be more grateful for the good things! Our baby is coming, so you should be happy."
Present blessings and future joy are incomparably better than what we experience in spiritual labor, but none of it erases the pain. It just puts the pain in its place.
Many faithful believers have been led to assume they are doing something wrong when they experience difficulties in life. I've sat with people who assumed their chronic illness, their wayward kid, or their years of infertility meant they'd fallen out of God's favor. They see their pain as evidence of failure, or that God is simply cruel. Sometimes our own unwise or sinful choices do make things harder, but at other times it's simply the painful groaning of labor. We're experiencing the intense groaning of redemption, as God works to bring out something good.
Rest In Between Contractions
Some people seem to experience far worse circumstances than others, and it's truly not fair. Not every labor is the same. Some women experience fairly painless labor that moves quickly, and for others, labor can be horrifically intense and last 24 hours, or even longer.
For the one who has chronic pain for decades, or the person who unexpectedly loses a spouse or, worse, a child, the pain can be devastating. For the one who has been cheated on or has faced abuse, creation groans with you. For those who struggle with the regret of sin, creation yearns for your redemption, for the day when Christ will make all things new!
However, in every case, there are moments of reprieve, rest, and recovery. Contractions can be broken up by seasons of rest. Take these seasons of blessing and happiness as a small gift. They remind us that labor will not last forever and give us opportunity to prepare for real progress in the next.
Hopeful Labor Gives Way to Joy
If you're in a contraction right now, if the pressure is building and every instinct in you wants to clench down and survive it all on your own, I want to say the same thing our midwife said to Rebekah: "Baby wants out."
Every believer is in the process of being born again. We are saved already, just like a fertilized egg already carries all the DNA of the full-term baby it will become. But the reality of that salvation won't be complete until we stand face to face with Jesus, whether at our death or at His return. This means the labor pains for each of us will, unfortunately, increase. Our bodies age and wear out. Our eyes grow dim, and each of us will have one final push into eternity.
But when the curtain is pulled back, and the new little one has arrived in His presence, the joy of heaven will be thunderously more than the birth of a prince or princess!
Let each labor pain, then, remind you of what is to come. Let it give you hope, not surprise. As you patiently groan for home, rest your body in cooperation with the Spirit's work.
Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.'" (John 3:5-7)
No one should go through labor alone, let alone go through the new birth alone. If you are struggling and need someone to walk beside you, please reach out today.
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