One Grandma's Secret Desire

“Delight yourself also in the Lord, And He shall give you the desires of your heart.” Proverbs 37:4

The Sheppard family on June 12, 2009, in Madison, WI

Four years ago my son John-Mark married the beautiful Sara Dean, whom he had met while she was on a mission trip to Liberia. John-Mark had been raised in Liberia and the Ivory Coast and needed a wife just like Sara. Thankfully she was available and willing.

Because Sara had ovarian cancer twice as a teen, it was not a simple thing to start a family. But God allowed Sara to conceive and Audrey Ellen Sheppard was born on April 4, 2012. The entire Sheppard family was thrilled.

To her great surprise, Sara discovered she was pregnant again in August. Then, six months into the pregnancy, John-Mark and she moved from the United States to Liberia to begin their missionary work among the people of Lofa County—the same people with whom the single, just out of college, John-Mark had worked previously and in whom God had already began His good work.

And like responsible people in a less than ideal medical reality, John-Mark and Sara made a birth plan. A missionary midwife —a long-time friend of the family—agreed to leave her family and ministry in the Ivory Coast to fly over to Liberia on June 7. Surely two and a half weeks before the due date was enough time.

On Monday, June 3rd, John-Mark and Sara took a Samaritan’s Purse flight from their home in Voinjama to Monrovia, where they were to stay with us for a few days before moving to more private accommodations. Tuesday night we enjoyed a lovely dinner with friends, sitting around the table visiting until well after nine. At nine-thirty Sara was tired and uncomfortable, so went to the bedroom to rest.

After the guests left I was washing dishes when my husband Mark rushed into the kitchen. “Sara thinks her water broke!” he announced. “Get the mattress cover from Jonah’s bed!”

Knowing the labor leading to Audrey’s birth had been a mere two and a half hours from start to finish, we knew we had just a brief window of time to get things prepared. Mark grabbed his cell phone to call a local midwife while I hurried to Jonah’s room to pull the mattress cover from under my sleeping son.

I had pulled off the first corner when I heard a panicked “Help!” coming from the guest room. Rushing in, I found it empty and realized Sara was in the bathroom. I asked for permission to enter, never dreaming what I would see. John-Mark was kneeling on the floor with his hands supporting the emerging baby’s head. I dropped to the floor and placed my hands around the baby’s head as well. Instinctively I prayed aloud, pointing out to God the obvious—we didn’t know what we were doing—and asking that the baby be safely born. Mark, in the adjoining bedroom, was tossing advice through the open door.

Soon the tiny shoulders appeared. Then, with a sudden gush, a very slippery Noah Robert Sheppard emerged. John-Mark and I guided him into the bath towel Sara had, in an act of foresight, grabbed and thrown into John-Mark’s lap. “He’s so beautiful! He’s so beautiful!” John-Mark and I kept repeating as tears of joy flooded our faces. 

Noah Robert Sheppard

Using dental floss, I tied the umbilical cord as Mark went to get Rose, the midwife. John-Mark, Sara, Noah and I waited calmly in the bathroom as if this was a common event around our house. When Mark returned, Rose decided my dental floss job needed a redo before she cut the umbilical cord. She then inspected Noah and found him, not surprisingly, perfect.

It took some time for us to comprehend what had just happened. John-Mark and I had jointly delivered his son and my grandson and, by God’s grace, Sara and Noah were both fine. Had either John-Mark or I done it alone, it would have been completely overwhelming and scary, but doing it together was a blessing no words could possibly convey.

In the following days I continued to meditate on my experience. As amazing as our story was to anyone who heard of it—and the story spread like wildfire—it was even more amazing because I knew one more little tidbit. I had had on my “bucket list” for several years an unusual dream—I wanted to deliver a baby. Of course I knew it would never happen because no one would ever ask an untrained person such as myself to deliver her baby.

John-Mark, Sara and Noah two hours after Noah's birth

God knows our wishes and, like the best of all earthly fathers plus so much more, He delights in our delight. Each time I see our precious little Noah, I am reminded I have a Savior who not only loves me enough to die for me, He loves me enough to give me my secret, silly, impossible desire.

Nancy and newborn baby Noah

See On Making Jonah a Sheppard.

See Jonah's Brush with Death.

See The Greatest Treasure of All.
See the satirical Book Review: Humility and How I Attained It by I.M. Phake.