Jeremiah 20:14-18Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed. / Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, saying, “A son is born to you,” bringing him great joy. / May that man be like the cities that the LORD overthrew without compassion. May he hear an outcry in the morning and a battle cry at noon, ...
Ecclesiastes 4:2-3So I admired the dead, who had already died, above the living, who are still alive. / But better than both is he who has not yet existed, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.
Lamentations 3:1-3I am the man who has seen affliction under the rod of God’s wrath. / He has driven me away and made me walk in darkness instead of light. / Indeed, He keeps turning His hand against me all day long.
Isaiah 49:15“Can a woman forget her nursing child, or lack compassion for the son of her womb? Even if she could forget, I will not forget you!
Psalm 22:9-10Yet You brought me forth from the womb; You made me secure at my mother’s breast. / From birth I was cast upon You; from my mother’s womb You have been my God.
Psalm 139:13-16For You formed my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother’s womb. / I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are Your works, and I know this very well. / My frame was not hidden from You when I was made in secret, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. ...
Genesis 30:1-2When Rachel saw that she was not bearing any children for Jacob, she envied her sister. “Give me children, or I will die!” she said to Jacob. / Jacob became angry with Rachel and said, “Am I in the place of God, who has withheld children from you?”
1 Samuel 1:10-11In her bitter distress, Hannah prayed to the LORD and wept with many tears. / And she made a vow, saying, “O LORD of Hosts, if only You will look upon the affliction of Your maidservant and remember me, not forgetting Your maidservant but giving her a son, then I will dedicate him to the LORD all the days of his life, and no razor shall ever touch his head.”
2 Kings 4:27-28When she reached the man of God at the mountain, she clung to his feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her alone, for her soul is in deep distress, and the LORD has hidden it from me and has not told me.” / Then she said, “Did I ask you for a son, my lord? Didn’t I say, ‘Do not deceive me?’”
Ruth 1:20-21“Do not call me Naomi,” she replied. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has dealt quite bitterly with me. / I went away full, but the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? After all, the LORD has testified against me, and the Almighty has afflicted me.”
Matthew 2:16-18When Herod saw that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was filled with rage. Sending orders, he put to death all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, according to the time he had learned from the Magi. / Then what was spoken through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: / “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”
Luke 1:41-44When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. / In a loud voice she exclaimed, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! / And why am I so honored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? ...
John 16:21A woman has pain in childbirth because her time has come; but when she brings forth her child, she forgets her anguish because of her joy that a child has been born into the world.
Romans 8:22-23We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until the present time. / Not only that, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
1 Corinthians 4:11-13To this very hour we are hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clothed, we are brutally treated, we are homeless. / We work hard with our own hands. When we are vilified, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; / when we are slandered, we answer gently. Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world.
