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charge. When the baby is born, the mother will rightly say: “We did it ourselves!”
    Birth is not just about delivering something new, but also about empowering the deliverer. Midwifery, in other words, is the art of bringing out the best potential hidden deep within another. It is defined as “one who assists in or takes a part in bringing about a result.” 12 It is about people working synergistically together to bring forth the divine intents and purposes God has ordained for the members of His Body.
    We need to be able to recognize in one another what God has planted in each of our hearts and that our destinies are interrelated:
“As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love”
(Ephesians 4:16 NLT). There will be occasions for me to push you and occasions for you to push me—the Body of Christ must come together to birth our God-given assignments into the earthly realm.
    In essence, we are called to
midwife
, or “work together with,” those who labor in bringing forth new life. A midwife is any person you bring into your life to help provide you with the emotional and spiritual resources necessary for you to safely deliver what God has given you by way of purpose and destiny. In her book,
Midwives: Pioneers of Faith
, Sarah Zadok observed, “A midwife’s role, among other things, is to encourage a birthing mother to ‘let go’ and allow herself to become a conduit for this great Force to flow through.” 13
    In 1493 a young German physician by the name of Eucharius Rösslin wrote the first widely published guidebook on the art of midwifery. In 1532 his son translated the book into Latin, and in 1540 it was translated into English. It was oddly enough entitled
The Byrth of Mankynde,
and it became the foundation for the development of the profession as we know it today. Here is a telling excerpt from the mid-sixteenth-century English translation:
    The midwife her selfe shall sit before the labouring woman, and shall diligently observe and waite, how much and after what means the child stireth itselfe. Also the midwife must instruct and comfort the party, not only refreshing her with good meate and drinke, but also with sweet words, giving her hope of a good speedie deliverance, encouraging…her to patience and tolerance. 14
    A midwife comforts, encourages, and brings hopes. She patiently “stands by” those who labor. In fact, the word
obstetrics
is derived from the Latin
obstare,
which means “to stand by.” Scripture records in Genesis 35:17 the words of the midwife who stood by Rachel as she gave birth to Benjamin:
“Now it came to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the midwife said to her, ‘Do not fear; you will have this son also.’”
Oftentimes, these are the most important words a midwife will use as she stands by those who find themselves disoriented by the pains of labor: “Do not fear.”
    There are times a midwife must encourage an expectant mother to be still and wait, to breathe deeply and stay calm. An expert midwife knows when energy is best conserved for a later time and when it is the right time to bear down and push hard. A midwife will help the mother pace herself in order to conserve her strength. We read in 2 Kings 19:3 where Hezekiah prophesied about the impending calamity of the nation of Israel not having the strength to deliver at the moment of birth:
“This day is a day of trouble, and rebuke, and blasphemy; for the children have come to birth, but there is no strength to bring them forth.”
    Referring back to the mid-sixteenth-century edition of
The Byrth of Mankynde
, we read this wise admonition:
    But this must the midwife above all things take heede of, that she compell not the woman to labour before the birth come forward…. For before that time, all labour is in vaine…and in this case many times it cometh to passe, that the party hath laboured so sore before the time, that