For a mom whose first birth was traumatic, preparing for another delivery can become about much more than bringing a baby into the world.

And one woman is asking BlazeTV host Allie Beth Stuckey how to pursue a vaginal birth after a C-section while resisting the temptation to view it as a chance to redeem her first birth experience.

Stuckey, who has gone through two C-sections before a successful VBAC, knows firsthand how complex and emotional it can be.

“I had two C-sections and then I had a VBAC,” Stuckey, who is over halfway through her fourth pregnancy, answers, noting that she did not expect her first or second C-section, only one of which was “necessary.”

Stuckey’s first C-section was “unnecessary,” as her doctor was “too C-section-happy” and didn’t like the idea of her going over 40 weeks in her pregnancy.

“I don’t think all C-sections are unnecessary,” she explains. “I’m not that kind of person that’s like, ‘Every single time your body always knows what to do, and natural is always better.'”

“No, I believe that modern medicine can be a wonderful gift of common grace and it can be absolutely lifesaving,” she continues, pointing out that before the C-section, she was “pressured" into an induction.

“My body was not ready to give birth. And so I tried to induce, and it just didn’t work. My body was not ready; baby was not ready,” she explains.

“It’s very stressful, and it’s such a whirlwind, and you’re already so vulnerable. You don’t yet, most of the time, when you’re a first-time mom, know how to advocate for yourself,” she continues. “You’re trusting this doctor and these nurses that you’ve gotten to know."

“You think you’re making the best decision as a mom when they say things like stillbirth and all of that, which wasn’t actually on the table for us. That wasn’t something that was about to happen,” she adds.

After the C-section, she explains, is the “worst part.”

“Even though you can’t feel much, there is something that is so painful about this. You have a nurse who comes and presses on your stomach as hard as possible,” she says.

“I was so emotional, maybe postpartum-depressed after my first. It was really, really tough, and so I knew that I didn’t want that again. I wanted a VBAC for my second birth. I did all of the things. I listened to all the podcasts. I did all of the different exercises and classes and everything that you’re supposed to do,” she continues.

“And I just wanted so bad to redeem the first birth,” she adds.

But that’s not how it panned out, and Stuckey ended up getting another C-section.

“I think it’s important just not to have the expectation that God is going to use this VBAC to redeem something of the past,” she says. “That might not be what he uses to redeem your past traumatic birth. He might use something totally different.”

“So how he wants to heal,” she continues, “how he wants to redeem, is totally up to him.”

“I think that is how we let go of the idolatry of birth,” she adds.

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

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What happens to the human soul when AI makes work optional?

Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk has repeatedly predicted that a day is coming soon when AI and robotics will make traditional work optional in a utopian age of abundance, where humans will rely on universal high income while pursuing personal interests.

Trading the daily grind for a life of comfort and leisure may be compelling, but is it good for the human soul?

That’s the question Allie Beth Stuckey asked Stonebridge Bible Church Pastor Jonny Ardavanis, whose new book, “Get to Work: Seeing Your Daily Grind as God’s Good Gift,” explores why work is a divine gift rather than a burden to escape.

“I just think that’s going to be a horrible, horrible existence,” Ardavanis says of Musk’s AI utopia.

Regardless of one’s belief system, there’s an intrinsic understanding that work is a necessary part of the human experience, he argues, citing the oft-used expression “a job well done.”

“You mow the lawn, you see the stripes in your lawn, and you put your hands on your hips and you go, ‘There’s something Edenic about this,”’ Ardavanis says.

This sense of fulfillment, he says, can be traced back to the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve were first charged to cultivate and keep the garden as part of God’s original good design.

“Deep down, God has hardwired Eden into our souls, and we’re pining away to get back there,” he tells Allie, citing Ecclesiastes 3:11’s reminder that God has “set eternity in the human heart.”

But if AI removes the necessity of work, Ardavanis warns that the human heart, with its God-given orientation toward purpose and vocation, will wither.

“When a robot starts mowing your lawn, you know, you’re going to start to be stripped and starved of the opportunities to reflect God in that way. And I think it is going to be soul-crushing,” he says.

Work, he points out, isn’t just about doing; it’s also about thinking. When robots can think in our stead, what happens to the God-created mind?

“What does it mean to be made in the image of God? Well, it means we have a mind. It means that we are to engage that mind,” Ardavanis says. “Almost all of the instruction in the New Testament regarding the Christian life is what we do with our mind.”

“Your mind is God's gift to you, to employ it.”

This longing isn’t limited to believers. Even non-Christians recognize the irreplicable uniqueness of the human experience. Ardavanis points to globally famous actor Tom Cruise, who, in response to a question about AI’s impact on filmmaking, said, “There is nothing like human.”

“Even though Tom Cruise doesn’t know the God of the Bible, the God of the Bible has hardwired something into Tom Cruise’s heart,” he says. “We are to mirror and mimic God. When we do so, it gives us joy, and it gives us a level of purpose and meaning.”

“I’m looking into a world where people are excited about the absence of work, the three-day work week ... and biblically speaking, I think that that’s hard to reconcile with the fact that we’ve been given a mission by God.”

To hear more, watch the episode above.