Yesteryear Chapter 39 Summary: “If You Want to Make God Laugh”

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

The chapter opens with the narrator breaking her earlier promise to the Lord that she would not become pregnant. Now pregnant, she feels betrayed and terrified. She mocks the platitude “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans,” but admits she is not laughing. Each day she mechanically performs her homestead chores and bakes inedible bread while panic rises. She prays for an explanation, asking what she is supposed to learn, and even requests a different assignment. God remains silent. She no longer senses His presence in sunlight or prayer. She feels like a woman abandoned by the man who impregnated her. The chapter ends with her wrestling with two unsettling questions: what happens if she fails this test, and what happens if she passes.

Key Events

The narrator confesses that despite her fervent prayers, she is pregnant.
She performs daily homestead chores mechanically, struggling to suppress panic.
She attempts to pray, asking God for an explanation and a new assignment, but receives no answer.
She describes losing her sense of divine connection; sunlight no longer feels like God’s breath.
She compares her situation to being “knocked up by a man who will no longer answer her calls.”
She contemplates the stakes of this “test,” questioning both failure and success.

Character Development

The Narrator: Up to this point, the narrator has defined herself through her faith and her determination to control her life. This chapter shatters that self-image. She is forced to confront her vulnerability, her loss of control, and the fragility of her relationship with God. Her internal voice shifts from defiant prayer to raw desperation, marking a significant emotional turning point.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

Faith and Silence: God’s failure to respond becomes a central theme. The narrator’s prayers go unanswered, mirroring her sense of abandonment.
The Body as a Site of Betrayal: Her pregnancy, once a feared outcome, now feels like a physical betrayal that undermines all her plans.
Domestic Labor as a Mask: The “good little homesteader” chores and inedible bread symbolize the performance of normalcy while internal chaos erupts.
The “Test” Motif: The chapter reframes the entire homestead experience as a divine test, but raises the terrifying possibility that both passing and failing are equally destructive.

Why This Chapter Matters

Chapter 39 provides the emotional climax of the narrator’s spiritual arc. It transforms the novel’s central conflict—survival on the homestead—into an interior crisis. The pregnancy forces the narrator to question not only her choices but the very nature of her relationship with God. This chapter deepens the novel’s exploration of free will, suffering, and the silence of the divine. It also sets up the next narrative conflict: how will she face her future with a child she never wanted?

Study Questions and Answers

1. Why does the narrator repeat the phrase “Remember how I said I wouldn’t get pregnant?”
She uses this rhetorical question to highlight her own failed promises and to underline the irony of her situation. It shows that her plans—and her prayers—have been overturned, leaving her feeling betrayed by both herself and God.

2. What does the line “I’m starting to feel like a woman who has been knocked up by a man who will no longer answer her calls” reveal about her state of mind?
It reveals that she now equates God with an absent, irresponsible lover. Her faith has become personal, even romanticized, and God’s silence feels like a cruel abandonment. The comparison underscores her deep sense of rejection and confusion.

3. How does the narrator’s question “What happens if I pass?” complicate the “test” metaphor?
Initially, she fears failing the test, but the second question implies that passing might be even worse. It suggests that surviving this trial might force her to accept a life she never wanted, raising doubts about whether God’s tests are meant to build character or to destroy it.