On Mei and Mysteries

One year ago today we held our sweet Mei in our arms for the first time.

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We met her in an office at her orphanage. They brought us to her and less than an hour later she left the only life she could remember.

We wondered- “Would she be scared? Would she cry inconsolably? Would she learn to love us (for we already loved her)?”

But she wasn’t inconsolable. She was quiet at first. Just taking it all in… tentative… yet open to our love and affection.

In the past year, we have had the honor of watching Mei learn so much- she took her first steps when home just three days, and she learned to talk (she was not speaking yet in Ch*na)**. She is now speaking in full sentences (at a consistently elevated volume to be sure that she is heard!) Not only is she talking, but this child is one smart cookie! I am always amazed by the connections she makes and her comprehension of things for her age (and considering she’s only heard our language for a year!) For instance, the other day, I was watching her pretend to make some cookies out of sand, and I said “Mei, you are such a good cook!” She looked right at me and said, “I am not cooking; I am baking!”

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We’ve seen wonderful things on the medical front, too. Our little peanut has gained a pound for every month she has been home- no longer can she be labeled ‘failure to thrive’! In Cincinnati this summer, she was able to receive the surgery that will give her the best chance at ‘normal’ function of all of her systems. And perhaps even more importantly, the testing prior to her surgery in Cincinnati revealed another condition that, left undiagnosed and untreated, would have led to kidney failure. (We sure stood in awe of God that He had orchestrated all of this – her crossing the ocean and then us all heading states away- to get her to the right doctor who would find this condition.)

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Please if you hear anything in this post, please hear this. We share all of this for one reason and one reason alone- to give glory to our Lord. If you think for a second, what an amazing family… see what they’ve done for her… she is so lucky! … you have totally and completely missed the point. Oh, how my heart hurts inside when someone says this! I know it is meant for good, and we do receive it as such- as a gift of encouragement. But all I can think is- Oh, how I wish they knew the truth.

If there is one thing that I have learned this year, it is, ironically, exactly what Satan tried to convince me of to keep me from adopting Mei in the first place.

Because the truth is- we are not enough.

We are not strong enough, loving enough, or faithful enough. We do not have what it takes to save or redeem or heal the broken heart and body of an orphan child- (or, coincidentally, ourselves or our birth children).

Now I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is true… It is just not the whole story.

That day when we met Mei, we met a child in desperate need. And she met two parents in desperate need. And all we have done is carried her, sometimes crawling ourselves, to the altar of God. Where all those who know they have nothing to offer meet a God who delights in offering Himself to fulfill our every need.

So I have shared with you how Mei has changed in the past year. How we have seen a life renewed… redeemed. But what I cannot share with you is how. Because so much of it is mystery. This is all I remember, and quite frankly, much of these memories are foggy (smile). I remember …

hugs
kisses
pigtails
dirty diapers
doctor’s visits
laughter
tickling
laundry
reading together
playing
cleaning
hospital visits
prayers, tons of prayers
tears
awe
gratitude

That’s what I remember. That was my part, pretty much. So you can see I am pretty much un-awesome. Pretty much just like you. Doing the things you would do. Many of which were thoroughly enjoyable.

But what is awesome is how all of those things, offered into the hands of our Loving Father, have been shaped and molded to bring about miracles right under our roof- in both my life and MeiMei’s.

It is a mystery. A beautiful, marvelous, redemptive mystery. I have not the slightest idea how to explain it, but I know it is not new. It is, in fact, the Story we celebrate this Advent season, is it not?

Like Mary, I want to say- “I am your servant. Let it be to me as you have said.”

And yet, so very often, the best I feel I can offer Him is .. well, not much. I am a mess. I want to offer Him more, but at the end of the day, the truth is my greatest efforts often fail… I am a mess.

But then I remember… that’s where He first came. Into a messy, dirty, humble stable. That’s where our God chose to enter the world.

And (can I get a Halleluiah here?) HE STILL DOES!

This Christmas we celebrate Emmanuel, “GOD WITH US”. And that, my friends, is the key to the mystery. The mystery of my redemption.. of Mei’s redemption.. of all these mundane, commonplace things transformed by God into marvelous miracles.

He still comes! He is still Emmanuel!

I’m not talking about how he comes when I get a warm feeling while singing Silent Night by candlelight on Christmas Eve. (Because for eighteen years this is as close as I thought He got to me).

I am talking about how He comes in the everyday– even in… no, especially in… my stables, my messy places I set aside for Him with a hope-filled prayer that He would make His home here. Right here in my heart, in my home, in my arms as they reached for that no-longer-orphan child… Praying Oh, come Emmanuel. Just be with us. And help me to trust that is Enough.

My prayer for us this Christmas… That we may slow. Slow the searching for the “magic” of Christmas- in all the lights, and gifts, and parties, and food. That we might look deeper. Look for the miracle. Celebrate the God who came. The God who still comes. Emmanuel.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel has come to you…

** I would be remiss if I did not pause here to stress that Mei was in a very good institution. We believe that she was truly loved and cared for. We do not believe that she was mistreated in any way. To the contrary, we believe that she was given the best care that was available to her at that time. We are incredibly grateful for her birth country and specifically for the orphanage and caregivers who loved and cared for our daughter for those two years.

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Haley Long

I am a recipient of amazing grace. I’ve been married 12 years to my husband, Scott. We had 2 children, Isaac and Zoe. Then one day God met us both in the same moment and broke our hearts and filled them with love for orphan children. In 2008, we brought our son Beniam home from Ethiopia and in 2012, we brought home our daughter, Mei from China. I am a Florida girl who loves sunshine, water, and sand. I enjoy almost anything you can do outdoors, especially in the mountains. When forced to stay inside, I love to read and write.

It’s Mothers’ Week: His Miracles and Our Rescue

When things get crazy around here (which happens alot lately!), I am praying and asking that God would help me to stop for a few minutes and just live in this miracle. Between laundry and doctor’s appointments and cleaning up messes of all sorts and smells…well, sometimes it is just too easy to let my focus stay there. To buy into the idea that I have to keep doing…cleaning, fixing, working…and I cannot stop and just be here and sit in wonder at this little miracle unfolding right here in my house.

Because it is a miracle. All this. This child who is coming alive and blossoming so beautifully right here in my messy home. Scott and I wondered about all this as we sat all weary on the couch the other night: How does this happen? How does a child who has been alive for two and a half years and really has no idea that two people on the other side of the world have been preparing their hearts and homes to become her parents…how does she become so very ours in such a short time? We are her parents! Just think of that. In her little mind, two months ago, she had no framework even for that. What is a parent anyway? For really she had only known nannies and orphanage life.

How does she come to embrace us, to know us as parents in such a short time, in just the way our other children do? How can that not be a miracle?

And then there’s the other miracle. The one that Scott and I know in our hearts but may just not be able to explain. Just that we get to be a part of all this.

Adoption has etched in our hearts such a deeper, more living understanding of what it means that God has adopted us…rescued us…redeemed us.

She has been redeemed and rescued. Outside of simply not having a family, Mei’s future without intervention was not looking good. Because of her medical condition and simply because she was an orphan – this is simply the reality.

Please do not hear me saying that we are heroes or rescuers or redeemers. Because with all my heart I know that I am the one being rescued. We know deep in our hearts that all of this was about God’s love for Mei and His amazing plan to care for this child. And Scott and I? We are just so grateful that He would let us be a part as His plan unfolds each day.

And, in being a part of all this, we are being rescued. No, our need for rescue was not as obvious as Mei’s…but we knew. And we have prayed for this very thing. Because here, with our lives and our blessings being so abundant, we know how easy it is for us to fall into lives that are mediocre, self-sufficient, complacent, unaware, and, frankly, selfish. We know the pull the American Dream has on us when, with all our hearts, what we really want is to know and serve God with radical abandon every day of our lives.

Today I am more desperate for God’s presence than ever before. I am more aware of the suffering that goes on all around me in the world, and by His grace, I am more willing to be used by Him for His kingdom’s purposes. Everyday, every hour, I see glimpses of Jesus’ work all around me and in me. Everyday, I am less and less satisfied with anything but knowing Him more and being a part of His purposes both here in my city and around the world.

So, yes, God, in His grace had a plan to rescue Mei. But this plan is my rescue too.

(courtesy of Red Letter Ink, click image for more)

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Haley Long

I am a recipient of amazing grace. I’ve been married 11 years to my husband, Scott. We had 2 children, Isaac and Zoe. Then one day God met us both in the same moment and broke our hearts and filled them with love for orphan children. In 2008, we brought our son Beniam, now 3, home from Ethiopia. And, we recently added to our family again, welcoming home Mei from China. I am a Florida girl who loves sunshine, water, and sand. I enjoy almost anything you can do outdoors, especially in the mountains. When forced to stay inside, I love to read and write.

Blessed Be Your Name

The first time I met you, you were asleep. It was naptime and all the infants at Hannah’s Hope Ethiopia were swaddled all cozy in their Moses baskets in the common area. Except you. You were too big. So there you were in that miniature crib on the end, sleeping all soundly. I knelt down next to you and touched your face. And I marvelled at those impossibly long eyelashes.

Should I wake you up? I longed to hold you. But I do not believe in waking sleeping babies unless you are saving them from an emergency like a fire or tornado.

So I waited, trying to soak in the moment. (Which was smart because it was the last time you would sleep that soundly for about two years. *wink*) Then I heard it. Here in this place where I was so far from my world… where everything felt so unfamiliar… I heard these familiar words playing softly on a nearby radio.

Every blessing you pour out, I’ll turn back to praise
And when the darkness closes in, Lord, still I’m gonna say
‘Blessed be the name of the Lord. Blessed be your name.
Blessed be the name of the Lord. Blessed be your glorious name.’
You give and take away… You give and take away.
My heart will choose to say… ‘Lord, blessed be your name.’

This song, of all songs! This, I knew, was His gift to me. This very song… that was on our lips and in our hearts through every step of your adoption process. When we wanted to worry but sang instead. When we wanted to fear the unknown but worshipped instead. When things we held so dear seemed surely to be lost… and by His grace alone, we learned how to praise His name in the storm.

It was one of two moments that week that I felt God’s presence in a way that I simply cannot explain in words.

Then because Daddy and I could wait no longer, I picked you up and held you close. Slowly, those big brown eyes opened… wider… and wider… and wider. And for about six months or so, that was your signature ‘look’. Eyes, wide as saucers, taking in the world around you, all the while clinging tightly to Daddy and me. And, us clinging, too… clinging so tightly to Abba Father. (Eyes mostly drooping from lack of sleep and delirium.)

As I sit here today in this quiet place and remember these things I have ‘treasured in my heart’, truly all I can think to say is this… Blessed be your name, Jesus.

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Haley Long

I am a recipient of amazing grace. I’ve been married 11 years to my husband, Scott. We had 2 children, Isaac and Zoe. Then one day God met us both in the same moment and broke our hearts and filled them with love for orphan children. In 2008, we brought our son Beniam, now 3, home from Ethiopia. We are currently in the process to adopt a little girl named Mei from China. I am a Florida girl who loves sunshine, water, and sand. I enjoy almost anything you can do outdoors, especially in the mountains. When forced to stay inside, I love to read and write.

Part 3 of 3: I Refuse

Through this season of prayer and seeking God through His Word, Scott and I had become convinced that indeed God was leading us to begin the process to adopt a little girl from China with “special needs.” It was all so different than the process we went through to adopt Beniam from Ethiopia. This time, we were looking at photos of waiting children and asking God to show us which one we should adopt. It felt so strange to make this choice and often we felt paralyzed and unsure of where to go from here.

We spent hours looking and reading and praying. Sometimes I wondered if we were taking too long. But now, I can look back and see what God was doing in that time. Every child we looked at I wondered, “Could this be our child?” So with every child, my heart was opened to see them as a son or daughter, not just a picture or a statistic of yet another orphan who I could not help. With each passing week, I became more willing to say “Whatever, Lord. Whatever you want. I just want to love one of these precious children.” And following this season of searching, my heart has broken more and more for children waiting for a family. Their faces are etched in my mind, and I am totally confident that God will use these things that have happened in my heart for further use down the road.

Then one day, I think we were just ready. And, we saw this picture of Mei and Scott said, “That’s her.” We did not know much about her at all, and her special need was one we had not considered before. That night we put her file on hold in order to have it reviewed by an international pediatrician who could tell us more. When I was getting ready to go to sleep that night, I began to think more about little Mei’s “special need,” and I thought maybe this wasn’t something I was comfortable with after all. I just let my mind focus on her medical records and lost sight of some other things. My heart was heavy, and I was worn out. I sighed and rolled over to turn on the alarm for tomorrow. As I did this, I whispered out loud a quick prayer, “What do you think, Lord? Please speak to me.” (Thinking that I was checking out for the night, and the prayer could maybe be answered tomorrow) I pushed the button to check the volume on the radio, and these were the exact words I heard:

He cries in the corner where nobody sees
He

Part 2 of 3: Everything in Here is Crazy

Scott did not freak out. I decided to tell him on our car ride to see family over the weekend since the kids would be engrossed in their books or DVDs. And, he didn’t freak out. His attitude was that if God is calling us to this, then He would make that clear and take care of everything. I was so sure he would freak out that it freaked me out that he didn’t freak out. I handled it all very maturely by telling him he was crazy and climbing into the back seat to hang out with slightly more sane people. At which point, I kid you not, Scott calls out, “Hey kids, you wanna adopt a sister into our family?” This was met with a rousing cheer from the back.

Now, I was really mad! This is not how we normally handle family decisions!

But, I was beginning to get excited too.

After talking about it some more, I agreed to find out more about “Mandy” acknowledging that God was probably calling us to be an advocate for her and help her find a family. When I inquired, we found that Mandy had found her family.

But, we both knew that God was doing something in our family, so we began to pray and read scripture, seeking His will. My heart began to be softened and eager to follow wherever God was leading us. But, I was still scared. At first, all I could see was my own weaknesses, limitations, and inabilities. But, day after day of drawing near to God, I found that I was seeing things more from his perspective. And, everything changed.

And I do mean everything. Not just my desire to follow his will no matter what. But the way I looked at my day and my kids and my house and my husband. The further we went on this journey, the more I was throwing off all these things that had hindered me from stepping out in the first place. Worry. Fear. Selfishness. Doubt. Discontentment with what I’ve been given or how my day goes. All of a sudden things that used to seem such a big deal- a missed nap, a temper tantrum, the flu, potty training, a migraine… they were all things that I could laugh in the midst of. Because, slowly, I was seeing it all through a different lens.

And that lens was Truth. It was the Word that I said I believed and loved but now I would have to live. It was the God I said I trusted but never had I been asked to trust so much. And, He was so very patient with me in my doubt. So very gracious to continue to meet me when I asked for Him to show me the way.

I remember specifically one night when I was focusing my thoughts on what others would think of our decision to adopt a child with “special needs.” I was holding my Bible open again.

“God, this is crazy. Seriously. This is crazy.”

And just as clear as day, this is what came to my mind . . . a patient, gentle voice, but firm . . .

“Haley, everything in here is crazy.”

And, I looked back down at the Bible and thought, “Did I hear that right?” So I began to think through all the stories of the Bible I could think of. And it is true. From a human perspective, everything in there is crazy. Everything.

It was a significant moment for me. Because I knew that I believed it all and God had confirmed it over and over again in my life. So if what was Good and True and Love and the Way of Jesus were crazy in the eyes of man, well then, call me crazy.

Part 3 to follow…

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Haley Long

I am a recipient of amazing grace. I’ve been married 11 years to my husband, Scott. We had 2 children, Isaac and Zoe. Then one day God met us both in the same moment and broke our hearts and filled them with love for orphan children. In 2008, we brought our son Beniam, now 3, home from Ethiopia. We are currently in the process to adopt a little girl named Mei from China. I am a Florida girl who loves sunshine, water, and sand. I enjoy almost anything you can do outdoors, especially in the mountains. When forced to stay inside, I love to read and write.

Part 1 of 3: Not On Our Radar

Adopting Mei was not our idea. We both knew that we wanted to adopt again and had our ideas of what that would look like. We would adopt a girl, maybe about 4 years old from Ethiopia or domestically, and we would wait until Beniam was in kindergarten. Because God knows we have our hands full right now. I mean, if everyone who sees me in the grocery store with all three kids remarks that I have my hands full, surely God knows, too. That is what I thought. Because that is how I looked at it then.

But, then one night, I was looking at this girl staring back at me on a computer screen. She was a “waiting child” from China. I had not intended to see her. (It is easier if you do not see.) I was innocently checking a blog to see an update on a friend’s new daughter from China. I did not know that she primarily uses her blog to advocate for waiting children in China.

So there I sat, looking at

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