Dear God,

I’m thinking you laugh.  That you smile.  That you are so creative, all knowing, and sovereign that we messy, tremble prone humans must make you giggle.  I’m hoping so anyway.

You are love in its purest form.   The ultimate Father.  So I don’t imagine your laugh to be mocking or your smile to be mean.

I imagine you smiling at me the way I grin at my growing, desperate to be independent kids.  The way I chuckle as I stand beside them through their anxious, untrained attempts at bike riding, diving board jumping, and chapter book reading.  I beam knowing they’ll get it.  Their doubts are raging and knees shaking.  But I know what they don’t, so I can’t help but smile.   I grin knowing the joy that is ahead if they will just trust my leading.

It’s that kind of joy that I imagine you having over me.  For me.  With me.

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Did you laugh when adolescent me attended to the seed of adoption you planted in my heart and started dreaming of an Asian baby?  I bet you pictured almond-eyed Claire, Eli and Evelyn around my future dinner table and smiled big.

Did you laugh when love struck, totally naive, college student Mark and I sat across from each other at Applebees on our first date and I mentioned adoption?  You knew how deeply and beautifully it would complicate our uncomplicated lives, so I imagine you had a good laugh at wide eyed us.

Did you belly laugh when newlywed us mapped out our life plan?  When we decided on one bio birth and one adoption?  We thought ourselves so wise and so adventurous. We loved our slightly risky plan.  We couldn’t see then how you’d teach us to release our grip, open our hands and accept the grand adventure you had planned. How you’d wring out our control issues like a wet cloth, soaking it full again with your grace, mercy and a better vision for our lives.

Did you chuckle when we filled out that first adoption application and checked “non-special needs”?  You knew.  You knew that in fact all of our children would have “special needs” that would press into our parenting limits.  And that each adopted child would have greater needs requiring a special love much bigger than their cleft palates, cleft lip and urological needs.  That emotions and behaviors and loss and living in a broken world would require parenting beyond our capabilities.

Did you grin when, at the end of ourselves in the five year wait to bring home our long dreamed of daughter, we finally realized that the whole pursuit was more about journeying to you than journeying to our baby?  That though you dearly loved our daughter, that more than anything you wanted hearts tethered to you?  That though the timing seemed so off to our weary selves, that it was just the right time?  Your timing ensured that OUR girl, our Claire Liu Wusha, was placed in our (more faith filled) arms in a stark conference room in Chengdu, China, two decades after the seed of adoption was placed in her momma’s teenage heart.

Did you smile when we filled out our special needs checklist for our second adoption and marked yes to all the most minor and easily correctable special needs?  You pictured us holding Evelyn, didn’t you? And I bet you beamed knowing that we faced chronic challenges, regular infections, multiple surgeries and a lifetime of care.  I think you beamed not because you were right, but because you knew how she’d bless our socks off.  That despite having to stand waiting outside operating rooms, that she’d bring us life.  How we wouldn’t trade medical supplies, specialist appointments and hospital stays for the easier days before her soul was woven into ours.

Did you giggle when we filed a petition for the adoption of Evelyn, knowing that a trip to adopt one more child, would end up being a trip to adopt TWO more children?  If any of our bends in the road made you smile, I bet it was that surprise late night phone call with a match “in case we also wanted a boy”.  How you must have giggled later when the unexpected gift of a son came around the corner of the orphanage office door.  You knew how Elijah LanChang would smile and giggle.  How he’d bring lightness, laughter and joy to the hardest year of our lives.

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I like to hope that our lives, all these years of growing and stretching, of both tiptoeing and leaping outside our comfort zone have brought you joy.  I know that givers love to give, and that you’ve given us much.  You bestowed adoption on us like a miraculous offering that was ours for the taking.  And because we said yes, it’s blessed and bent us in ways we never could have dreamed of.  I think you must smile when we step out of our plans and into yours.

I know our story has your glory written all into it.   Not because of our strength, but yours.  Not because of our abilities, but yours.  Not because of our plans, but yours.  I can look back on it now and smile along with you.   Now, I can count it all joy.  All the waiting, all the doubts, all the surprises, all the hurt, all the life deconstruction, all the heart widening, and the faith deepening.

You dropped a seed into my heart and then stood back and watched tender roots shoot forth, bloom and multiply.  And I bet there is more to come. That’s gotta make you smile.

With much gratitude and a smile,

Rebecca

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Rebecca Radicchi is a homeschooling, tea sipping, mother of four. Already moved well outside her comfort zone by motherhood, missions, orphan care and adoption, the Lord keeps taking new ground in her heart. Only able to offer a “yes” when the Lord calls, God’s been blessing, refining and stretching her. With the hope that others might be encouraged, her humble response is to share the stories. You can find her recording the wonder, struggles and graces of everyday family life at La Dolce Vita and as a contributor at No Hands But Ours and Ungrind Webzine.