Family Stories Archives - Page 7 of 24

February 19, 2014February 19, 2014

God’s Dreams for Us

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that one day I would adopt an eight year old boy China. In fact, if you had told me three years ago that I would now have a nine year old son, I probably would have laughed. Isn’t it beautiful how God works, changing and molding us into the vessel He intends us to be when we open our hearts to him.

When God first revealed to us His plan, I was honestly absolutely terrified at the thought initially, but God whispered in my heart, “Trust Me, dear one” and I settled under the secure wings of my Almighty Father and let Him lead. Adopting an older child is not an easy path, but God didn’t promise that the road would be easy, did He? But has it been rewarding and amazing? Absolutely!

For Anthony’s one year anniversary as our son, we purchased a Bible with his name imprinted on it. I had been waiting for the right time to start showing him how God speaks to us through the Bible and provides us with everything we need to follow Him. I didn’t want to rush things but Holy Spirit has been working in his heart one from the very day he entered our lives.

As we were setting down for our evening routine of a devotional reading, he said, “My heart believes in God, but my sometimes my brain doesn’t understand.” I could feel the prompting of the Holy Spirit to seize this very moment!

I said, “Yes, our brains try to understand, but we will never understand everything about God because He is God and our brain is too small in comparison to Him. Let’s look at verse in Isaiah that talks about this very thing. We can look it up in your new bible!”

So I picked up his new Bible and turned to Is. 55:8-9:

“‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your
ways my ways,’

declares the Lord.

‘As the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways
higher than your ways

and my thoughts
than your thoughts.'” (NIV)

As Anthony read the verse aloud to me, his eyes grew big and he looked at me and exclaimed rather loudly,

“That is exactly what I was thinking! The Bible is amazing!! I am so happy! I love God with all my heart! My heart is different now.”

Heart pounding . . . tears of joy welling up . . . silent praise to God. This boy, one year ago, had not even heard the name of God!

“Anthony, I can’t tell you how happy it makes me that you understand how God speaks to us from His word. He also tells us that we are new creations because of Christ and have a new heart.”

“Are there verses that tell us that?”

“Oh, yes! Let me show you!”

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (2 Cor. 5:17, NIV)

“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” (Ez. 36:26, NIV)

God is working in the heart of my boy who only just heard about God one year ago. Just think, if we hadn’t listened to God’s call, we would have missed out on the amazing work God is doing in his life.

______________________________________

After struggling with infertility for 5 years, God led Suzanne and her husband, Adam, to His Plan A for their lives—adoption! Their daughter, Grace Lihua, came into their lives May 2011 on Mother’s Day from Fuzhou City, Fujian Province, China. And, their son, Anthony Jianyou, joined their family in January 2013 from Shanghai. After a career in politics, Suzanne now works as a part time Pilates instructor while home schooling their children, writing and working as a part of the Sparrow Fund Blog leadership team. You can follow their adoption journey and life on her blog, Surpassing
Greatness.

February 12, 2014February 12, 2014

Losing the Streets

The slum streets were her childhood playground.

Her lungs took their first swallow of earth’s air in the poor African’s version of a waiting room, while her mama held her place in line for a “free-clinic” bed — one that she never saw. Hope was welcomed by this world into the dirt, and it would indoctrinate her first five years of life.

And from what I can tell, she did street life well.

The skill set required to scavenge for food and beg (simply to get by) is quite different, even, than the one needed to slide into the masses of an orphanage food line. To move from streets to shanty-like slums and back again, over and over, makes one resourceful. Vigilant. Prudent.

And … nervous. Afraid.

Nearly six years there, in that life, and now just over six months home, Hope shows the wear-and-tear a child her age is much too young to have received. No government aid could touch the heart-wounds which come from a child fending and fearing during the years she was meant to be furrowing.

My sweet little girl has a heart that longs to live childlike-free, but which is trapped behind years of inertia. At times, she moves like a freight-train — unstopping, always racing, never able to rest. She didn’t stop then, so why now? Rest was danger; how could it, overnight, turn into safety? She barrels through life and, at times, people.

It’s what she has always done. It was her survival.

But tucked away behind 10 of her missteps is one move in the right direction, one sprig of beauty.

And I’m the mama He’s called to search it out.

One of the greatest dangers of adoption is believing for your child what your child already believes about themselves. It’s subtle. And easy, when the sum total of all their behaviors in a given day seems to point in one direction.

But we weren’t called to be the thermometer in the life of a child who has years of seeing themselves in only one light. We are here to tell them who they really are and, in light of who He is, that they are royalty.

They just don’t know it yet. They haven’t been told.

She scooted over on the couch: “Eden can sit here!”

She seemed to be offering her sister an olive branch, by way of the hotly-coveted seat next to Lily for read-aloud time. But, as Eden began to move, Hope’s intentions became clear to me (but not to the others). Instead of forfeiting her own seat next to Lily, she was finagling a way to squeeze, now, two bottoms in one spot. She stepped forward for a moment to re-adjust, so I took the initiative for her.

“Hope! Look at that,” I said, as I surreptitiously scooted her body to the other side of the couch. “You gave your sister the seat you wanted most. Sweetheart, that was beautiful.”

Her face flashed remorse, for a second, before she tried on the new mantle I’d foisted on her. All of a sudden, her countenance changed. She adjusted her shoulders and her eyes sparkled. “Yes, Mommy, Eden can have it. I want her to have it.”

My little girl danced and pranced her way through the rest of that night, light-footed, light-hearted. It was as if she started to believe she might be something other than the tempestuous little girl she’s painted herself to be.

The next morning, I woke to find a different child in my home. She scampered downstairs to get waters for her siblings, without them knowing. She shared her colored pencils without being asked and snuggled closer and longer to all of us. “Mommy, I want to bless you,” she said, as I caught her carrying my running clothes from the floor where I’d left them to my hamper.

And this is how it goes. This is how He is winning her back. The age-old strategy of delight is the Father’s best-kept secret. He kneels, toes pressed against the ground, staring into dirt, and His fingers so tenderly search for that one shoot that says life is here. He wades through years of lies calcified against my heart to find His own Truths buried within, and He calls them forth. I call myself “messy” and He says beauty in the making.

And when I learn from Him, I can do it with her.

Perspective is everything.

No child born of God is forever lost. No doctor’s diagnosis or psychologist’s analysis is the final verdict.

The Father looks on my daughter not with eyes of hopelessness and fear. He stares into her deep and calls forth Himself, planted in her from before the day she met the streets. What the enemy calls misfit, He reclaims as heiress.

And as her now-mother, my role is to carry this torch over her life. I live advocacy in my flesh and in my spirit. My prayers and my words form the bridge of partnership between His promises and her reality. I partner. She is being made new and it’s my job to speak it loud and to believe it in my quiet.

It’s His job to impart it.

And mine to receive.

With all that I am and all that I have, to receive. And this is motherhood.

The streets — or the diagnoses, the fears, the setbacks and mistakes — these do not have to stand. We get to stand in their place.

* Photos courtesy of Mandie Joy

_________________________________

Sara is a wife to Nate and a mother of four (and one on the way) whose birth canal bridged the expanse between the United States and Africa. After almost a decade of Christian life she was introduced to pain and perplexity and, ultimately, intimacy with Jesus. God met her and moved her when life stopped working. And out of the overflow of this perplexity, came her writing.You can read more of her writing at Every Bitter Thing Is Sweet.

February 10, 2014

What Has God Done For You?

We try to be very intentional about our dinnertime conversations. David, especially, loves to challenge our children to think about and respond to sermons that we’ve listened to, things that we’re discussing at school and books that we’ve read. The kids have been learning to ask deep questions during our mealtimes, as well. Getting into the swing of things a few nights ago, Grace asked the question, “What has God done for you?”

I loved some of their answers (which were very elaborate and detailed, but I’ll just give you the main points).

He died for me.

He gave me a rock-n-rollin’ family.

He gave me a dad whose like an angel.

He let you adopt me.

He loved me so much.

It was amazing to me that the two things that our children said that they valued the most were the love of Jesus, who died for us, and becoming beloved sons and daughters, through adoption.

Even though our children often tell us that they love us (and some of them even tell us that we are the best parents in the whole world…hehehe…just wait until they discover the truth!), I was surprised at how strongly each one expressed his/her joy in being adopted. I certainly wouldn’t have expected this, anymore than I would have expected a birth child to express such gratitude for being born. But, I also know that when a person has experienced the sort of loss that our precious children have experienced, that person can either get angry, or he/she can choose to love, forgive and be grateful for what he/she does have. I’m so glad that each one of our children is learning to be the latter sort of person.

adoption

It’s a beautiful thing.

_______________________________

David and Sarah have been joyfully married for almost 18 years. They have been blessed with 6 wonderful children (one homegrown son, a daughter from Ukraine and four children from China) and are never sure if they’re “done yet”! They love Jesus and are grateful that He has recently led them to the urban core of Kansas City where they are learning to give their lives away as they build His church in the inner city. You can read more about what God is doing in their lives at http://davidandsarahb.blogspot.com.

February 5, 2014February 4, 2014

He was shy!

If there is one thing I love to celebrate,
it’s progress.

Especially with your children.

It always feels good to begin to see that the things you have been hoping for, praying for, trying your best to patiently teach, finally break through in your child.

That happened for us over the Christmas break.

It was a proud moment for me.

One that not everyone would understand jumping up and down to celebrate.

See, my child acted shy upon meeting his cousins, that live in Texas, for the first time.

Most people don’t jump up and down when their children act shyly.

As a matter of fact, most parents want their children to overcome it.

But for us, it was a major victory.

I really wanted to run around and say,
“My goodness!
Did you just see that?!
My son just hid behind my leg upon meeting new people!!
WHAT?!
YAAAAYY!!”

I mean, no one would really get that, right?
What is wrong with that lady???

But it was HUGE for us!
And for the first time in a while,
I felt the sweet satisfaction of thank-you-Lord progress.

Because it wasn’t even an attention-getting shyness,
which is his usual attempt at coping with new situations.

I was real, legitimate, I-don’t-know-about-this shyness.
And I was proud.

Crazy, huh?
But oh, so real.

But the good news is…progress is being made.
Our little boy is healing.
Spirit, soul and body.
And I am so blessed to be his mama.

______________________

Anna Lokey and her husband Shaun have four girls (one from China) and FINALLY a boy (also from China). She’s a normal mom, living a life for God, raising a family that does the same, homeschooling, and trying to keep up with everyone’s schedules. She says, “If I can get my kids to school and gymnastics on time and then fix a real meal for dinner, it’s been a good day!” You can read more about them and their anything but LoKEY life on her blog www.anythingbutlokey.com.

January 31, 2014February 2, 2014

Stories

I have told both of my boys thier adoption stories since they were newborns in my arms. It’s not easy to put into words the miraculous and complicated way God brought them into our lives, but I’ve always felt like it was good practice for me even if they have no clue what I’m saying. The way they became part of our family is precious and I don’t ever want to forget those stories that made me a mama.

Right now, it’s pretty much a one-sided conversation. My oldest is starting to make some straight-forward connections like…

“L is my birthmommy.”

“I grew in her tummy”

“She picked you and daddy to be my parents.”

Then there are moments when I can see it in his eyes. His little brain is just spinning trying to figure out his story.

That’s when a little bit of fear sets in. I realize that there will probably come a day when there will be hard questions to answer and upset or confused emotions that come out of my boys. In my humanness, I want to protect them. I don’t ever want them to doubt our love for them or their birthfamilies love for them.

Then my loving, heavenly Father whispers to me and says, “Abby, don’t you remember how I used some really difficult situations in your life to draw you closer to me? I want to do that for your boys too.”

So, yes. It will be hard. There will be emotions that may be difficult to deal with. I won’t have all the answers for my boys, but I have the priviledge of pointing them to The One who is control of all things and has EVERYTHING they need.

“And my God will meet all you needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:19

_________________________

Abby and her college sweetheart husband Wes began the journey of domestic adoption in 2009. Blessed with a (more than they had planned but oh so thankful for it) open adoption experience, they were able to witness the birth of their first child Max in the summer of 2010. Little brother Sam joined their team in September of 2012. Wes and Abby are trusting God as he leads them in their relationship with their sons’ birth families. You can follow their story at Akers of Love.

January 24, 2014January 24, 2014

Profundity of Life After Adoption

“Nummies, Mama? I make you dis.”

His tiny little voice barely above a whisper as he approaches me on the couch, handing me a tiny toy colander filled with a wooden pizza slice and two felt pieces of bread- white and rye. “Peanut butter, cheese, and chocolate, ” he tells me.

Gifts from my boy.

From where I am sitting I can see a wall full of pictures; pictures we took of him last July, when we first met our little boy in a Moscow orphanage. He’s two, but he looks much younger. Maybe a year and a half old.

I remember last year: worrying about him, wanting- no aching– to bring him home, and counting down every eternal day until we did. Mostly I remember walking the streets around our neighbourhood and praying as desperately as I could for that home-coming day to arrive soon.

Lots about parenting an adopted child is very normal. We do all the regular parenting things like books and baths, play dough and painting, making messes and tidying up…

But parts of it are just so profound. Every time we walk those same streets together- my boy and I- I think about those prayers I whispered and that deep ache in my heart, now filled. Neither my heart nor my mind can comprehend the mysterious way in which God seemed to bend fate and bring us together. Redemption for both of us.

We do such normal things like taking our boy to the zoo and yet the whole experience is seeped in this profound brew of what is and what could have been. I watch my boy who has morphed from babyhood to childhood in nine short months and I am amazed. As he gestated in our family he has grown only more vibrant. Just when we think we’ve hit the height of his transformation, he surprises us.

Nine months ago, he grew upset when we had him run around inside without shoes on, so used to having his little feet always covered. Five months ago we took him, bundled in our winter clothes, to the shore of Lake Michigan and he froze in the sand, then gingerly pushed it back with the tip of boot, wondering what is this stuff? We tried him on a trampoline twice this summer, both times to cries of, “I don’t like it!!” and scooped him off.

And then yesterday, we came across this net at our zoo’s playground- roped across a pit, bouncing and insecure beneath the happy feet of running children. And Arie tried it.

With apprehension, he took two steps and cried out, “Mama help!” but we encouraged him to do it alone. “Only kids allowed on here Arie! No grown ups. I know you can do it!”

Slowly, he took another step. And another. His face grew more determined and proud with every inch until finally, he reached the other side. Pure victory for my little man.

As he raced around that play fort I was lost again in the profundity of what is and what could have been. A year ago, an orphanage. Today, a zoo. A year ago, thousands of miles away. Today, here. What could have been: the small world, the day-to-day, the every changing care-givers, and the insecurity of not knowing who comes next. A little boy, relying on himself. What is: a big world of new experiences, the day-to-day and the joyful surprises, the constant love of mom and dad, the security of knowing that it’s us, forever. A big boy, growing brave and finding his way.

His life verse runs constant through my mind:

See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
and streams in the wasteland.

With his life, God is doing a new thing. The profound moments stitched like a colorful thread through the fabric of my day.

There will be many more of these moments. Many more times when I will be struck with the wonder of his life- of my life- redeemed. More pictures in albums and photos on my wall. Restoration. Streams in the wasteland.

Love.

_______________________________

Jillian Burden is still adjusting to this beautiful thing called motherhood; she and her husband are parents to a son by way of a Russian adoption. While her belly might not have expanded, her heart and her faith sure grew as her family did! You can read about this soul stretching journey to parenthood on her blog.

January 15, 2014January 15, 2014

Again and Again and Again

There was no getting it out of my head. It had become my heart’s background music.

How great is our God. Sing with me. How great is our God.

Ashlyn had invited Lydia to watch her adoption video again…and again and again. As I buzzed around the kitchen, I could hear the song from the other room over and over with Ashlyn’s sweet narration of the images that have become as much a part of the song as the notes and lyrics themselves for our family.

As I danced between the stove and sink to prepare our meal as mothers often do, a small person ran into the room and hugged my legs tight, forcing me to still as small people often do.

I love being adopted. I want to be adopted again!

Caught up in the words of praise and moving music and dramatic images, she recognized in her little 4 year old way the significance and beauty of that moment when we received her in our arms after years of anticipation.

I told her then and write now to preserve the words and my heart here for when her little 4 year old heart is an 8 year old heart or a 12 year old heart or it bursts one day as a mother’s heart.

I love you “being adopted” too. I am so happy to be your mother. When I see you sleeping in the car or watch snuggled up with your sister or listen to your long prayers before dinner, my heart smiles along with my face and I hear the words of “How Great is Our God” in my heart again. The day I saw you enter that office room in the arms of a woman who had cared for you for a year, wearing your big puffy pants, I was amazed and filled with wonder. Years of desiring you had come to fruition. I remember every moment of that day—the songs of the street cleaning trucks, the echoes in the marble halls, the cough that rattled your little frame. I can get caught up in wanting to relive that day too. But, my love, there is no need now to pine for that day. When we adopted you, it was done. Finished. You become ours. Grafted in. If I were able to go back and do it again, I would because I love you even more fully now than I did that day. But, there’s no do overs with that. Our vows that day still stand today and will tomorrow and forever more as every part of you is every part of us.

Yes, I love you being adopted. I loved that day when we adopted you. And, I’d do it again 100 x 100 times if I could. I love you that much.

________________________________________

Forever changed by our experience of being adopted and adopting, Kelly is a stay-at-home mom/manager to 4 children and a professional juggler, juggling her calling as wife and mother with her secondary callings (editing and serving adoptive families through The Sparrow Fund). You can learn more about their adoption story, how they’ve been changed, and what life for them looks like on their personal blog, My Overthinking.

January 8, 2014January 8, 2014

Reflections . . . the first year

It’s hard to believe it has been almost a year since our precious boy walked into our lives that frigid day in Shanghai. I can barely remember life without him. It seems as if he has always been here, and in a sense, he has. God chose him for us before the foundation of the world. He placed Anthony in our hearts before he was even a thought in our finite minds. What a mighty God we serve!

First Photo ever with my new son!

The past year has taken us on an amazing journey far beyond our imaginations. Never in my wildest dreams or fantasies of my future life (of which there have been many) did I ever picture myself adopting an 8 year old boy. When Adam first told me that he wanted Anthony, the fear that rose in me was fierce but stronger yet was the gentle voice of God whispering, “trust Me”.

“‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways,’

declares the Lord.” (Is. 55:8, NIV)

Adoption is all about trust.

Trusting that God will provide a child for you.

Trusting that God will provide the funds you need for the adoption costs.

Trusting that God will protect and love your child while someone else holds them.

Trusting that God will comfort them when they are ripped from the only life they have ever known.

Trusting that God will meld and knit your family together for His glory.

And now, here we sit, one year later . . . still trusting, as each new day brings

More love

More joy

More frustrations

More openness

More peace

More trust.

What an amazing year!

_____________________________________

After struggling with infertility for 5 years, God led Suzanne and her husband, Adam, to His Plan A for their lives—adoption! Their daughter, Grace Lihua, came into their lives on May 8, 2011 (Mother’s Day) from Fuzhou City, Fujian Province, China. And, their son, Anthony Jianyou, joined their family on January 14, 2013 from Shanghai. After a career in politics, Suzanne now works as a part time Pilates instructor while home schooling their children, writing and working as a part of the Sparrow Fund Blog leadership team. You can follow their adoption journey and life on her blog, Surpassing Greatness.

December 9, 2013May 16, 2022

Go Again

We stand in line at the grocery store like clockwork. It’s Friday. The cashiers know my family and my children know them by name. Miss Misty is having a baby. Eden called it months before it was obvious and I hushed her in fear that she’d engaged in the taboo question all children have a hard time containing. Mr. Ty’s daddy just died. Caleb prayed for him to be healed nearly every day since he’d told us, but Mr. Ty’s heart seemed to be healed in the meantime. “I believe in God, now,” he tells them as he weighs my cucumbers. Miss Sata has a new hairstyle, again, and Mr. Roger still isn’t quite sure my groceries will fit in the oversized bag I tote every week.

Just like at home, I forget we are different when we are there. We may have been”different” to each one of them, when they first met us, but now the normal we live everyday is just as normal to the man re-stocking the produce each week as we scoot our cart passed him.

But one week, our cashier was new and curious and demonstrative. The groceries slowed to a halt on the belt and his face flushed, red, as he gushed about them and gave kudos to me. “Wow, it’s so amazing what you’ve done.”

Adoptive mamas alike share the same discomfort with comments like this, but this particular one struck a new, strained, chord.

This week, when the window shades were pulled, I had been far from amazing.

Tired at best. I hid behind my bedroom door and cried, exhausted. Was it always going to be this hard? I’d run bone dry — out of those tender, patient words with a long-suffering tone, and this particular child pushed away every movement I’d made towards love. It was as if every one of her actions was purposed to say: “I’m going to make it impossible for you to love me. I’m waiting for you to fail me. Prove to me I’m not worth it.”

And fail her I did.

She needed steady and I reacted. How many times will this child resist my advancements towards her heart? In my fearful expectations, I inhaled her years of fatherlessness like it was a death sentence. Albeit subtle — all in my head — she read me, of course; a child, once orphaned, becomes an expert at detecting a weak-link of love. They prepare to flee at the first indication that love might fall short.

Hearts bleed in my home in different intervals, but at any given moment one or another is reminding me that we aren’t exactly re-creating normal. I press my hand against the wound and it hemorrhages and I wonder if we’ll ever stop bleeding out old blood.

What a perfect storm. The recovering perfectionist fails and the child backs away further. Who wouldn’t fail this child who’s fiercely resisting my love? I argue to myself. She waits expectantly for her history to repeat itself and I fight feeling trapped by her expectations.

On days like these, while you cry behind the shades pulled tight and your neighbors are shouting out accolades, the YouTube video of the beautiful moment when they found themselves wrapped in your arms is not enough to sustain you. Those of us who have saidyes to the wounded child — or even if you just happened to find yourself raising one — need a grid for their very worst days.

He gave it. In words, once. In expression, all throughout history.

Go again.*

He told the man, Hosea, who married a harlot that couldn’t leave her darkly-patterned ways. What a life calling. How do you explain this to your mother and father, whose dreams for you surely stretched well beyond welcoming a stained bride who still hasn’t decided yet if she is staying?

His words to me are in kind. Look deeply into those eyes that are like vacant corridors and hold her again. Let her forehead feel your lips. Scratch her back and tickle her belly and tell her — again — that she’s yours … forever. Call forth from what is not, what will one-day be. “…just like the love of the Lord for the children of Israel” (Hosea 3:1).

You see, friends, she (any one of the “she”s in my home on a given day) is only my greatest challenge if I believe that my eighty-something years on earth were intended for me only to know safe love — the world’s version of love. If I am to receive and live a love that has a known a shape and form that doesn’t bend or break or bleed, then she’s a real problem. A hindrance.

But His love isn’t plastic.

And He said about me what He is saying to me about her.

Go again.

So I go, again, to her — not because I have some stalwart strength that needs recognition from a grocery store cashier, but because I want to invest my life in knowing the “other-than” love of the Father that outlies every one of my natural understandings of Him.

It’s not my resolve that equips me. My knees are busted open and blood-shod from falling in my pursuit of her heart. But in my weakest moments, I can know this love. Because of my weakest moments, I can know this love.

The most beautiful part of my story these days is bloody.

A friend recently stared into the eyes of her daughter, adopted at an older age and bristling — hard — against her love, and said tenderly, “Babe, you’re going to call me your best friend one day.”

That’s His love that goes again.

Going again is looking into that dead-pan expression and saying it’s not about how far gone you are [the lie they’ve listened to all their lives], it’s about how far He is willing to go to retrieve you.

I won’t come by this love naturally. It’s not natural for those of us clothed in flesh to lean in, not back, when pushed away. The real life-blood of God courses through my system when I resist the urge to divorce my heart from the battle for hers and, instead, go again.

It’s in the going again that we wear the cross and find out from experience what we know in Word, that that tree was more about life than death. Though death was required.

The person in our lives most challenging to love — the child in our home or the friend down the street or even our blood-kin — is the instrument for bringing us to the end of that plastic kind of love and the beginning of our own personal revelation of the cross as a doorway, not just a destination.

He’s aptly positioned them so we might have a place where we get to be the rare ones on the earth who share His heart — the heart that goes again.

They aren’t our greatest challenge, friends. They are our greatest asset.

++++

Making it Practical for those in and outside of adoption: If your love for the one under your roof has run dry, start the line of prayer with yourself: Father, where I am putting up walls to Your love? Where am I not receiving You? Though maybe not connected by blood, this child was given to you for more than just their own heart’s redemption. Every one of their challenges is tied to something He is also doing in your heart. Resist the urge to divorce them in your heart and ask Him to reveal the layers in you that need to know Him as the Father who goes again.

Spend time meditating in the gospels on the cross. Smell the blood and sweat against that wood. Ask Him to make His Word alive in your experience.

And put what He shows you into action. Slide away from the screen, pad your way down the hall to her bedroom, and wrap your arms around her, tight. Ask Him on the way “How do You see her?” and tell her what He shows you. Make it a habit: hug her as many times as you feed her. Give her His words about her, not just your observations. Let them become her true food.

Go again.

First, fourth, fifth and sixth photos compliments of Mandie Joy. Second and third photos compliments of Cherish Andrea Photography. Last photo compliments of Photography by Kamarah.

_________________________________

Sara is a wife to Nate and a mother of five whose birth canal bridged the expanse between the United States and Africa. After almost a decade of Christian life she was introduced to pain and perplexity and, ultimately, intimacy with Jesus. God met her and moved her when life stopped working. And out of the overflow of this perplexity, came her writing.You can read more of her writing at Every Bitt er Thing is Sweet.

November 20, 2013November 20, 2013

An Answer…

I was going to blog about Wednesday.

I was going to blog about Wednesday and how disappointed we were in the non-answers we received.

The girls had their big Neurology appointment on Wednesday and we were so hoping to hear “an answer”.

We wanted a, “this what is wrong and this is what we are going to do about it” answer.

We wanted an answer as to why sweet Maggie cannot control her precious little body.

We wanted to hear that with good physical therapy, Lucy would one day run!

That is not what we heard though and we were left feeling saddened by what our girls might have to overcome or simply learn to deal with as they grow up.

Once again, I found myself feeling un-equipped for what we heard or did not hear.

There was just no “answer”…

or at least not the answer that we wanted…and that was hard and left me feeling discouraged – but then…He answered

and He answered in the way that He knew would penetrate my heart the most.

After the business of the rest of the day, my sweet Lizzie…

you know the one whom we thought might have the toughest time adjusting to her new sisters, the one whom we thought might not want to share us…

or her stuff!

Yep, the Lord used that Lizzie to give me an answer but it wasn’t an answer to our “what is wrong” question but more an answer to “what is right”.There is a question that comes up about our adoptions (spoken and unspoken).It is a question that many adoptive families get, especially those who have adopted multiple times.How will this affect your other children?Sigh…Don’t get me wrong, I totally get that most people ask this out of genuine concern for our children but it still makes me sigh.The Lord gave me an answer though as sweet Lizzie chose this day to show us what she had been writing in her journal at school.

Interpretation – “I love you Maggie and Lucy so much!! They have cerebral palsy. For Maggie, it affects her talking. For Lucy, it affects her walking. Lucy is like Charlie (loud – hehe). I LOVE YOU MAGGIE AND LUCY!”

Yep, she had written about her sisters and about her big family and about how much she loved us – all of us and there was my answer.

Not the answers we had hoped for that day but the answer that really mattered.

Love, just love, unconditional and totally accepting.

I saw it in the face of our Emmeline that day on the beach.

You all remember those pics right?

Those beautiful pictures of Em realizing that her sister, Lucy, who walks very slowly and unsteadily had been left behind…

and the joy that radiated from Em’s sweet face as she went back to get her was my answer.

It was not a burden for sweet Em, but a joy.

A moment that was not lost on me and one that I use to remind myself of the blessings that have been gifted to us.

I was reminded again today as we watched our precious Lizzie play soccer.

After watching this amazing child just tear up that soccer field, our precious Lucy insisted that she walk across that field, all by herself, so that she could give her Lizzie a hug! The look on Lizzie’s face as she watched her sweet sister struggle to get across that field and walk right into her arms was all the answer I needed!

So, yes, growing our family through adoption has indeed affected our other children. By allowing them to tap into to those precious fruits of the Spirit, they are learning (and are teaching me) that just loving unconditionally, without an “answer”…

is the best answer of all!
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22-23

His answers aren’t always what we would like them to be but they are always the best answers and trusting in that is a constant work in progress for me but what blessings come from waiting on Him and staying on that sometimes rocky path!Praising You in the good times and in the tough times Lord!

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Annie H. and her husband, Chris, live in Charleston, SC along with their 7 children, Christian, Charlie, Caleb, Emmeline, Lizzie, Maggie and Lucy. After Annie and her family adopted their daughter, Lizzie, from China in 2008, Annie’s heart was forever changed and following the Lord’s call, she became an advocate for those precious children still waiting. Annie now works for Lifeline Children’s Services as their International Adoption Advocate and has loved working with the same wonderful agency who helped her to bring her daughter home in 2008 as well as their two newest daughters in August of this year. Annie manages the Lifeline advocacy site Wonderful Waiting Kids where she advocates mostly for older children and those with more significant special needs and blogs about their family and adoption at Cornbread and Chopsticks.