Waiting

I've been feeling compelled to write, but am not even sure what to say, because honestly my heart has been sad this week.  The adoption road is not easy.  Its bumpy, unpredictable, long, and honestly I feel weary.  So does my dear husband. We are a weary pair, feeling different emotions on different days, put us together and well, sometimes we laugh, cry, pray, sigh, feel discouraged, and yet encouraged.

Last week it seemed an email came in daily from a friend that was so encouraging, one offering to do a fundraiser, another sharing a word from the Lord for us, another sharing a blog we might like, another asking how we're doing and if there's any news, another saying we've been on her heart and she's praying for us.  There have been recent interactions - one friend said she wept for us, another said I particularly have been on her heart since Christmas and she is praying for me.  We literally feel lifted up - thank you!

We have never really been on the receiving end of such grace, such love, so much prayer, provision and kindness.  At first, we were quiet about our adoption, not really knowing how exactly to share that we were in the process.  Then, our son's referral came shockingly fast, only 6 months after paperwork was submitted to Korea.  So then, it took time just for us to wrap our heads around the fact that our son was IN the world breathing on his own, while I assumed he or she was in utero, but Adam had a feeling.  Then we started sharing, and let me tell you, there is a blessing that comes when we share what is going on our lives - relationships form, connections are made, people start praying, and we realized that this adoption is SO much bigger than us, and about FAR more than our son or our little family.

So while we're down, we are encouraged.  Though we feel sad sometimes, we know God has a plan all the time, and its not even an "I-know-it-deep-down-kinda-feeling."  Its an "I-tell-myself-all-day" kinda thing!  In the midst of my frustration the other day, I hung clothes on the drying rack in the basement and just started talking out loud to God, "What is going on?! Why is this taking so long? etc."  To which the words flow back to me......... "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." (Jeremiah 29:11)  God spoke this verse over my family.  I was touched and encouraged, as if God said, "I hear you. I'm busy working hard right now for you all."

I've been struck by waiting. I am waiting for my son. I have no control over when he will come home to the States.  I wait each day. I wonder about it constantly.

And laying in bed recently, I thought to myself, waiting is human.  Its part of life - God knew it would be, but humans do NOT like to wait. We are impatient, working hard to change situations in which we have wait, to lessen the wait-time, shorten the line.  There are times in life in which we must wait: waiting to get pregnant, waiting for labor to be begin, waiting for the referral of a child to adopt, waiting for a diagnoses and medical results, waiting for a job offer or a big break, waiting for word of good or bad news, waiting to hear from a soldier overseas, waiting for someone we love to pass on into eternal life as the body fails, waiting, watching, wondering.........

We wait everyday for big stuff and little stuff.  Many of us have experienced the kind of waiting like this: that causes your heart to ache and physically hurt sometimes, or that causes sleepless nights, that causes you to refresh your email 20 times a day in hopes of some news, that causes you to get down on your knees and say, "God please help.  I need you."

In the Bible, there is often talk of "waiting on the Lord" - I can say I never truly experienced that until this adoption process - the kind of waiting where you have to daily put your trust in the Lord about the same thing just to function and move forward, and that trust in the Lord is a part of purifying your heart and aligning your heart with His will.

In Sunday School I was touched by a verse that strikes me every time I hear it -

 

2 Corinthians 12:9-10 - But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

So what do you do while you wait, when you feel completely weak and NOT strong, when there are no pictures of your son in your email inbox, nor well baby check-ups, when the state of the adoption program you're apart of seems so focused on refining the process for now, and your child will just have to wait? What do I do? What does my husband do?

Well, confession time: I cry.  I cry.  We feel edgy. We feel angry and impatient. We feel sad, so sad. We feel anxious. We desire so much just to see him move, his eyes to blink, to see his toes or knees, to watch him sleep, to hear him breathe, to hear his voice, his cry. We desire to be his Mommy and Daddy, and meet his every need.  So for now, we dream and wonder and share our hearts with each other. Gosh, I'm good one day, one moment, and the next, tears creep in my eyes. I'm blessed with my husband's hugs.

And I know His grace is sufficient and I am so thankful for the life He has built for our family, and the doors He has encouraged us to walk through.  I know God alone is more than enough to satisfy the longing in my heart. I know He sees each tear that falls and catches them and could count them.  I know He loves me and understands the sadness of a momma apart from her son - the pain of separation many of us feel right now from those we love and miss.  Just the thought of how much my Father God deeply loves me, His daughter, makes me cry!  How deep the Father's love for us....How vast beyond all measure.......What's amazing is how God longs for me, loves me, the way I long for my son - that parent-child love is strong, strong, strong.  Truth is, we are weary, but we know He is our strength and His grace is sufficient, that resting at His feet is right where we should always be.

And why share the darkside? The hardside?  The sadness I feel?  To encourage those of you who are sad, who are waiting, who are wondering when such and such will come your way, who are experiencing a painful separation from someone you love, and in the meantime, you're aching.  I want to encourage those of you who feel you're running in place, instead of forward, that He, our good Lord, is right there next to you. He's not just waiting at the finishline - He is right beside you.

We have an Intimate, Loving God, who is a Friend and a Savior, who is a King and a Rescuer.  He's that noble, that sovereign, that caring, that He steps off his throne and walks with us.  And when I focus on that... there is peace. When I focus on what I don't have, I ache.  But when I picture myself across the coffee shop table from my dear Savior AND Friend, named Jesus, sipping tea, looking at me intently as I pour out of my heart, and reaching his hand across the table to touch mine and comfort me, I know He knows my pain.  He knows my heart. He made my heart and put in it the desire to love a little one on the other side of the heart.  The One who made my heart holds my heart, and you know what else? He holds my 17 month old little boy's heart too and can see him right now. 

I know it the strength of our Loving God that sustains us, when we are just DONE waiting, when we feel weary but must go on.

As I paged through my Bible, looking up every verse about "Waiting On God" in the concordance yesterday, I happened upon 1 Peter 5:7 - "Cast all your anxiety on him because He cares for you."  These are words I'm breathing this week.  When I went up to put Oliver down for his nap, on the side of his changing table was a verse on an index card I taped there a month ago to memorize........ it was 1 Peter 5:6-7 (same verse I'd already read that day but included the previous verse....)

"Humble yourselves, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that He will lift you up in due time. 

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you." 

 

Funny, I thought. I don't remember picking that one, but there it was in my own handwriting and I put it there.  And again, I felt God reminding me to humble myself, to trust Him, knowing full well He is near to the brokenhearted, and will lift us up in due time.

This song always makes me feel better, preferably played loud, windows down:

 Jars of Clay - God Will Lift Up Your Head

Thanks for reading, for sharing in our journey.  And please continue to pray for Benjamin's eye, no update on how he is doing yet.  Thank you!!