Yesterday morning, I was greeted with an email regarding our adoption. My heart leapt when I first saw it. I didn’t hesitate to open it, heart pounding so hard I could barely hear anything else.
It was not good news. It wasn’t hopeless news. But it was more waiting news. Lots more waiting. It was also confusing. Not that I didn’t understand what the circumstances were, but that I didn’t understand how we ended up there.
And then I got another email. The news was a blow, knocking the wind out of me, and it leaves everything very uncertain. There are so many things I cannot see and so many things we have HAD to trust God with.
This new season of waiting is no different. Many things are out of our control. There’s nothing we can do but trust God to do the work on our behalf. And really, isn’t that a good place to be? The best place?
And every time I try to go to a place where I want to let go and be at peace with the reality that they may NOT come home, I’m very unsettled about it. All I can think of is what will happen to them if they don’t have this opportunity. They will end up on the streets once they age out. No family. No support. No opportunity to be raised by a family who loves them and lives the Gospel with them.
That doesn’t seem like a place I could see God taking this. But I’m not God. And sometimes I wonder if all my notions and beliefs are false. Not my believing in God, but believing what I thought I knew of Him. But to me, that road would not be consistent with His character of the Bible. But is that reality for Him? Or is it my own wishful thinking? His redemption goes deeper than I could ever imagine.
And maybe? Maybe this process is a cleansing for me, too?
People keep bringing me back to the promise of Abraham. Even when God’s promise seemed laughable, He showed up. He fulfilled it.
God’s hand has been in this from the beginning. Why would I think it would just crumble beneath us? Why would He ask us to do this if He wasn’t go to see it through to completion – not just their homecoming, but beyond that?
This week I was brought to a place of greater peace with where we were and now this new season of waiting has become raw once again.
But isn’t that it? God stretched me in that last season. He stretched me, He sustained me, He strengthened me. Did He decide I was ready for the next season of waiting?
And do I want to walk down this road the same way I did last time?
Did the anxiety help me or my adoption move forward? Did it help me learn to trust God more? And who is this really about anyways?
I’m tempted to remove myself emotionally because it’s just so hard. The unknown and uncertainties are hard. And maybe that’s just it? Maybe I’m holding this adoption up to high?
The process is foggy, but when I choose to see, I can see God leading the way. And I can turn around and see how far He’s already brought us. God will only show me what I need to see. It’s how my faith is tested and stretched. Will I follow Him when I cannot see?
Would God truly lead us to a dead end? That’s not the God I know — but do I know the right God? Or have I created a god whom I want to see rather than the One who Is?
This new season of waiting is different. It carries more uncertainty then our entire process has thus far.
Will our girls even make it home?