Don’t you just hate it when you spend a long time writing a post and then you hit “Publish” and Blogger eats the whole thing? Yeah, me too. Well, let me see if I can get those same thoughts out one more time…
It’s been a crazy four days… they would have been busy anyway because we had a lot of stuff on our schedule, but then throw in the whole Going-To-Vietnam-In-A-Week thing and we quickly escalated to Crazy. But we now have both visas and tickets in hand and the grandparents will be here in just a few days, so I’m taking a short break from the crazy whirlwind to contemplate what I have learned from this experience, thus far. Wait, that sounds too big and overwhelmingly huge in scope. What I mean is there’s one thought I’ve had recently that I wanted to share.
On Thursday morning as I was driving to my friend’s house, I was listening to my Tree63 worship CD and singing along. Over the whole past year, there has never been a day where I felt so joyous, so in the mood to sing praises as I did on Thursday. And yet, at the same time, I felt a little shallow. I thought, why am I praising God today? Is it because I finally got what I have been asking for? Because that seems kind of lame, only praising God when I get the answer I want. But I realized that deep down, what I was really praising God for - what literally made me cry tears of thankfulness and joy - was that God brought me through the past year, to this day. I knew with a deep certainty that were it not for God, I would not be celebrating the news that we were finally approved to adopt Zeeb. Because I would very likely have given up a long time ago.
Recently, I read on Dawn’s blog about this very thing.
Any time all this pressure can build up… and at any time in the adoption process adoptive parents can say …. I can not take any more, I am afraid,I am broke, I have to trust God too much, I just want out. And you can be done. Out of the process.
I’m sure it comes as no surprise that I thought all of those things. B~ and I were even advised by our agency that we should consider exactly how long we were willing to wait for Zeeb. Everyone has their breaking point, and I felt like I was hitting mine over and over and over. But every time I did, somehow God got me through. Kind words from a friend; a good song that touched my soul; a sermon that spoke to my heart. In so many ways He reached out and gave me the strength to get through another day. And that is why I was thanking God with all my heart.
And yet, even though I learned this lesson, that God will walk me through even the darkest hours, by the time I woke up on Sunday I was finding all new things to stress and worry about. Little things, like you know, What If I Die or What If K~ and/or A~ Dies while we are apart? I was getting really worked up about it, thinking of how angry K~ would be if I died in a plane crash on the way to her youngest brother. (She hasn’t been very secretive about her feelings, announcing at dinner on Thursday that she feels left out and forgotten).
The funny thing was, we went to church and every song we sang on Sunday morning was about trusting God - even with your very life. And the sermon? You’ll love this one: “Jesus + Trials = Perseverance” . It was based on James 1:1-18 . And lest I think that epiphany I had on Thursday morning came from my own brilliant mind, our Pastor said this: “Don’t doubt God’s character. My faith is in His character, not what He will do for me.” Okay God, message received! I need to keep on trusting, even though the Big Wait is over. There will still be more hurdles, more worries, more challenges. But God is God. He’s the same yesterday, today and tomorrow and I can trust Him.
Through many dangers, toils and snares
I have already come
His grace has brought me safe thus far
And Grace will lead me home.
