Faith Part 1 – The Ups and Downs of the Adoption Process
Have you ever noticed how faith can be so easy and so hard at the same time? All the time I try to think and say that I have faith that GOD will bring our kids to us in His timing, and logically that makes sense. Logically, it even makes sense that GOD is doing everything in His timing. As we are pursuing both adoption and a move to be missionaries in Haiti, it is even more important to rely on GOD’s timing rather than our own. So my prayer is that we can wait on GOD. That we neither get behind nor ahead of Him but that we wait on Him in faith.
But faith can be so difficult sometimes. It is easy to have a few cute sayings like “Give, Go, Grow” or “Fully Rely on GOD” or any of those things that people say that sound good and in some way are probably true. But those sayings don’t really help when real life happens and you have to rely on GOD for something to work. You see, we got an email a little over a week ago stating that the adoption process in Ethiopia was slowing down a little for a variety of reasons, and it was a little discouraging. We are so excited about adopting and having our children home with us and going through this process together. But we also know that GOD has His own timing. Does He want the adoption to take a little longer so that we can work toward the orphanage more, or is He going to show us our kids tomorrow? Does He want us to move to Haiti before we have our kids or does He want us to wait? All of these questions are always going through our mind, and they all absolutely take faith. Real faith. The kind of faith that makes you lay aside your own desires and passions for the desires and passions of GOD.
We have never started an orphanage. We have never adopted. We have never been parents to 1 (much less 33) even 1 child, yet GOD is calling us to this incredible journey. And here is what I’ve learned about faith…
It is easy to have faith when you spend every day at work not getting into the mess of others’ lives and sharing the living Word of GOD with them. It is easy to have faith when you come home every night and sit in front of the television for hours with no thought of what’s going on in the world around you. It is easy to have faith when your biggest concern is what vacation you will take next or what restaurant you want to go and visit for the first time.
But faith becomes much more difficult when you cannot accomplish what you need to accomplish without the power of GOD! When everything in your life is out of your own control and in the hands of GOD. Even knowing that He is my loving Father, perfect Savior, and powerful GOD. Putting your lives in the hands of another is very difficult, and up to this point in my life I don’t think I’ve ever really done that before. It is scary, it is hard sometimes, but it is exactly where we are supposed to be…In the hands of our Savior.
Please do not see or hear this as me thinking we are perfect because we are so far from perfect I could never begin to imagine what perfection even looks like…Until I think about Romans 12:1 that tells me “Therefore, in view of God’s mercy” and then I think, I can see perfection. Not in myself or any other human friend, but in the mercy, love, forgiveness, and grace of GOD. It is difficult, but my prayer now is that I could live everyday by the type of faith that allows me to give my life over to my Savior. I’m not even close to doing that now, but everyday I can see a little bit more what that could look like.
So encouragement to everyone who reads this is this…Do something that requires faith! Not the type of faith that makes you say a catch phrase or slogan or something like that. But the type of faith that everyday you wake up and wonder how GOD is going to bless you today because you are doing something that could never be accomplished with your Savior!
Even though the adoption is still up in the air, we have faith that we will meet and hold our kids when GOD decides it is time, and I can’t think of a better time for anything to happen than that!