Sweet Child of Mine

I've always had a heart for children.  I can't stand to see children suffering or hurting or being mistreated.  It literally brings pain to my heart to read the horrid stories in the news about things people do to their own children or about children suffering or starving in far away places.  I grew up with several families around me that did foster care and I always admired them.  I thought that one day I would like to do something like that.... take care of children that had experienced so much pain and show them how life could be different.  But my husband has never been too keen on the idea of foster care.  He always gives me the "that's something we can talk about later" response.  If it's meant to be, he'll come around.  God will change his heart.

But recently I have felt tugged in a different direction.  This is how it happened....

I am away from my family right now for a year-long class.  I have started using this time to get closer to God.  I've started reading my Bible daily and praying and as I've spent more time with God, the topic of children has been more on my heart than ever before.  I know my purpose has something to do with kids... I just haven't been sure what that is.  Then I started to feel like God has been showing me how lucky I am.  My husband has been steadily getting better and better jobs making more and more money in the midst of a time where the economy is crumbling around us and I feel God telling me that this isn't happening to us because we are just special.  There is a purpose for our life going this way and that purpose isn't just so that we can live a life of ease.  So what is that purpose?  Kids.  Maybe it's kids.

Then a friend send me a blog she is writing about the process her and her husband are going through to adopt a child from Ethiopia.  I was immediately intrigued.  She, much like me, had always felt a desire to help children... but she knew she wanted to adopt and her husband did not like the idea.  So she never brought it up again... she just prayed that God would change his heart and he did.  Her husband decided he wanted to adopt and now they are doing it.  As I finished reading her blog with tears streaming down my face, I thought, "Maybe Hubby and I could do this.  Maybe we should adopt a child."  I started praying about it right away and the feeling hasn't dissipated... it's only gotten stronger.  But if Hubby didn't like the idea of foster care, he certainly wouldn't like the idea of adoption right?  So I prayed.  And cried.  And prayed some more.

About a week ago, I decided to bring the idea up with Hubby.  I told him I wanted to talk to him about something that was on my mind and I just wanted him to think and pray about it.  I told him everything that had been happening in my mind and heart over the previous few weeks and he just listened.  I was completely shocked at his response.  He actually sounded excited about the idea and he said that as soon as I said I wanted to talk to him, he knew it was going to be about adoption.... a topic I hadn't really brought up before.  He's the one that said one OR TWO!  Two???  I had just wanted him to think about the idea and he's mentioning two?? Maybe God started working on Hubby's heart long before mine... after all, I would be much easier to convince to help a hurting child!  I had tears streaming down my face when I hung up the phone.  The first obstacle.... what I thought would be the most difficult one, isn't even an obstacle at all!

So now what?  I feel almost sure that we should do this.  But when?  Where will the money come from? Do we have a 4th kid?  Do we skip the 4th kid?  Do we wait till our kids are older?  What about all the other plans we had for our life?  Do those change... do we stick to them?  I have so many questions.  I am a planner.  Maybe God is trying to remind me that my plans are not my plans.  My plans need to come from him.  He has the perfect plan but how do I know what that is?  This is the biggest test of faith that I have ever had because we really need to trust God completely with this decision.  I am a doubter.  What if I'm not hearing Him right?  What if we do this at the wrong time?  What if I get pregnant right when we are supposed to adopt?  Will our house be big enough for all these kids?  How will we buy a new house when we owe so much on ours?  I feel like God is telling me not to worry about that... he will take care of it.  But the obsessive planner in me has all these questions.  How can I be sure we are doing the right thing?

If you are reading this, and you pray, please pray for us.  I don't know what else to do right now besides pray.  I was dead set on having a 4th baby but I'm not even sure if that will happen now and that is a hard decision for me.  I don't know if God is trying to work on me to give up that last child or if we will still have another.  I feel like I don't know anything... but I know I want to do this.

So child out there (or two), I don't know your name, I don't know where you are, I don't know how old you are or if you are a boy or a girl but I am praying for you.  I pray that Jesus wraps you in his arms and gives you peace.  Whoever you are, we will love you like our own child.  I have already started to love you.  Once God gives us the go ahead, we will come for you with open arms.