It took me a while to write about this
topic, so I'm sorry that it's a few weeks late. Mother's day was a
little tough. Not for the reasons you might suspect, but being so far
away from my wonderful mom and my sister who is having a baby soon. I
realized that living here in China I may never get to feel my
sister's swollen belly. I'm also not going to get to help her set up,
or go shopping with her. I can send things I buy online to her, sure,
but that isn't everything I want to give her! I want to help with the
baby shower and sew a baby blanket for her. I also want to hang out
and feel the baby kick. These things make me miss home. I wish I
could have gone camping with them for my mom's birthday a few weeks
ago. I wish I could sit on the porch swing and talk with her, telling
her about thoughts and dreams we have. I wish I could tell her,
face-to-face, all about the adoption plans and obstacles. I wish I
could brainstorm with her, weigh pros and cons.
These things and the thoughts about my
future family were enough to avoid going to church. Now I realize
that this may offend some, but I honestly could not make myself go to
church on Mother's day. I would leave more depressed than encouraged
and I knew exactly how that church service would go anyway. Now I'm
not saying that celebrating Mother's Day is a bad idea, but really
just hard for me at this point in my life. Sometimes a little extra
private Bible study is better than a church service; not always mind
you, but for some situations I feel church is more of a hindrance to
my spiritual walk than a help. I knew this church service would
involve lady's who are mothers being asked to stand and be
recognized. This would count mother's whose babies are grown, new
mothers, mothers who are in the middle of child-rearing and
altogether ladies who have children. This was highly uncomfortable
for me because of the fact that I so long to be a momma. My little
sister having a baby before I have any children is a little, well,
depressing. I also feel that most churches fail to recognize the
mommas who have lost babies or suffer infertility. I have wanted to
have a baby since I've been engaged. I wanted to start a family as
soon as we were married. God and David had other plans. This has been
a difficult and fantastic change. I chafed for years that I was not
allowed to follow my plans. For periods of time I felt like a baby
was the key to my happiness. I felt like the only way I could really
begin to enjoy my life was having a baby and starting into
motherhood. I wanted to design my baby's room and see my husband hold
it and love it. I thought this would complete my world and my
marriage.
It's funny how desires, even entirely
pure ones, can be in exact opposition to what God plans for our
lives. He had my husband remain strong in insistence that we should
wait, that we were not yet ready. Through my tears and pleads and
depressions, David was able to comfort me and give me hope, but not
give in to my wants. So I waited, mostly unhappily. Eventually,
through a Bible study started this school year, I was able to see
that God sometimes holds off our wants for something better. I may
not be infertile, but I have definitely waited, painfully for
children. I know that God has done everything according to his
purpose, and I have seen that plainly in my life. It is crazy how God
turned my heart from the desire to have a baby, to have a child. From
having a child to having children. God was not only working on my
heart during this time, but also David's heart. He previously had
been opposed to the idea of adoption or having a child at the time at
all. He grew more and more open as time passed, and he was the one
who heard about a sibling group and felt so completely at peace.
When
we talked about Bulgaria, the biggest reason we came to the decision
was we felt peace. When we thought and prayed about other countries
there was a tension, an indecision. There were just so many options!
So many countries with babies that needed a family! How could we ever
choose?! But when we found Bulgaria and the need for families to
adopt sibling groups, we just knew that this is what we should do.
This is where we should go to start our family. We know that
sometimes God point us into a direction only to turn us when we think
we're just about to our destination. We know that he may change us
into something new and unexpected. We're just excited to begin our
part of serving the orphans we were called to care for.
