Hope. Hope. Hope.

What I have become so fearful of these last days is that our story - our failed adoption - will make others afraid to adopt.  We have become That Family.  The family whose fairy tale ending got ripped to shreds. 

Well...the truth is, I would do this all again in an heartbeat.  Every part of it.  Even the gut-wrenching, sobbing, heart-ripped-out-of-my-chest part of it that was our failed referral. 

The day after Christmas was awful.  A darkness settled in my soul that just wouldn't leave.  I felt overwhelmingly sad and overwhelmingly discouraged.  I felt like we didn't get Callyrose because I wasn't going to be a good enough adoptive mother, maybe I was already in over my head with the 3 kids I have, maybe I just wasn't perfect enough or have enough time to devote to a new child...maybe God knew I would fail miserably at this task.

I spilled out my feelings to my dear friend, Christina...who promptly told me that I was crazy and that those thoughts were not thoughts from our Heavenly Father.  She  gently reminded me of why we had decided to pursue adoption and then referred me to this blog about spiritual warfare and adoption.  Now, I am not a big attributing-every-bad-thing-that-happens-to-demons-attacking kind of girl...but this blog...oh this blog.  It literally echoed my fears almost word for word.  It reminded me that we have a very real Enemy who does not want to see  "the fatherless placed in families and the Church telling the fatherless about Christ."  If you are in the process of adoption and feel like waves of discouragement keep washing over your head, please read it.

Hope began to creep back in.  The next day...it was literally handed to me in the gift of a pair of earrings and a canvas, both spelling the word "hope" in Amharic, the official language of Ethiopia. 

 
And as I spent more and more time reading the Bible, I became reminded time and time again of 3 things: 1) God is the Defender of the fatherless and loves them 2) God loves me and is greater than any enemy along this adoption journey 3) my plans are not always God's plans...and thank goodness for that.  His adoption journey for me and for Callyrose is soo much better than what I had planned. Verses began to leap out left and right:

"In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines His steps."  Proverbs 16:9

"`For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,' declares the LORD." Isaiah 55:8

"Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides You, who acts on behalf of those who wait for Him." Isaiah 64:4

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight."  Proverbs 3:5,6

The darkness lifted and this is what I saw:  I have had the amazing experience of loving a child half a world away...and being used in her life for a short time until her Forever Family entered her life.  I am not trying to gloss over the pain.  But if you are going to experience pain...let it be this kind:  The kind that can rejoice because a child's arms will hug a mother's neck for the first time...and I can be confident that Callyrose is with the mother God had planned for her.

And we get to experience the joy of loving another little one again...this time, Lord willing, the one He has planned to be a part of our family.  And if not, she will become part of our story, part of our journey to whomever He has planned for us.

We have asked our agency for another referral.  My plan was to write this in between...to tell of all the amazing things God has been showing us as we wait.  But this afternoon, before I had a chance to write, I got a call from our agency....about a 3-month-old little girl, found abandoned in the sand at birth, who weighed only 5 lbs when she was a month-and-a-half old...OUR little girl.  She was born October 8th..well after our referral for Callyrose.  We would have never had her if we hadn't had Callyrose first.  God's ways are definitely not my ways...and I am happy about that. ;-)