Spirit of Adoption

Once upon a time, not so long ago, my pride and joy was just a figment of my imagination, a dream yet to come true. I hadn't seen him. I didn't know his name. His life, his entire being, was a mystery. If I could go back in time I would tell myself to pray through the pain of that experience with even more fervor than I actually did. I would carefully explain that crying so hard I almost threw up was a little over dramatic, even for me. Oh it isn't that I've forgotten the pain, it was so acute, so peculiar, that I think I will remember it for the rest of my life. It's just that if I'd really trusted God, I think the pain would have felt a little less like kicking against the goads.

Garrett was nine months old when we decided a sibling was in order. He'll be two in July and the Lord God Almighty, in all of his infinite and perfect wisdom, has kept us a three person family. I'd be lying if I said that I didn't sometimes want to march right up to heaven's gate and demand an explanation. Why us? Again? And there are days when I want to pummel pregnant people for the simple fact that they look cute in their maternity shirts. But oh how I am trying to learn new lessons and not fail the same old tests. I'm trying to understand that, like James says, the testing of my faith develops perseverance and that perseverance must finish its work so that I may be mature and complete. I'm believing that this is wholly the will of God and that we have nothing to do with it.

We've been discussing adoption again. We haven't chosen an agency or landed on any kind of program. We certainly don't have the small fortune it costs to bring a child into this family. But I can feel the stirring in my soul. I do not know what my family will look like at it's completion. We were set to adopt once before and I found myself carrying our biological son. I do know that Troy and I have always had a deep appreciation for adoption. Of course we would eagerly accept another biological child, but more and more I wonder if God has chosen us to love a son or daughter born not of our own flesh, but of our hearts alone. Perhaps He has given us no choice but to live out James 1:27 "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress..." I know that we cannot look after them all--orphanages throughout the world are filled and so many children in our own country need homes--and I know that He could close the doors even on us saving just one, but for this moment in time, I can feel the *spirit of adoption moving once more.

Romans 8:15 "For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, 'Abba, Father.'”