While I have just now begun this blog (and done it so badly and sporadically) and many are just learning of our adoption plans, we have actually been on this path for years now. Officially for two and half, but in our hearts and minds - ever since we got married. And so, if for no one else's sake other than my own, I wanted to write some about the God moments we have had along the way and the care He has taken with our family to show us this is His plan. Some days are very, very hard to keep going - and it is on those days that these memories sustain my spirit.
In April of 2010, I was getting ready to go to a women's conference in Pigeon Forge with ladies from my church. A couple of weeks earlier I had been "reprimanded" by a friend that I never took risks or went on an adventure - that I just lived a safe little life in my minivan. I, of course, was offended - but I also wondered what could that mean for me? I was reading (or at least supposed to be reading) a book called Wild Goose Chase by Mark Batterson - and the Celtic Christians had used a word for "the wild goose" as a name for the Holy Spirit. The first chapter of the book asked the question about what "cages" we find ourselves in that prevent us from chasing the Holy Spirit. And one of those cages was responsibility. Could it be that my perceived responsibilities - to my children, my husband, my home, my life - were my excuses for not pursuing what God wanted me to do? Maybe. But I also knew He had given me those responsibilities for a reason - and chucking them for some "adventure" was not the plan. But it was the quote he started that chapter with that resonated with me...
"Life is either a daring adventure, or it is nothing at all."
--Helen Keller
And so I started thinking. Could my adventure encompass and mesh with my responsibilities? Could my family BE my adventure? Hmmm - it was a possibility.
I had read that chapter and quote (and friends, I am sad to say that is where I stopped in the book. I should one day finish it.) while we were in line to park at the conference in Pigeon Forge. The opening speaker that night started off with a quote - by Helen Keller - and said "Life is an adventure, or it is nothing at all." Well, well, well God - you have my attention. Her story was a sad and depressing one, so I just stuck with the quote running through my mind and what it could possibly mean for me.
The next evening we were treated to a concert from Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman. I had already told my friends that I knew he would talk about his adopted daughter who had tragically died the previous year and that I would be updating the contacts on my phone during this time - not because I was rude, but because I knew I could not deal with hearing that story and seeing those pictures - I am not strong enough and I am a big enough wimp to admit it. It was the first public performance he had done since her death - and do you know what his opening song was? The Great Adventure. Are we noticing a trend here? This is how God has to work with me -slowly and deliberately - as if he were teaching a 3 year old how to write her name. During a break in the concert, he spoke about their decision to adopt and their experiences with their daughters from China. I did wind up looking at some of the pictures of his youngest daughter on the screen, though they were blurred from the mass of tears in my eyes.
The last speaker of the weekend was Karen Kingsbury who spoke about her books and her older children and a poem (or was it a song?) about how mothers always remember the first time their child does something, but never consider the last time. We never know when we will give the last piggyback ride, the last carrying them upstairs after they fall asleep in the car, the last time they hold our hand on the way into the grocery store - because we want to believe their childhood will go on forever - but there comes a day when they are too heavy to carry and can drive themselves to the store - and we have failed to hold on to that last time. It was a great message for me to hear and entirely enough to take up her speaking time. But then, out of the blue, she tells about the three boys from Haiti she and her husband adopted.
By now, I am floored. Only one other time in my life have I felt God was speaking so clearly and specifically to me. He was using the Holy Spirit throughout that weekend to nudge open this door to adoption that had been standing in front of me for years and years. He was using the words of Helen Keller to encourage me toward an adventure - not diving with great white sharks or climbing Mount Everest - but an adventure for and with my family. He was letting me respect my responsibilities and send me on an adventure to take on one more.
Adventure, adventure, adventure... All weekend long that word popped up around me. And it didn't stop there. But that is for another day.
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