May 27th - Enjoy the view!

     If you've ever been on a journey/trip probably the most common question asked by a young child or even an adult for that matter is "How much longer?"  If we are going to a destination we have an idea of the length of the journey.  Sure, situations can change that; a flat tire, an accident, a snow storm but we do know how long in normal conditions we will need to wait until we reach our destination.

Recently we have been using a gps/sat nav a few times as we have gone places.  They are interestingly little machines that often have a mind of their own as we recently discovered whilst driving the wrong way down a one way street in the middle of a big city, but that's another story....  Moving swiftly on, the great thing about these clever little devices is that they tell you how long you will be on that road before moving to the next, how many miles left to travel, as well as approximately how many minutes until you hear the welcome words, "You have reached your destination."  The whole system is down to a science and unless an unexpected circumstance occurs the whole journey is quite prescribed.
The thing is though that life isn't always like that and the length of waiting isn't always known.  Can you imagine getting in a car to go somewhere and not knowing if you will arrive in 10 minutes or 24 hours or even a few weeks?  How do you prepare?  What do you wear?  Do you take your ipod or food for the journey?  It's nearly impossible to plan.
It seems this is the world that Earl and I have found ourselves in.  I've waited for many things over the years, waited for graduation day, for special trips to visit friends, for my wedding day, etc. etc.  All of these waiting periods had quite a bit of definition around them but this, this is so very, very different.  Recently someone came up to me that had been praying for me and shared something with me.  They felt God had told them to share with me that the road was difficult because I didn't know the length of the road that I was travelling on but that it was important that I enjoy the view!

I really love that perspective but how do you enjoy the view on a journey that could be extremely short or extremely long.  The answers are not obvious but I have come to a few conclusions.  First of all, I have had to rest in the fact that there is absolutely nothing I can do to make this process go faster.  We are approved and we wait to be chosen.  That's it, my job is to wait.  Also, I am enjoying the view.  Life is good and even though it will change drastically at some point I trust that God will show me how to cope with those changes.  But for now I am not focusing on what will be but what is.  I am enjoying life with my amazing husband of nearly 16 years, loving our new home that we share with our dear friend Lizzie who is a sister to both of us, leading West Basingstoke Community church that has some of the most caring, generous, and Godly people I know, and just taking each day as a new adventure.  Life here in England is far from boring and I don't want to miss it simply waiting to hear the words, "You have reached your destination."

The link below is 'Never Once' by Matt Redman, it is one that has spoken to us recently

May 17th - Phone conversations and more

 Rebecca's conversation between her and a delightful little 6 year old:

Child:  "So, when are you going to South Africa to get your baby?  It is South Africa right?"

Me: "Close, it's America."

Child:  "Ok, so when are you getting your baby?"

Me: "When they call us and tell us then we will get our baby.  We are just waiting for the phone to ring."

Child:  "So, when they call you, then you will have your baby?"

Me:  "Yes, but how old are you?"

Child:  "I'm 6!"

Me:  "Ok, well, it might happen when you are 6 or it might happen when you are 7, we just don't know."

Child:  "Ok, but I think it will happen when I am 6 because I will be 6 for a long time!"

Me:  " I hope it happens when you are 6 too, but I will tell you when it happens, we just have to wait for the phone to ring."

     I'll bet if you think about it you can remember times when you've been seated by the phone or had your mobile in your hand just waiting for that call. I can remember when I was going to get a phone call from an elementary school that I was hoping to work for and the expectation of the ring superceded almost everything else. I also remember back when I was 17 and excited about getting a first real job and expecting Pizza Hut to call to say whether or not I was going to be part of the team of making pizzas and pastas. Those are decent examples but in all reality the phone was going to ring soon enough with the answers to my employment questions on the other end of the line. For us presently we know that there is a phone call or email out there at some point which will most likely be very life-changing but the fact is we don't know when this important call may come.
     As you can imagine the question that we now face almost daily is 'do you know when you get a baby' and of course answering this almost daily can be a bit of a drain. With the adoption not happening until the timing is right we have no choice but to carry on living our daily lives. It's like this, when I get up in the morning I tend to think about eating breakfast, taking a shower, looking to see how the Rangers did in the previous nights ballgame, thinking through what I need to before going out, and checking email to see if there are any pressing issues. I don't immediatley run to the phone, sit down next to it and wait for a call from the agency in America. If that were all there was daily then that would drive us to craziness, but alas there is so much more in our lives than the adoption process which we have entered and have gotten well past the starting gate. There is the reality of leading the West Region of Basingstoke Community Churches, there are village relationships and activities, there is sharing our house/life with Lizzie, there is our wide range of relationships in America that we value, etc... so there is more to do daily than wait by the phone.

not my daily life but an example of a daily life

     What a blessing that while we wait in faith we are encountering many other opportunties to see God at work in our daily lives. Since our lives are about being and not just off doing this and doing that I think that we are able to keep this balance of waiting while going about daily living in a healthy balance.

May 3rd - The keyword is sacrifice

     There a number of words that come up often when helping lead a church, some of them are grace, salvation, love, the cross, sacrifice, freedom etc and the word that I want to hone in on for this blog enrtry is sacrifice. It has been on my mind much lately, I've had quite a few people mention that what we are doing with adoption is a sacrifice. I like to think that the whole of our lives are sacrifice, simply being willing to give away and lay down what we have. Sure there are sacrifices with something like adoption, time, money, emotion but surely that is all worth it, it is worth having on the block  or laying on the altar.
     So far in this journey we have had to 'sacrifice' some of our time including a month in the US, well that was a great time not exactly something where we felt a huge loss as you would when giving something up. There has been cost and there will be much more to come as the adoption goes through but what better way to spend the money that we have saved and planned for over the years? Ya we could go out and use money on an extravagant vacation, or buy a nicer car or various other purchases but why not use our finance on something as special as life. There has definetely been emotion sacrificed but again it has been worth it, to share in the joys of new relationships we've built through this process, to be able tell stories of how God has set up various aspects of our trip and organizing the whole process. We have had some downs as well as ups, but that is reality, it's not all peaches and cream as they say. So for us there is sacrifice but we are more than willing and ready to offer what we have in all the various ways written about before. I'd rather look at other sacrifices that take place through the adoption process.
     I cannot imagine what the feeling must be for a mother who has carried a life for up to 9 months and then after a couple of days this life is given to another family. An attachment that took around 3/4 of a year is physically severed and emotionally changed over the course of a couple of days after birth. This to me is huge sacrifice to be willing to carry this life, go through the trials of pregnancy, the pain of birth all with the plan of then 'sacrificing' this child in the way of giving he or she to another. What a bold statement, rather than taking the 'easy road' of abortion the mother fully gives life to the little one in the womb. We look with a steady gaze at the day when we adopt, when we hold the one given to us by both God and the brave lady who went through it all, not for her but for another. We look to that day, for now we wait until that lady makes contact with the agency and with us about the life that she would like to offer to us.

Have a listen to 'Worth it All' by Rita Springer