Even the stones will cry out

Luke 19:40
"I tell you," he replied, "if they keep quiet the stones will cry out."

I was walking through a snow covered grove of Sequoia trees all over 200 ft tall looking up at these huge giants thinking even if I never told anyone about God these amazing creations would scream that there is a creator. I looked at the brown bear with her blond and black cubs and thought only God would color things so perfectly. I sat next to a lake that reflected the image of a huge mountain and thought only a God that cared about my enjoyment of this world would make things so beautiful. I thought probably a hundred times last week that even if we never testified to God's existence even the stones would cry out. How amazing is our God? It was very humbling to be reminded so many times of His power and creativity. It was also reassuring to a heart that sometimes questions God's presence.

On our adventures through Norther California's national parks we also hiked to the 5th tallest waterfall in the world. It was probably one of the most physically challenging things I have ever done. I was trudging straight up this rocky slope thinking I just can't do this. This is too hard. This hurts too much. Soon after came this thought "this is exactly how my life has been." That is at least how I have been feeling. I wanted to stop. I wanted to sit down and be frustrated and say this is too hard and I give up. After having a minor melt down I simply decided that I was going to keep putting one foot in front of the other and stop staring at the end goal that seemed so far away. Step by step I made it up this seemingly impossible hike and ended up at the top looking out thinking I cannot believe I made it. Simple whispers to my heart that this is what God is asking of me to do right now in my life washed over me. I am asked to simply put one foot in front of the other on God's path and to try not to look at the seemingly impossible end. I have to fight and not give up. I have to trust that in the end I will be where he wants me to be. It may be hard and at times painful but in the end I will be stronger and able to see where God was leading me. Another lesson learned in God's creation.

Right before we left for the trip we received a letter saying that we have been officially approved and are now waiting for our baby. It was a moment of peace. We finally made it. We have jumped through the hoops and climbed the mountains of paper work and have landed into a time of waiting. I thought that this would bring me so much joy and release, that I would seamlessly and patiently wait for our baby with happiness and a heart to prepare. I have been fighting a lot of fear. Mainly fearing that we might be facing a long wait and how that will affect us. I am scared to prepare and truly allow myself to be "expecting" for fear that it will end up hurting more in the end. Please pray that I will keep putting one foot in front of the other and enjoy what God is doing in my life right now. I don't want to focus on the seemingly impossible end. I want to grow stronger. If you are praying for our family I want to take this time to say thank you. We couldn't appreciate your support through prayer more. You will never know how much we value your prayers!

Lord Willing

I have adopted a new phrase, well new to me. Lord willing....and fill in the blank. It is so true. If the Lord is willing nothing can stop Him, and if the Lord has other plans my inability to understand doesn't lessen the goodness of those plans. The Lord was willing today to allow us to finish our home study! Our social worker came over, took less than 10 minutes to look at the house, reviewed our paperwork and then was on her way. It was easy and painless. I haven't been able to say that very often the last few years. We are so thankful for an easy and painless step. She met with our pastor after us, and walking by Dave on the way out she said "I think you passed." And then it was over. Our paper work will now be sent to the home office in Asheville to await approval. It should take about 2 weeks and then we are officially waiting! Thank you for all of the encouragement and prayers. We will continue to need prayer as we enter this new phase of waiting. Pray that the paper work will be approved quickly, pray that Lord willing we will not have a long wait, pray for our baby's safety, and for the birth mother as she begins to make this difficult decision. Lord willing, we will strengthen our faith in Him, and Lord willing we will be holding our child soon.

Teachable moments

I am going to rename this blog teachable moments. That is what this blog is. It is me sharing the moments in my life when I actually allow God to teach me something. It is the aha moments. The moments in my life that are worth sharing. This week our home study was scheduled for Wedn morning. I was supposed to be blogging about how amazing it is to be done with this process and how hopeful and excited I feel. Instead, I crawled into my car after a long night shift and checked my phone. The text message read: Crystal, I am so sorry to do this, but I woke up with a fever,chills, and body aches, and I have to cancel our visit for today. Again, I am sorry.
All of the anticipation, hope, and joy came crashing down with one simple text.
Are you kidding me? Of all the days that our social worker would wake up sick, it just happens to be our home study. Of all of the months to get the flu- May?! Is this a sick joke? Well, add it to the list of road blocks. Of course you have to cancel, nothing can be easy...that was the running dialogue in my head as I drove home. Angry. God, how do you explain this?
I forced myself to turn on the Christian radio station, and even thought- I am not singing though. Beth Moore came on and said "Have you ever had those situations that you just don't know how to deal with? You don't have a file for this. You don't know how to respond. That is when we need to pray for wisdom." All I could think was that is exactly how I feel. I don't have a file for this. I don't know how to deal with this. I don't know how to respond in faith. Well, I guess I should ask for wisdom. That is exactly what I did.
Last night I got in my car for my 1 hour drive to work and wisdom fell like rain. I was listening to my favorite worship song (you hold me now), and the end keeps repeating "your kingdom come, your will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven." That struck me. God's will is Heavenly and when it is lived out here on Earth it may not look like we think it should. But, it is divine and perfect. When I ask for God's will (which I frequently do), I am asking for a Heaven inspired plan that will probably not make much Earthly sense. I started to pray...Lord, I believe that your plan is perfect and that this timing is there to lead me to the child you have chosen for me. In a still moment God spoke directly to my heart this question: do you really believe that? The answer was evident... no. I am that father in Mark 9:26 that yells out to Jesus "I do believe, but help me overcome my unbelief." I was telling God what I thought I should say and in that moment realized that I didn't believe it. I felt the immediate need to confess my unbelief. I began to confess my doubts, fears, emotions. I felt the reassurance of the love of my father wash over me. I acknowledged the unbelief and allowed God to soothe my frustrated heart. It was good. It was so good.
That was a teachable moment. That was God giving me the wisdom I asked for. From now on I am not going to ask for God to fix situations, I am going to ask for the wisdom to understand the heavenly will of God.

A Gift

A purple card with a black and white picture of a mothers hands holding two tiny feet that says
" Soon those ten tiny toes will tiptoe into your heart...and leave their footprints forever." My first Mother's Day gift. No one can imagine the impact.
Last night after going to dinner with Dave and my parents we came back to my house to exchange gifts. Dave got a birthday gift, my dad got a birthday gift, and my mom got a mothers day gift. After all of the gift giving was done my mom and dad said that they had just one more.
Out came a BABY bag that contained the sweet card I quoted above and two teddy bears, one pink, and one blue. It was a Mother's Day gift. For me. There were so many layers to what this meant to me.
What a small thing that it was in a baby bag, but I have never been the one to receive a baby bag. I have sat and watched shower after shower and dreamed of the day that I would unwrap gifts from pastel bags, but this time it was meant for me. I unwrapped it. Next that sweet card-tears automatically followed. It represents hope. As my mom said- you are expecting and I want you to feel that. I did. I have this card to hold on to. A symbol of hope of the blessing that are already on their way. Next, the bears. The excitement of not knowing if our baby will need pink or blue, or possibly we will get babies for both bears. They are going to sit in the crib until it is filled with our sweet child. (By the way, I have already picked out the crib I want- no surprise.) It was such a sweet moment for me. My parents are going to be grandparents and they are so excited and that couldn't mean more to me.
When I climbed into bed last night I couldn't help but be humbled by a love from God that I don't deserve. A love from family that I don't deserve. I prayed that God would help me love those around me the way God loves me. I am so blessed. I am so loved. I am so undeserving. That is what is so amazing about God's love. I did nothing to make God love me, but He does. I did nothing to deserve these gifts, but He gives them. I am nothing, but through Him I am someone. He holds me the way that mom on my card is holding those tiny feet. And there is hope in God's love.

Comedy of errors

This Thursday we headed off to Asheville for our adoption conference with Bethany. Dave and I were excited, nervous, and not sure what to expect. We followed the directions Bethany provided and exited off of the exit where our hotel was supposed to be. All of the other hotels they listed were there, but our hotel was no where to be found. After 3 phone calls we realized that the directions they provided to our hotel were wrong, but a nice woman gave us the address to our hotel and about 5 exits down we found it.

Now, if anyone knows me you will understand what happened next. We pulled up to our hotel and it was actually a motel, with the doors opening to the outside. All I could think was of course the one we picked is not what we thought it was, and of course it was the only one on the list that was a motel, and of course it was the only one with the wrong directions. This is par for the course of my life! We walked into the room and I walked into the bathroom and burst into tears. Utter melt down. Not a good start to the weekend.

Dave found me sitting in the bathroom balling my eyes out. I blubbered out "why does our life always have to be like this?" The words of our mouths are from the overflow of our hearts- who am I to ask more of God than what he has already blessed me with? Why do I feel entitled to something better? What an ungrateful child I am! The truth of my sin was sobering. I quickly pulled myself together and we headed out for dinner.

God didn't have to provide his ungrateful child with yet another gift, but He did. We found a place that I had heard about in Southern Living magazine called the Tupelo Honey Cafe. It was an amazingly perfect little place in downtown Asheville. It was beautiful, quaint, and kind of fairy tale like. There were homemade biscuits and blackberry Jam...and we had the perfect date night with lovely intimate conversation. A gift!

The next morning at 8:45 am we were heading into the church where our meeting was. There were 26 couples. All with the same look on their faces as we had. The look of fear, but also the look of hope. After a very long day- I came away with a renewed sense of purpose. Adoption is what God has called us to. Adoption is so much bigger than us just becoming parents, adoption is the legacy we will leave with our kids. They will have a new identity, a new name, and be loved by us as their parents. God has adopted those who believe in Him. He has given us a new identity as His sons and daughters in Christ. He is our father. We will inherit the kingdom of Heaven. Our kids will inherit the legacy of our love for them and their adoption into our family, as well as their identity in Christ. What a beautiful picture adoption is of Christ's love for us. We are so privileged to be a part of an adoption story. We cannot wait to see God's plan unfold. What a privileged life I live!

Waiting

Psalm 27:14 "Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart, and wait for the Lord."

I read this scripture and thought now this is one I need to commit to memory. So much of our life is about waiting right now. We are waiting for the paperwork to be finished, we are waiting for our baby, we are waiting for Dave to finish school, I am waiting for a time when we will have another income, we are waiting to see where Dave will get a job, I am waiting to see if one day I can work less ;)...we are in an indefinite time of waiting.
I am not good at waiting. I was reading this morning in my "Adopted for Life" book and he mentioned that God has always been about waiting in anticipation for something better. He created Adam, but didn't create Eve right away, God waited until Adam realized that there wasn't a helper suitable for him on the Earth. God promised Abraham a son and they waited for God to fulfill that prophecy. Hannah waited for years until she finally had a child. Mary and Martha waited for Jesus to come heal Lazarus- Jesus didn't come until Lazarus was dead. Jesus said he would return and we are anxiously still waiting for that day. But the end to these stories of waiting is the fulfillment of God's best. Adam found his helper, Sarah and Hannah had babies, Lazarus was raised from the dead, and Jesus is coming back for us.
The waiting was part of God's plan. He has a purpose in the waiting. He is using this time to make me more like Christ. He is using this time to prepare me to be a mom. He is using this time to show me that I am horrible at trusting in God's goodness when I am waiting. I am so weak and I realize that I should beg for God's mercy for ever questioning His goodness. In the end I may not get exactly what I am waiting for, but I do have God's love, and He will get the glory that He deserves.
Please remind me of this when I once again fall apart and lose patience in the waiting...

how sweet

I wanted to let everyone know that we are almost done with the home study!!! YEAH!!!! Our class has been moved to April 23rd and we have our final home study visit on May 5th. We are very excited to see light at the end of the paper work tunnel. It has seemed like forever since we started this journey. I am so thankful to not be alone on this untraveled road...
I talked to one of my sweetest friends today, my best friend, and was reminded just how valuable friendships are. She has been one of the most constant people in my life since elementary school. It is so precious to be able to talk with someone who knows you, really knows you. Someone who understands why you are the way you are and how you got to be that way. It is so sweet to share in what God is teaching you and in how tough life can be. To know that you have someone on the other side of the world who is praying for you and encouraging you. My sister in Christ, but really when it comes down to it, just my sister.
I have seen recently so many examples of friendship. Dinner last night with women who have come together to show that when one world is falling apart the others are there to hold up the pieces. Church on Sunday, one of the women I look up to the most grabbed my hand and said "Really, how are you?" I couldn't resist the torrent of emotions that flowed from my mouth and she couldn't resist hugging me and praying for me. She went to battle against the enemy for me. There is no better friend. A friend from work asking "What are you going to do in your nursery?" She has no idea that just that simple question overflows my aching heart so much because she is validating that I am preparing to be a mom, and that doesn't happen often to families adopting. Phone calls to see how I am doing, messages on my blog of sweet encouragement, texts, emails, facebook messages, cards, and Easter baskets.
I see so clearly that we are in fact the body of Christ. My friends and family are His arms hugging me, His words encouraging me, Him loving me. Jesus uses those sweet relationships in my life to remind me that He is good. It reminds me of that phrase "the aroma of Christ", the love that draws you to him, that satisfies, that is sweet to the soul, that makes the empty cup of my heart overflow. What would I do without my Jesus?