"Gotcha Day"

“Gotcha” Day. May 23, 2013. Three years ago today the Lord placed 2 little Ethiopian orphans in a family… our family. We did the paperwork and went to the required meetings. We followed the standard procedures and then waited. We prayed. We had truly seen the impossible done to be able to bring them home. It was not the end of the journey but only the beginning. It sounds so obvious to say that but I am not too sure we had any idea what life would be like for us once they were home with us. We were so wrapped up in the opportunity to see God glorified in our lives during the adoption “process”; and we did.

The trouble with praying for God to be glorified in our lives is that He doesn’t always provide the easy way of doing that. We secretly only want it to be during the big wins and accomplishments that we live out those prayers. Surely He does receive the glory in those incredible moments. But since our adoption, I am becoming increasingly aware that it is in the every day struggle and muddling of our lives that He reveals even more of His glory and who He is. God’s glory more often comes in the position of bringing us to the end of our own strength, the end of our own expertise and the end of our own abilities... at which point we finally allow Him to do the rest and thus making it so evident that He alone can be glorified.  He has to receive the glory; it’s nothing we could have done or gotten through by ourselves!

There are ups and downs that go along with raising children that have been abandoned and have experienced disparity that most typical Americans cannot fathom. There are days we laugh, play or hold hands together with a sense of oneness as a family. But not every day is like that.  Some days are filed with difficulties and tears, and not just for our newest family members. However, we are all in this together and finding new ways every day to see God and His glory in things we would have not known before this adoption.   

Prayer: The invitation continues to be our daily prayer, “God, be glorified in our lives.” Our hope is not in our circumstances or our own abilities. Our hope is in You! We want to know you more and more in and through the ups, as well as the downs of our lives as a family. We love and praise you Lord!