A Season of Waiting

So, we're still trying to sell our house. And we're still trying to adopt a baby.

Each summer, our church doesn't have Wednesday night activities, and we do small groups instead. I remember last summer when we had just put our house on the market and we were just finishing up our home study. I remember feeling so hopeful and so much anticipation for how our life was about to change in BIG ways. I remember week after week asking our small group to pray for those two big things. I felt like we had actual updates every week during prayer request time. "We've had several showings this week, and one family is really interested. Our house made their top three list!" Or, "Our home study is officially approved! Our case worker thinks that because of our level of openness, we shouldn't have to wait too long. Maybe sometime within the next 6 months we'll have a baby!" But here we sit a year later. With those same prayer requests. Not quite as hopeful. Maybe even a little discouraged. We are gearing up for small groups to start again soon, and even though we'll have a new group, I told David that I almost feel silly asking for prayer for the exact same two things that we were praying about last summer.

I know in my head that I shouldn't feel that way. It's NEVER silly to ask for prayer. Our church family has been so supportive, and people regularly ask us for updates. I know that they will keep praying for us as long as it takes. But I'm just ready to be able to share a PRAISE about these two specific things.

The Lord has just had us in a season of waiting the past year. And that's not really something that I'm good at. I wanted a baby last summer. And I fully expected my house to be sold LONG ago. But that's not the plan the Lord had for us. And I trust that His plan is good, even when I don't know what He's doing.

The hardest part for me right now is knowing that eventually, owning two houses and being in the middle of an international adoption aren't going to mix. As I'm sure everyone knows, adopting is expensive. We knew that going in, and it's something that we were ok with and prepared for. I know it's tacky to talk about money, but I'll just put this out there: a lot of our money is tied up in our houses right now. Because we didn't sell our old house before buying our new house, we had to use a good bit of our savings for the down payment on our new house. Our savings that we planned to put towards our adoption. Right now, things are fine. We're still in the homestudy/dossier stage of the adoption. But in the next few months, we'll have some big fees due in order to proceed with our adoption. David and I have talked about the fact that if our house doesn't sell before then, we very well might have to tap the breaks on our adoption process. And I'll be honest - that would be pretty devastating. I just feel like this has been such a PROCESS, and to have to slow things down now because of something that we really had no control of would just be a HARD pill to swallow. It's also hard because we feel SO certain that God has called us to adopt. We also feel confident that He led us to put our house on the market and move. So, it's just confusing when the two don't seem to go together.

But I do know this for certain: He's doing something. Something GOOD! I was talking to some friends recently and sharing some of this with them. One friend said that she can't wait to see how this story ends. She said she hopes there ends up being a really cool story. Something that will give us chills and make us say, "WOW. We can clearly see how God was at work in that situation." You know, like maybe we do have to slow our adoption process down, and then our house sells, and we end up adopting a baby domestically that we never would have gotten if we had proceeded with the international adoption. I agree. I'd LOVE an exciting story, one that will make me fall to my knees in praise. But the truth is that we might not get that. Our house might sell next week and we proceed with everything as planned and have a "normal" international adoption experience and never really know why it took our house so long to sell. We might be on this adoption journey for YEARS and for whatever reason never end up with a baby. I might get pregnant and God closes the adoption door completely. We just don't know. But even if we don't end up with an "exciting" story, we DO know that God is at work. He's been in every detail, He's orchestrated all of our steps to get us where we are today, and He'll continue to do that. Of course we desire for this journey to end with us getting a child!! But even if it doesn't, He's been in this process. Every detail. We might one day be able to clearly see how He was working "behind the scenes" all along, or we may never see that. Either way, I can rest in His sovereignty.

So, when I get discouraged that it feels like, in a lot of ways, we're exactly where we were this time last summer, I repeat to myself what I know to be true. God is at work. And He's good. All the time.