Still Kickin'

are

I have NO clue how long it's been since I've written a blog entry, but we ARE still alive. It's just still a huge adjustment around here with 5 kids. There's such a gap in ages that we are constantly on the go. As many of you know, it's totally different to parent a 14 year old and a 3 year old. And, don't forget the 12, 7 and 5 year olds either!

Each of our children was created by God in a totally unique way. We are learning that it is SO easy to pass over someone's needs just because we are busy tending to another child. Some children are very easy to deal with on a daily basis and others are not. So, we have to guard our time to make sure that every child is being parented as the Bible directs. Oh, it's TIRING!!!

I reminded a friend the other day that our memory will return in about 2 years. That's the one thing no one told me when I gave birth to Kaitlyn. You WILL lose your memory. I figured it out on my own when I found the milk sitting on the table (overnight) and my keys in the refrigerator.... Well, the same thing happens with adoption. For each child you bring into your family, your memory leaves for a while. I started calling my boys by my brothers' names the other day....uuuggh!

But, life is full. It is full of laughter (a lot of that) and bike rides and hugs and kisses and bandaids and piano and soccer and baking and squeals. I wouldn't change a thing...not one. I'm so grateful to God for giving me this privilege, and I want to take it seriously every day. It is NOT easy...but it is rewarding!

I hope that I'll have time to update the blog more often, but we'll see! God's plans are definitely higher than my ways, and well, there are days/weeks that it won't happen. But, maybe every once in a while....

Do I Really Care?

Do I really care if I must decrease in the sight of man for the sake of the glory of God? Yes, I care. But, I desire His glory more than mine. If no one remembers my name or anything I have done...praise God. May He and He alone be lifted high.

As I was reading in Phillipians this morning, I was reminded of Paul's plight among his peers. He did NOT care if his reputation was being tarnished or if people were gloating that he was in jail. In fact, he boasted that people were preaching out of selfish motives. But, what was the gain...Christ was being proclaimed! Oh, there are many times when I have been critical of someone because of their motives...but oh, that Christ were magnified...that should be by aim! Praise God anytime the name of Christ is exalted.

There are days when we are still drowning in the whole adopted child syndrome. I read a post from a friend in Africa yesterday that described her day. She was referring to the child as one with 2 personalities...one that is still an orphan and one that is an adopted child fighting the orphan. I could totally relate and understand. I think that is what we deal with on a daily basis....former orphans who crave and desire this life that they are in but still fight the orphan flesh.

Aren't we the same way? I crave intimacy with God and hear Him calling to me as soon as my eyes open in the morning. He calls me to come and spend time in His presence. The flesh wants to take a shower, go for a walk, clean the house, prepare breakfast....but He calls. The battle ensues...the heavenly vs. the worldly. It's a constant fight to focus on eternity.

Even just now I put down the computer for a while to hold a waking little girl. It is far more important that I snuggle, reassure, love and cuddle with her than telling anyone else about the lessons God is teaching me. She is the lesson. I am the student. He is the Teacher.

I must admit that it is really easier to focus on God today as I know my hubby comes home in 33 hours (yes, I am counting). God's design for the home is for both of us to be parents. It is refreshing to know that it will happen soon! But, my delight is in the Lord and the power of His name.

Praising God for His lessons and His calling....let the battle begin today.

I can't title this one...

Seriously, I can't title this post. My initial thoughts were something along these lines:

I don't know you, but I don't like you
How could you have done it?
If JT gets a hold of you, he'd go to prison
I don't know your name but you are about to know mine

So, none of those sound very appealing or Christ-honoring so I think I'll leave it untitled.

Since the very day we saw Ellyson Faith for the first time, my heart has been walking around in a 3 year old body. She was, at first, very quiet and timid. She was fearful of all men and didn't want anything to do with JT. But, over the course of time, God has renewed her trust and security. She loves her Poppa and knows that he will take care of her. He will fight for her and protect her.

We have seen DRASTIC changes in our sweet Elly over the past six months. She went from very quiet to very talkative. We've even asked her to be quiet for just five minutes..... She is vocal. She is now a story-teller. Every story starts and ends with "You mem-ber?" (you remember?). Elly is a vivacious and energetic child with a vivid imagination. She loves life. She smiles constantly and entertains at the drop of a hat. She breaks out in song everywhere we go (she especially has a fondness for singing Jesus Loves Me really loud in the grocery store). When Elly is awake, she is a CHANGED child. But, when she sleeps...that is a different story.

Past memories of pain and hurt are still emerging during sleeptime at night (we don't see this during nap time) for Elly. At first, she was sleeping in the girls' room on a trundle between their beds. However, she was waking them up 5-6 times a night with screaming and groaning. So, she sleeps in our room on a cot with all of her pink blankets and absolutely no pillow.

When she sleeps, she wakes up at least 3-4 times a night with nightmares. Sometimes, she screams out names and hollers, "No!" Sometimes, she just cries and groans. Without going into any detail, it's pretty obvious where the pain is coming from...memories of things done to her. It makes my heart ache and cry. It makes me angry and confused. I want to take the pain away (and to take the pain-maker OUT of this life). But, my God is bigger than my feelings and my desires. He is bigger than Elly's pain and memories. He is bigger than the nightmares.

I'm reminded of Daniel 3 in God's Word. As Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego stood before King Nebuchadnezzar, they proclaimed that they would NOT bow down to idols. We will not be consumed with fear or anger by these nightmares. They will NOT control our lives.

The same men told of the greatness of God: "We do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us." I believe with all of my being that our God can deliver Elly from these nightmares, and He can heal her!

Verse 18 is my personal favorite..."BUT EVEN IF HE DOES NOT, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we WILL not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up." EVEN IF GOD DOES NOT DELIVER Elly from these nightmares, we will worship Him and Him alone. He is worthy of all praise. If He chooses to use these nightmares for His glory, then let it be. However He chooses to use this pain to bring glory to Himself in Elly's life and our lives, we submit to His plan. He is abundantly worthy to receive all of the glory and honor and praise forever. Amen.

Oh, for grace....

I love that old hymn that says, "Oh, for grace to trust Him more." The chorus says, "Jesus, Jesus, how I trust Him. How I've proved Him o'er and o'er. I'm so glad I learned to trust Him. Oh, for grace to trust Him more." And, I am living that desire right now.

JT left today for Guatemala for another 2 weeks (he had been home for 6 days after a 2 week stint in New Mexico). He left very early so he kissed us all goodbye while it was still dark. I woke up but sadly, the kids did not. That makes this even harder for Z and E.

So, today was the day when Z decided he would push me to my limits. We spent 3 hours this morning in a boxing match of sorts. He wanted to do anything and everything to push me away. The mentality seems to be that he wants to see how much it will take to make me stop loving him. I don't give up that easily. He pushed, and I hugged. He hit, and I administered discipline in a loving way. He screamed and I prayed. He screamed louder, and I ran the vacuum cleaner (and prayed too). He threw himself on the floor and I sat him right back up. Over and over again, this boxing match continued.

All I could see over the course of those hours was a spiritual battle for his soul. I would not give up. I knew God was greater. My other kiddos can tell you that I was talking and praying aloud to the Father. "God, you know how much I can take, and I feel like I'm on the cliff and he is kicking me over...." I know that I cannot do this without the grace of our Father. He sustains. And, He won that battle.

Then, the war began to rage this evening. It lasted for at least 18 hours...it felt like 3 days...I think it was 2 hours total. Z started a new technique...laughing at everyone else, taunting me with discipline, and repeating every word that is said (but in a blah-blah-blah way). Nothing was working. Nothing. I was beat down to the core and showing the scars of the battle.

I sat him in my lap and had him face me. As clear as I could see, I recall a picture of my friend Keri holding her little girl Eden when she picked her up in China. What I remember from that picture is that Eden was screaming bloody murder, and Keri was crying for Eden. It broke my heart yet gave me a glimpse into the very heart of our Heavenly Father.

I told Z that my heart was sad for him today. I know that he missed Poppa and that he didn't like it when Poppa was gone. I told him that I know he doesn't have the words to explain or share his sadness. I told him that I loved him. And, then my eyes filled up with tears as I just said that I was so sad for him today. I saw a look in his eyes that I haven't seen before. Tears rolled down my face, and he began to wail. We just cried together. We must have looked like a snotty mess (thank you God that all of the other children were merrily making up beds and cleaning upstairs)..... I held him and we continued to cry.

Then, we prayed that God would heal his heart and be His Heavenly Father. I begged God to show grace and patience to me so that I could give it to Zeke. Oh, Father, I beg you for grace to trust You more!

It's not always easy...sometimes it is painful....sometimes it is ugly...sometimes it hurts like I cannot explain. But, our Father is good, and He has a plan. I don't understand it, but I know and trust that He is holy and He is just and He is Sovereign. Oh, for grace to trust Him more.

The Darkest Hour

We have all experienced tragedy, pain, sorry, and hurt in our lives. Those times weave a thread into our lives that God uses to teach us more about Himself and to draw us to Him. Sometimes, we use that same thread to become bitter and angry. I have recently looked back at several of those times and tried to truly process what God was doing.

Some of the most painful times in my life have to do with loss.....the loss of freedom for my dad when he was sent to prison in 2002, the loss of JT's dad in 2005, the loss of our home to a fire in January of 2005, etc,. There are other losses but these are the ones that come to mind first. Then, there was our adoption of Jett in 2007 (December). A loss? An adoption is a loss? Yes, for us and for Jett, it was. It was the darkest hour in our lives, and no one else knew.

As I said in an earlier post, we are just now even talking about that time in our lives. It has taken us several years to heal from the pain and everything that happened, so I hope to capture what it was like..... I hope that one day Jett can read this and know that we fought for his heart and soul with tenacity. I hope he remembers the long days and knows that we loved him whole-heartedly through it all. I hope our family can recall the spiritual battle lines that were drawn and the war we waged within our home. I hope, more than anything, that God alone is exalted and praised for His faithfulness and His goodness through the trials.

When we saw Jett for the very first time face to face, it was an overwhelming sense of fulfillment for me. The child that we had pursued for almost 2 years sat on the tile floor of an orphanage in Solola, Guatemala. He had NO clue who we were yet he smiled sheepishly anyway. My heart burst open and tears flowed without any stoppage in sight..... As I looked into his little brown eyes, God spoke clearly to me: "I pursued you like you have pursued this child." My heart was full, and I knew that God's purpose in our lives to adopt had been fulfilled. We had finished the race..... We had 2 weeks together in Guatemala, and we were good. There were some red flags along the way but nothing that we didn't think we could handle. We were wrong. Dead wrong.

Less than a week after we got home, JT had to fly to Arizona to finish leading a trip. I was furious.... This could've been prevented, so someone chose their own desires over the good of our family. I wasn't mad at JT, but once he was gone, I was. How could he leave me with a new child who doesn't even speak English yet? I was angry with God. Don't they know that I'm no good at this....I have NO patience....I cannot do this! Jett would rage and grieve every day....multiple times a day. If he did anything he wasn't suppose to do (stick his fingers in an outlet, hit the girls, run out the front door), and I told him, "No,"...well, he would lose it. Seriously lose it. Ugly cry, kick your legs, stomp your feet, grit your teeth ugly cry...scream...cry more....rub your eyes until they are about to pop out, tighten fists, straighten your body and refuse to budge cry.... The girls would generally just go to their rooms or somewhere else in the house. I was left alone to fight this battle. If he did it once a day, he would do it 10 times...or 20....felt like 50.

If the phone rang, I cringed. Do I dare answer it knowing that he could blow at any moment? If I walk out of the room, what will happen? The girls were withdrawing as they saw their "cute little brother" taking over the house. He was clearly running the show, and it seemed that everything revolved around him. He couldn't be let out of our sight for fear of what he might do. I was weary and so over the adoption part of our lives.

The worst part to me....going to church. Yes, going to church. We would go to church and people would see Jett and talk about how cute he is and what a joy adoption is and how great it was that our family had adopted. And, I wanted to scream, "If you only knew the chaos of our house! This is hard...don't adopt! Don't even think about it!"

JT came home from that first trip but had to travel again six weeks later to Africa. It was the WORST time ever....I must have called him 4-5 times a day. Jett didn't want anything to do with the girls...or me. He couldn't stand us. He didn't love me much less like me. It was so hurtful and hard. I would just hold him and cry. God showed me great pain and suffering, and my heart ached for all of us. How was God going to heal this? Was He going to heal this? Was this going to be our lives from now on?

We made some serious mistakes during that time.....having friends over too much (Jett needed to settle in our family and be secure with just us first), traveling to AZ, Africa, Indiana, resuming normal life as if nothing else had happened.....meanwhile, we were dying. It was painful and tiring. But life, as we had known it, was still going on around us, and that was the hardest part. We were isolated, and it felt like no one understood our pain. We couldn't even put it into words. We felt like we were drowning and people were just watching. Pick yourselves up by the bootstraps.....move on...come on, you can go out to eat....it's no big deal....he'll grow out of it....can't you just leave him with a babysitter..... Oh, the many things that people said that were well-meaning but hurt to the core. I felt trapped....I couldn't breathe....and I had no one to turn to who understood.

But, God used that year (more like 18 months) to strip us down to the core and the basics. He bonded our family in a way that I cannot describe. He showed us His faithfulness. He healed ALL of our hearts. He became our only focus. He convicted us of many areas where He was not being exalted in our lives. He rebuilt trust and established friendships. He cleansed us and even gave us the desire to adopt again. He showed us His love...in abundance. He graciously poured out His mercies upon us.

It was our darkest hour, but it was His shining glory. He drew us to Himself and loved us when we couldn't even utter our gratefulness. Looking back at that time, I see so many lessons, but I think this post is long enough. Hear the cry of my heart....adoption is a beautiful, difficult and uneasy process. It glorifies God....even in the hurt and pain...it brings Him glory. Thank you Lord for the valley that you walked us through and the hills you made us climb. We are grateful.....for You and You alone. You reign, and we do not. You rule, and we do not. You are exalted, and we are not. Praise Your great name!

Encouragement Galore....

After the last blog post, I have been OVERWHELMED with encouragement from family and friends. God has literally used so many people to minister to me. I am so grateful and blessed. Here are a few excerpts that were sent to me:

"I read your blog but didn't want to comment there. Just wanted to say "been there"...maybe not because of adoption but because of other reasons the Lord called us to "stay put" when our kids were young. And a lot of things He showed us to avoid...the large chaotic events...and called me out of teaching at church, too...He called our family HOME.

We didn't understand it at the time. People around us thought we were pulling out of life. But we walked by faith and the Lord did some things in our family that were good. Our calling home to that extreme was temporary (less than a year) but so very worth it.

Your message...it is for more than those who adopt. It is for the new homeschooling family...if this is your first year to homeschool- then stay home! New baby- stay home! Medical illness -stay home. You get the point."

and this one....

"First of all - I don't want you to ever, ever, ever worry about what [my husband} and I think. Ever. I am going to tell you what we are thinking. We are thinking that you are following God in great obedience to adopt and love and bring new life to two very precious little children. This is an all consuming task. We understand that this limits you greatly and we don't expect anything from you right now. We understand that you are pouring your heart and soul and mind into these two precious children and we don't want you to do anything else."

and then there's the friend who said to me in church yesterday,

"Since you are staying put, we'll just come to you."

The words of encouragement and support have literally flooded my soul with great joy. I'm so thankful for the people who truly "get it" and understand the call God has placed on our lives. Please know that I'm thankful beyond measure for each one of you.

The Second Time Around

The first time we adopted, we learned many lessons. It was a VERY dark time for me and our family....that is a post for another day. I'm just now ready to talk about that year in our lives. Needless to say, what everyone saw was not what was going on in our home. It was a different picture altogether.

But, now that we've learned those lessons, things are a bit different the second time around. Here's what we have been impressed by God to do:

1. Stay home as much as possible! While JT will be leading mission teams this summer (we have dropped the number of trips to only 5 intend of 8 or 9), I will be managing the home front. The kids and I will not be on any trips this summer. While I may lead one this fall, one of us as parents will always be home with the kids.
2. Do not leave our children (the two youngest ones) overnight anywhere for at least 6 months. They need this time to bond with us as parents and with our family. They need to know that we will always be here for them. (On a side note, Zeke STILL comes downstairs everyday and gasps when he sees us. He runs to one of us with open arms and gives the biggest hug. It's like he's still surprised we are here after almost 5 months.)
3. Delay going to any medical facility until necessary. We have taken Zeke to the doctor (malaria and giardia) but have only taken some parasite testing for Elly. Our kids have been poked and prodded enough, and they are both fearful of the doctor. We're going to spend some time reading all of our doctor books and talking about how wonderful doctors, nurses, hospitals, etc. are first. Preparation is key!
4. We will avoid large, unstructured events to the extent possible (concerts, baseball games, etc) as these tend to overwhelm the children. They don't meet a stranger, and we need to curb that..... Plus, the chaos of these events tends to initiate something chaotic in them too.
5. We will hug and kiss and hold a LOT. Lately (after Kaitlyn's surgery), Zeke has been VERY clingy. He was scared to an extent that none of us predicted. He wanted me to hold him often. He would just lay his head over on me many times a day. This is welcomed. Just yesterday, Elly followed me to the bathroom. As a brushed my teeth, she put her arms around my leg and laid her head on my thigh. Nothing like brushing your teeth with company.
6. We will seek support from other adoptive parents who have already traveled this road. We did this the first time around too, but we realized that we had not fully communicated our needs to our support group. We were desperate and drowning, and we didn't know where to turn.
7. Most importantly, we will PRAY daily for God to heal their hearts and minds of past pain. We pray that He will use their lives in Uganda to deepen their knowledge of His glory. We pray that He will make Himself known to them and call them to Himself. We pray that He will receive all of the glory and honor and praise.

This is nothing new to most of you. But, to our family, who tends to travel most of the summer, this is huge. We are staying put. We even have a garden (which produced its first bumper crop last evening - 4 cucumbers, 1 jalapeño pepper, 2 peppers, and 1 tomato) that we all work in weekly. Our pool is a source of daily exercise and entertainment. We even have a clothesline for drying our clothes. Now, if that doesn't say "Stay home!"....well, I don't know what does.

This will definitely be a different summer for me. As I told my brother David yesterday, we all are concerned (on some level) about what others think. I am. Often, I am more interested in that than what Jesus thinks. I don't like it. I abhor it. I fight it. This summer, as we avoid large crowds and stick close to home, I will not be concerned with the thoughts or words of others. I will seek Him and remember His calling on our lives to do this. I will invest every moment in what He has called us to do. And, I will relish in our mission field here at home.

For those of you with young children, soak up your time together. You may not be able to be involved in every single event at church or go on a mission trip or even visit your neighbors. This time will fade away quickly. Cherish every moment, and raise your family to the glory of God!