1.) with disdain, because although I was born in America and went to school here, I have not grasped the ins and outs of this language, it's punctuation rules, and how to make certain things plural!!!! I truly believe as a child I had a learning disability that went un-diagnosed and really did not figure out how to "learn" information until I was going through college and learned about different learning styles.
2.) with a red pen.....you can use by blog as a cathartic exercise! Print it out and take a red pen all to it and correct every single thing I have written...just please don't send it to me!
On to the better part of this blog post..... As many of you know I recently went to China on a mission trip. Our goal was to not only spread God's love but to fully live out what he says in James 1:27
"Pure and undefiled religion before our God and Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world."
This, THIS verse is what we did for those orphans in China. So much preparation went in to going that I never really had time to actually sit and think about what it would be like once we got there. But I can say that it was more than I could have ever imagined. I felt the closest to God in that orphanage than I have ever felt in my walk. We held babies and children, we fed them, played games with them, and just loved them for who they were. When we went back to our hotel rooms we prayed for these children, prayed for one another, and prayed for where we should go from here. Because you see, an orphan can just be an orphan until.....
"orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names.... see their faces... hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes."
Radical by David Platt
Once I returned from China, I felt like my work was not done in China. I felt that God was calling me to do something more. While in China, I would send Bob pictures of some of the kids and he would send pictures of what our kids were doing. It was one of those things that I think we both were thinking about the question but we never really talked about it. On our drive home that night, we had the best time talking for the hour and half it took to get back home. It was truly perfect! I love talking with my husband and to have an hour and half of just him with no one needing a diaper change, a glass of milk, or a boogie to wipe I was in heaven!!!! It was midnight when our flight arrived and I felt like it was a day on my honeymoon. We talked about everything, still kind of dancing around the adoption topic. For about two weeks after I returned we both began to pray really specifically for God to show us if this is the route He had for us. And to tell you about the Peace that comes from God would be like me trying to explain String Theory! I just can't, you just have to know it and experience it. We both just had a peace about adoption. The conversation came easy, the joy was overwhelming! Now I know that not everyone who has adopted went to an orphanage first but this is how adoption has been experienced by our family...if that makes sense.
Sooooooooooooooooooooooo we are adopting from China! We are in the midst of what is known as the paper chase and are loving every minute of it! The more we share our news with people, the more we fill out documents, talk with our social worker, the more confirmation we have that this is our next step as a family!
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