conversations with Tess.

Many conversations with my four-year-old, Tess, involve excessive usage of the word "WHY?" on her end, and challenging attempts to explain complex matters at a preschool level on my end...so when she's the one who ends up explaining things to me, I like to sit back, smile, and enjoy a quick glimpse into the way that her blossoming mind operates.  Here are some cute and telling interactions we've had over the past few weeks. I don't want to forget these gems...

***

On the drive to school the other morning:

Tess: Mommy, is God real?

Me: Yes, Tess.  He's the realest thing there is.

***

Just this morning, we were in my bed talking about mommies and babies, and this conversation followed:


Me [pointing at my belly]: Tess, can you believe you came out of my tummy?


Tess [pointing at my belly button]: Mommy, why did I come out of here?


Me: Because that's where babies are made.


Tess [pointing to my forearm]: Oh, do babies come from your arm?


Me: No, just bellies.


Tess: Oh, will brother baby come from your tummy?


Me [floundering for a good explanation]: Um, no, your brother isn't going to come from my tummy.  

Tess: Why?


Me [floundering some more]: Well, your brother is going to come from a different country, a place called China.  He's going to come from the same place where Ni Hao Kai-Lan lives.


Tess: Oh.  Are there princesses there?


Me: Yes, probably.


Tess: Oh.  I want to go there.

***

Tess and were sitting at the kitchen table and she was coloring.  We were listening to the Jack Johnson Curious George soundtrack...

Tess: Mommy, is this the sharing song?

Me: Yes, it's the sharing song.  Very good Tess.

Tess: I hate sharing.

Me: Whoa...you hate sharing?  Why?  Sharing is fun, Tess.

Tess: No, I just wanna do what I do.

...don't we all Tess...don't we all. 

***

This conversation took place in the car on the drive to her preschool one morning last week:

Tess: Look Mommy--it's raining!

Me: Yeah, look it is starting to rain.

Tess: Mommy, why is it raining?

Me: Well...because God is telling it to rain.  He controls the weather.  The rain helps the plants and trees grow.  They get really thirsty and God makes it rain so they can get a drink.

Tess: Oh, and flowers too?

Me: Yep, flowers, and all the living things.  

Tess: Oh, did God create all the things?

Me: Yes, He did!


Tess: He made you and daddy and Lucy?


Me: Yep, and He made you too!

Tess [soliloquy] : Yeah, God made me, and I was in God's head and then He created me and then He greeted me Tessa.  And then He made my house and then He made my bed and then I said I wanted a bunk bed but He said He didn't have that kind. He just had a regular big girl bed.

Me: Oh, God didn't have a bunk bed for you?  Maybe He will someday.

Tess: Yes, but He didn't have that kind.

***

I love you, sweet Tess.  Look forward to many more conversations with you in the future... 

REBEL.

Christianity alone has felt that God, to be wholly God, 

must have been a rebel as well as a king.

--G.K. Chesterton.

When someone says the word rebel, one of the people I instantly think of is my brother, Rick. In him, I always had an example of what would happen if I broke rules, pushed boundaries, and challenged limits. The consequences weren't pretty. I quietly watched as he provoked and tested my parents, his teachers, or any authority figure for that matter. I watched and wondered, WHEN WILL HE EVER LEARN?  

But secretly, I admired him. He got into a ton of trouble and caused a lot of conflict, but if he was guilty of anything, it certainly wasn't playing it safe or trying to be somebody or something that he was not. He had a strong voice and presence. He didn't seem to be driven by the affirmation or approval of others. He wasn't afraid to challenge the status quo. For me, the goody-goody, people-pleasing little sister, I often wished I could be a little more like him.

little Lib and rebel Rick.

In 2003, I left home and joined the military, and I soon came to realize that there was a rebellious streak even in me, the quintessential good girl. I suppose it took being strangulated by endless lists of military rules and regulations to draw out the latent rebel hiding inside. I never conspicuously challenged military regulations, but I certainly pressed the limits when I thought I could, which usually took the form of coming to work in civilian clothes before changing into my scrubs, skipping Commander's Calls, or showing up late when I knew how important it was to be on time. It all just seemed like a lot of pomp and circumstance to me.

rebel Lib with her gat.

My rebellious qualities have continued to evolve. (Perhaps in my adulthood I'm trying to make up for lost time.) I don't want to be main-stream or conform to the status quo. I resist labels. If someone tells me I need to do something, I don't want to do it. I'm horribly passive aggressive because I'm too scared to outwardly cause conflict and I care too much about what people think of me. Passive resistance feels safer. 

There have been many Sundays past when I've left church angry because it seems so contrived, so routine, so dulled down, so fake. After Tess was born, we stopped going to church altogether for over a year and I didn't miss it. I felt pretty justified in my revolt. When we joined our church in California almost two years ago, I was asked several times if I wanted to get baptized--a standard they have for all church members--and I said "no" (by maturely ignoring their offers). I knew I wanted to do it when I was ready--not just to fulfill a church requirement. I'd been a Christian for over 15 years, so it annoyed me that it was suddenly a big deal.  

Rebel Rd.  HOLLA!

I know my rebellious side has not always, or ever, been fruitful. It's been linked to a lot of cynicism and pride and pessimism. I've felt pretty justified in my small revolts over the years, but my rebellion was rarely a result of a super-spiritual connection to God. To use the cliché, I was a rebel without a cause, and to tell you the truth, I'm afraid my little revolts have been puny and inconsequential.

Over the last few months, I've been reading straight through the Gospels.  I decided to do this in the wake of reading Crazy Love and realizing that perhaps I didn't know Jesus as well as I thought I did.  I finished John a few days ago.

During my reading, one of the big things that struck me about Jesus was how much of a rebel He was.  He was constantly pushing the limits and pissing off the religious authorities.  He called a spade a spade and didn't sugar coat anything.  He was witty and edgy. He cut through all the crap and spoke plain truth while everyone else was playing games. He didn't care what people thought of Him...only what His Father thought.  He was in sync 100% with God, and that usually translated to a lot of conflict, disruption, confusion, and commotion when it came to his interactions with people...to the point that many people wanted him dead. 

He was a rebel WITH a cause.

He was THE Rebel with THE Cause.

I mean, let's face it.  Jesus was kind of a bad ass. It seems silly that people put lace covers on their Bibles. There is nothing lacy about Jesus. Maybe leather and spikes would be more appropriate for what He represented?

And what strikes me about Christ is the perfect balance of rebellion and submission that He lived:

Perfect submission to the Top-Dog, His Father.

Perfect rebellion against evil and the whack effects of sin.

Christ was a rebel, but that was a mere by-product of His perfect intimacy with the Father.  He was a rebel because He represented pure light in a world of darkness.  His rebellion changed the world forever because He was in perfect submission to THE true source of Life and Light and Hope and Beauty and Goodness.

He rebelled against all the things we hate in life...arrogance, religion, greed, pride, legalism, materialism, laziness, hypocrisy, sickness, selfishness, poverty, hatred, fear, and shame...to mention a few.  And when He died on the cross, He set us free from all of these things, because above all, He rebelled against DEATH and DEFEATED it FOREVER. And because of this, we can LIVE FOREVER if we follow Him. 

Like I said, He's a bad ass.

Every time we chose Him, we rebel against darkness and fear and we bring a little more light into this world.

So if you reject Christianity because you hate religion and rules and you deem yourself a rebel...think again.

One of my favorite authors is G.K. Chesterton, and there's a quote from his book Orthodoxy that I think of every Easter. It seems in line with this post, so I'd like to share it with you...

Christianity alone has felt that God, to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that the soul passes a breaking point--and does not break. 

In this indeed I approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss...But in that terrific tale of the Passion there is a distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of pessimism. 

When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the world...They will not find another god who has himself been in revolt. Nay...but let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which God seemed for an instant to be an atheist.

Disturbing?  Yes...I think so.  Awesome?  To be sure.

And He went through all of it because He LOVES us and wants us to have LIFE and have it to the FULL.

Meek. Mild. As If.

Are you a rebel?  What are you rebelling against?  What cause are you rebelling for?

HAPPY EASTER.  

HE. IS. RISEN.

haste and waiting.

I woke up at 6am this morning--my full bladder and empty stomach were my alarm clock.  I got up and started the coffee, hoping to catch some solitude before Tess woke up.  I'd been toying around with the idea of making hot cross buns for the past few days, and this morning, since I was up so early, I decided to take the plunge.

It's been a long time since I made any type of bread or pastry with yeast. Yeast is such a funny thing to me. It's small and magical, like pixie dust. Plus, it just looks so...fertile. I feel like I might get pregnant just looking at it. I stuck my nose into the small packet and took a whiff.  It smelled like Napa in late October during harvest, when the grapes are fermenting and mysteriously transforming their sugars into alcohol in big steel vats. As I cut open a package and dumped it into my pot, I was pondering a few things.

For one, I find it odd that we traditionally make hot cross buns, a leavened bread, on Good Friday, which is during Passover, which is the Jewish feast of UNleavened bread. I was reading up a bit about Passover this week, and I was reminded of how God told the Israelites not to put yeast in their bread during the week of Passover, because they would not have time to let the bread rise--they needed to be on guard and prepared to leave Egypt in haste when God said it was time. And so, to commemorate how God lead them out of slavery in Egypt, Jewish believers still only eat unleavened bread during the Passover week.  

And then, as a sort of paradox to this, I was also mindful of references that Jesus gave in the Gospels to yeast, particularly Matt 13:33, when He says,

"The Kingdom of Heaven is like the yeast a woman used in making bread. Even though she put only a little yeast in three measures of flour, it permeated every part of the dough."

After I added my yeast and flour to my big pot of milk, oil, and sugar, I waited for an hour to let the yeast do it's thing.  When I came back, my mass of dough was puffy and airy...full of life.  Those little granules of yeast are tiny, but like Jesus was saying, they permeate everything.

Making leavened bread takes time and patience. You can't force it or control it. You can only add the yeast to the dough, set it in a warm place, and let it do it's job.

So I was thinking about the contradiction of these two scenes of Scripture as they pertain to our life right now.

In Exodus, God is telling His people that there is no time to wait. They must move, and they must move NOW. They must act in haste.

And in the Gospels, Jesus is saying that the Kingdom of God has a life of its own...it is mysterious. It will grow slowly and its impact may not be visible to the naked eye, but it will permeate everything. Patience will be a necessity. There will be a lot of work...and there will be an equal amount of waiting.   

Haste.  

Waiting.

Both seem to be an important part in our relationship with God and responding to His Spirit.

Last fall, when Chris and I felt God's strong tug for us to adopt, we prayed a lot about timing. Do we start the process immediately, or do we wait? I felt a sense of urgency in my heart...a sense of haste. Chris didn't feel it like I did, so we took a week to pray hardcore, and we told God that if the time wasn't now, then we wanted to see closed doors.  

There were no closed doors.  

It was as if He was parting our own personal Red Sea, saying "Go ahead, it seems crazy, but I want you to go for it...NOW. Get a move on."

So we took the plunge and trusted that if our sense of discernment was totally jacked up, then God would at some point slam a door.

And now, I'm struck at the contrast of where we are currently sitting, versus where we were four months ago.  Now, most of our work is done.  We are coming down the home stretch of the paper chase, and I'm starting to get the sense that we are out of haste-mode and entering into waiting-mode. Waiting for immigration...waiting for a referral...waiting for China.  

In figurative terms, we have mixed together our ingredients, we have added the yeast, and now all we can do is sit back and watch the mystery unfold.  

Sometimes it's hard to know that you've done all you can do and now it's out of your hands.  But it's freeing, too.  It seems that this is where a lot of faith has to enter in.  

The other day I spoke with our China case manager, Tiffany, and she said that she's been looking for referrals for us, but hasn't found a match yet.  Because of agency protocols, our son must be at least nine months younger than Lucy, which means that he can't be older than seven months right now. Out of the thousands of boys in China's waiting-child database, the youngest ones are around 12-18 months old, which means we could be waiting for a while.  On the other hand, the database gets updated periodically with new children, and the little man who will someday be our son could show up at any time.  

So...we are ready...and we are waiting. It kind of feels like the expression commonly used in the military..."Hurry up and wait."

Sometimes it's hard to live in the existence of these two opposing realities.


I attended a Seized by Hope conference about two years ago.  The speaker at the conference was Jan Meyers, author of The Allure of Hope.  One of the poignant questions she posed to all of the women at the conference was this:


WHO ARE YOU IN THE WAITING?


Jan talked about all the aspects of life that require us to wait--places that we don't have control over--things that we can't fix or change, no matter how hard we try.  Life is full of these sorts of things, and usually, these are the places where we really need God to show up.  These are also the places where we are also tempted to try and do God's job and take more control...and that never seems to end well. 

So, like waiting for the yeast to turn lifeless dough into plump, fluffy buns...I want to sit back and enjoy the beautiful mystery of God's Kingdom at work in and around us come to life, trusting that everything will happen according to His plan and timing...not mine.


Easier said than done.

More thoughts to come on Easter in the next few days, hopefully.

If you'd like to try the hot cross buns, I used this recipe.  And if you do make them, you MUST add cardamom to the cinnamon-sugar mixture. It's one of the best spices in the world.

Are you in a season of haste or waiting right now?

attachment 101.

I’m currently reading a book called Attaching in Adoption by Deborah Gray.  It’s like the “attachment bible” for adoptive parents.  Gray talks a lot about what happens in the heart of a child when they become orphaned. She writes that when a child has suffered abandonment, neglect, or abuse, they internalize these sins and come to believe that they are the problem. They become ashamed. They think they did something to cause the abuse. These effects show up differently in different children--especially those that don't yet have the words or cognitive ability to express or understand such emotions.

In the aftermath of these tragedies, many children learn to control, rather than trust.  If they can control the situation, they don’t have to trust. It’s far less risky.  And, if something bad happens again, they believe it has to do with their inability to control the situation.  Hence, the cycle continues: they become responsible all over again, they feel more shame, and become even more controlling. Gray writes,

Ultimately, to promote attachment, a great deal of control has to be taken from children.

A vital part of successful attachment between children and their adoptive parents involves regaining trust.  It requires that the child let go of control, and it involves the parent creating a safe environment where the child can be a child again. In a healthy attachment, a child must believe that they deserve to be loved and cared for--that the wrong that was done to them was not their fault.    

The truth is, none of us escape the effects of sin. We all have a moment or moments when our own trust and innocence crumbles, when it is exchanged for the lie that we are unloveable, insignificant, responsible, careless, flawed, dirty, stupid...fill in the blank. We all have shame.  We’ve all been harmed in one way or another. The assault may look different for each of us--divorce, drug abuse, depression, death, illness, car accidents, sexual abuse, physical violence, addiction, legalism, betrayal, manipulation, neglect, etc--but the effects are similar: we feel foolish for trusting others, we feel ashamed of who we are, and we learn control as an alternative method.

In a way, we all suffer from attachment disorders when it comes to our relationship with God.  

Don’t we?

We don’t always trust Him.  We doubt His goodness.  We clamor for control.  We don’t let Him take care of us.  We’re angry.  We try to be our own parent and take care of ourselves.

I find it interesting that Jesus says that if we want to follow Him, we must come to Him as little children.  Innocent.  Playful.  Trusting.  Restful.

I also find it interesting that scripture says,

God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.  This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. --Ephesians 1:5

This week is Passion week--the final week of Christ’s life before He went to the Cross.  Over the past few days, I’ve been mindful that God gave up His Son, Jesus, in order that He might adopt us as sons and daughters.  God saw us as we were--traumatized children, running around trying to take care of ourselves, operating out of our shame and fear, assuming too much responsibility, trying to control our lives because we are so afraid of when the next assault is going to hit--and in His unfathomable love, He came to our rescue.

God has adopted us. He wants us to attach to Him. He wants to heal us. He wants to protect us, to be a safe place for us, to give us rest.  He wants us to believe His heart for us is good and faithful. He wants us to trust Him, to love Him.  He wants us to surrender control.  He wants us to be children again; He wants to be our parent.

Attaching to God seems to involve finding that innocent child inside of us--the one that was harmed and shamed--and reclaiming him or her.  It involves allowing God to take care of this child.  It means that we let Him redeem what this child lost. He's the only one who can.

And the good news is, even when we kick and scream and rage...even when we push Him away and act as if He’s going to abandon us...even when we won’t let Him take care of us and act like He’s going to harm us...He still pursues us in love.  He doesn’t back down.  We aren’t too much for Him.  His love is relentless.

Since starting this adoption process, I’ve read several places that that “adoption reflects the heart of God.”

As I dig deeper into the nitty-gritty of what might be involved in becoming an adoptive parent, I’m starting to see that this is true. As an adoptive mom, I want to erase all the neglect and abandonment that our son has most likely experienced.  I know I can’t undo it, but I want to be a place of rest for him.  I want to love him, protect him. I want to give him a chance to be a child again.

And more and more, I can hear God asking if I’ll let Him do the same for me.

share the love.

Since Chris and I started this adoption journey, I've done countless hours of research on the internet.  Amidst this research, I've come across tons of adoptive moms who have already traveled this road of adoption, and who have shared their own experiences via personal blogs.  These women have been a huge source of inspiration, encouragement, and hope to me, an adoption rookie.  Their stories have helped me fight through the fear of the unknown and reassured me that I'm not alone in this journey.

My blog friend Esty is about to leave for Uganda to pick up her baby girl. She leaves tomorrow! We met through a mutual friend and it's been fun to walk alongside her on this journey.

My blogger friend Colleen has two boys from Uganda.  I just "met" her the other week through a very cool set of circumstances.  I was asked to speak at our church a few weeks ago about what God is doing in my life and about this adoption process, and after the service, a lady named Yvonne came up to me and told me about two other adoptive moms, Colleen and Sonia, who used to go to our church.  Their hubbies are also in the military. Yvonne gave me the links to their blogs, and it's been encouraging to read their experiences.

I emailed with Colleen last week, and it turns out that she is dear friends with Stefanie, who is a huge source of support and inspiration in the adoption world, particularly to families who are adopting from China. Stefanie is a very well known figure amongst adoptive moms because her story is incredible and because she does a lot to advocate for orphans.  She started this website, which is an enormous resource for parents doing special needs adoptions from China. It was cool to find out that Colleen and Stefanie know each other, because I was already following Stefanie's blog before I met Colleen.  Small world. It's been incredible to see how connected this network of adoptive moms really is.

Anyhow, all of this is to say that the blogosphere has been a massive source of education, support, and encouragement to me over the past months, and I wanted to share the love by giving some support back to Stefanie, who is about to bring two gorgeous girls home from China.  Stefanie has eleven children, seven of which are from China. By clicking the link below, you can help them bring their two girls, Poppy and Esther, home.

click HERE to donate!

Plus, for any donation of $35 or more, you get an awesome T-shirt (pictured below), and for any donation of just $15, you're automatically entered into a huge give-away, where the first place prize is your choice of a MacBook or a legit Nikon D90 camera.

Thanks for reading and for supporting Chris and I in our journey so far...and if you are moved to do so, it would be awesome if you could send some support to Poppy and Esther! Every little bit helps!

bust a move.

T.G.I.F!  Here's a little mood-booster for you guys...it makes me totally wish that MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice were still on the music scene.  Hope everyone has an awesome weekend!

my song.

There are certain songs that hit me deep in the chest.  They slice right through the layers of cynicism, apathy, boredom, or fear that can surround my heart at any given moment.  They penetrate  to the core and draw out what is real and true with scary precision.

Do you have a song like that right now?

I do.  It came on my iPod last night as I was driving along this stretch of the road...

Highway 29.  Northbound to Napa.  

The sun was setting and I was driving to Yountville to meet my dear friend Kelly for dinner to celebrate her 30th birthday.  There I was, driving along, in awe of the majestic sunset, the hypnotic rows of grapevines that border the road, and the precious rarity of driving without kids in the backseat, and suddenly this song came on.  It was perfect.  It was one of those moments when you feel like God really sees you.

The first time I heard this song was one Sunday morning in church, about a year ago.  Chris had just left for Afghanistan.  I was a real mess.  It was all I could do to get myself and the girls dressed, fed, and ready for church on Sunday mornings.  The promise of at least one hour of free childcare was usually enough motivation to get me going, but by the time I arrived in the sanctuary, I felt too tired and wrung out to offer anything to God. 

There are certain times in your life when worship songs mean more to you than they ever have before, when the lyrics touch something deep inside that aches and grieves, when you cling to the truth of the words and the beauty of the music like your very life depends on it.  This was one of those times. 

I'd never heard or sung this song before, but the power and beauty of the lyrics and music hit me hard. I remember opening my mouth to sing and tasting the salt from my tears instead.  I had a hard time getting any sound out. Singing this song made feel God's power and majesty in a whole new way. It made me want to fall on my knees and raise my hands and really worship Him in the midst of all my fatigue and fear, and I'm not even "that kind of person."  I'm reserved. I sing quietly at church and keep my hands to myself. But not when this song comes on. This song unravels all of my pretensions and reservations. 

This song that I'm talking about is called REVELATION SONG. Have you heard it? I can't wait to belt this song out in heaven. Maybe I'll have a good voice then. My favorite version right now is by Jesus Culture...

Jesus Your name is power

breath and living water

such a marvelous mystery...

Be my everything

Be my everything.

What is "your" song right now?

oh what up Spring?

Spring is here.  

I decided it was time to get my hands dirty...

(and go on another Instagram binge)

and plant some new flowers for my hanging baskets, 

some new basil for my kitchen window...

and a plump Ranunculus for my desk.  

I look forward to watching it bloom while I plug away on more paperwork for Ren boy.

Tee-tee had a good time while we were outside planting this weekend.

The girls and I stayed home from church yesterday morning because Tess is bit a sick.  Chris went to teach Sunday school, and I set the girls up to watch Tangled--a gift from Uncle Sean--for about the 14th time in three days.  I get suckered into watching it with them every time...especially the scene with the floating lights...it makes me cry every time.  (Dude, how do these Disney movies un-glue me?) That scene is such a vivid display of how we hope and dream for things...and how we fear what will happen if those things don't end up being all that we'd hoped for.  I love Rapunzel's innocence in this scene.

The first time I saw Tangled was over Christmas when we took Tess to see it in the movie theatre.  I blubbered like a baby.  It was right around the time that Chris and I had decided we were gonna file our adoption paperwork.  I was a mixture of scared, excited, hopeful, joyful, and massively emotional.  I felt like I was seeing the world in a new light for the first time in a long time...like God wanted to use us in a significant way to shine His light in the world.  The lyrics...and at last I see the light...and it's like the fog has lifted...and it's like the sky is new...those words felt true in my heart, and it felt really good.  

Anyhow, yesterday afternoon we all hung out here and let the girls play outside. It was one of those April days when "the sun was warm but the wind was chill," like Robert Frost says. I made afternoon coffee for Chris and I. I love making coffee for two.  It's one of my favorite things about weekends.

I was flipping through an Anne Lamott book yesterday and she writes, "Spring is sweet, the baby season; summer is the teenage season--too much energy, too much growth and beauty and heat and late nights, none of them what they are cracked up to be."

I have loved the past few weeks here...digging in the dirt, planting, watching how my flower buds change each day.  I'm enjoying the warm, wet days, mindful that all too soon the dry summer heat will set in.

On Friday afternoon I received our official, final, edited, revised, approved copy of our home study.  It's been a long time coming.  This morning I will take it, along with our completed I800A-form, and go to the post office to mail it off to immigration!  I'm thankful to have this next step finally in process...and praying that immigration doesn't take too long.

I talked with our China case manager on the phone last week and she said she can start looking for referrals for us. I am excited...hopeful...trying to be patient.

What is being birthed in you this spring?  What is growing?  What do you want to plant?

Passports

So, it seems that the journey to get our Ren boy is also becoming a personal journey back through places of my own story.  There are many things I feel God whispering to me in the midst of this whole process, and one of them is that this adoption isn't just about bringing another child into our home.  It's also about remembering the child that I used to be, and how that little girl and her story impacts the woman that I am today.  

And as I've felt God nudging me back into places of my past, I've told Him, "Hey, wait...this isn't about ME.  This is about me trying to help a boy who needs a home.  This is about our son."

And He answers and says, "Oh yes, child...but it's about you too."

Hmmm. He always seems to have more in store for us than we originally thought.

Anyhow, I was thinking about all of this a few days ago when I pulled my shiny new passport out of my desk drawer.  It came in the mail while we were on vacation.  I stroked it and admired it.  Then I opened the front cover and looked at the photo of myself... 

30 year old Lib.

I proceeded to flip through its clean, crisp, blank pages.  No stamps, no stories. Not yet. I realized that the first stamp in my new passport will be CHINA. And then I thought about the fact that China is not a country I've ever really desired to go...not until now. And that got me thinking about the places I have been and my old passports.

The last passport I had expired a few years ago. I got it when I was seventeen...

17 year old Lib.

This passport took me on youth group mission trip to Dublin, Ireland. It took me on a summer study abroad trip to Italy before my junior year of college. It took me to Fiji on my honeymoon. It took me to Mazatlan, Mexico for Chris's and my one-year anniversary. As I look at the photo of the seventeen year old me, it feels like such a long time ago,   and I'm mindful of all the places I traveled, both physically and emotionally, with that passport. And then I started wondering about the passport I had even before this one.

And there it was...lying the bottom of my desk drawer...and this is the girl I saw peering back at me as I opened the front cover...

10 year old Lib.

This is the passport I got in preparation to move to England. I remember the day my mom took my brother and I to get these photos taken. I don't think I really understood what a passport was at the time. A few months after this passport was issued, we left our lives in Atlanta, GA and boarded a British Airways flight bound for London, England. Gatwick Airport was the first stamp in my first passport...the first of many to follow. Spain. Greece.  Sweden. Denmark. Holland. Germany. Austria. Belgium. France.  Canary Islands.  

The four years that my family lived in England were during a very formative time in my life. The exposure to different people, languages, and cultures at an early age changed me forever. Moving back to the states after those four years was one of the most difficult times in my life. When we returned to the U.S., I felt like an outsider in my own country. I felt different from all of my American friends and I felt like I couldn't share pieces of my past with them. Over time, I learned to be careful about who I shared that my part of my story with because it only seemed to make me feel misunderstood and alone.  When I shared things about my life in Europe, most of the responses I heard were along the lines of, "well, if you like it so much over there, why don't you just go back."  

I know there will be so many places where our son will probably feel misunderstood and alone.  He will be different and those differences will be difficult, if not impossible, to hide.  But I want him to feel loved and cherished for those differences, because those differences are what make him unique and special.  I hope I can do everything in my power to celebrate these differences, rather than let them become a source of aloneness for him.

My overseas experience cultivated a love of travel and overseas-life that is a significant component of my desire to adopt a child from a different country. I would love the chance to live overseas again one day. I don't know that this hope will ever be fulfilled, but in some way, it seems like bringing our boy home will be a bit like bringing the overseas to us. I'm starting to see that maybe God planted this desire in my heart for this very purpose.  

During the drive to pick up Tess from school this afternoon, I was listening to a song by Greg Laswell. Towards the end of the song, he sings,

Yeah, it's well worth the time that it's taken to get here now.

Those lyrics feel true to where I'm at today.  Each stamp in my  passport is a part of where I've been...a part of the journey that God has written into my story. It's taken my whole life to bring me to where I'm at now, and I'm seeing even more that God doesn't waste a thing.  He uses each of our experiences to shape our desires and prepare us for the amazing things He wants to do through us.  I never dreamed that China would be a stamp in my passport...but like I said earlier...


He always seems to have more in store for us than we originally thought.