Four children. A boy first and
then whatever followed, but hopefully one of each gender. Oh and close in age so we can still be cool
and hip when our kids leave the house. We planned,
envisioned, dreamed.
We had road mapped our future children without regard to God’s plan for
our family.
Child #1 (surprise!)Girl!
Child #2 (15 months later just as planned!) Girl!
Child #3 waiting, waiting, why isn’t this happening…
pain
heartache
frustration
doubt
contentment
whatever-happens-happens
no longer content still longing
we wanted our children close together, maybe we should stop trying
we want to love on more children regardless of age gap, let's keep trying
come on God what’s the deal...
are we not good enough parents (lie)
do we need to eat healthier and exercise more (maybe)
let’s talk to a doctor, consider a homeopathic approach, try essential oils …
NO.
God we trust your plan for our family.
Please show us the way Lord.
pain
heartache
frustration
doubt
contentment
whatever-happens-happens
no longer content still longing
we wanted our children close together, maybe we should stop trying
we want to love on more children regardless of age gap, let's keep trying
come on God what’s the deal...
are we not good enough parents (lie)
do we need to eat healthier and exercise more (maybe)
let’s talk to a doctor, consider a homeopathic approach, try essential oils …
NO.
God we trust your plan for our family.
Please show us the way Lord.
We have been experiencing secondary infertility as we try for our 3rd
baby. It’s been hard. Very hard.
However, God has used this painful experience to draw us nearer to Him
and His plan for our lives. He has used
this experience to strengthen our marriage and has helped us to focus on being present and intentional in parenting the children that we do have.
So here we are, mostly content with our current inability to conceive, but
still longing to have babies and toddlers in our home again.
Ok God, we get it, we hear you…we’ve been
dragging our feet a bit because, well, what your asking is hard.
The signs were subtle at first.
Inklings of direction. The Spirit nudging us through videos we watched together, sermons we listened to and while reading God’s
Word. However, subtle is fairly easy to
dismiss. We made excuses. We could never do that, we aren’t strong
enough, we aren’t good enough (lies).
So, we pushed the feelings aside, but didn’t close the door. We entertained the idea and started
discussing it more and more. We
researched and prayed. “God, if this is truly
your will for our family please make it very clear.” Suddenly God did make our path very clear. Inklings became stronger, signs became more frequent and ads, articles, and related scripture captured our attention in a way only God could make possible. His timing was impeccable and certainly no coincidence.
We are in the process of becoming licensed to open our hearts and our
home to foster children.
We have talked with our county’s foster care coordinator and a case worker to gain necessary information and to ask questions. We have considered many what if’s and considered
the impact on our family. We are currently in the process of filling out
the rigorous pile of paperwork that is necessary and shortly we will begin our
training.
We are a little nervous, but also excited. We will accept children who are younger than our children and will become licensed to foster-to-adopt, though our goal is reunification with birth parents. We will be working with case workers and the birth parents,
helping to equip them, encourage them, and praying for them, with hopes
that they will be able to adequately provide for their children again. We aren’t certain how long we will be on this
journey. We may get all the way through
the licensing process and not end up taking in a child because it no longer
seems like the right next step for our family.
We don’t feel that will be the case, but we just don’t know. There are so many unknowns. We trust that God knows and will show us the
way.
We have wrestled with concerns about how this will impact our life and
how this will impact our children’s lives.
We have no doubt that this will be hard and painful, but it’s also worthy,
important and needed. There are children
out there who need us. We have room in
our home and in our hearts and we are prepared to endure hard. We are prepared to step outside of our
comfort zone. We are prepared to
sacrifice some of our own privacy and ease to help others. We are prepared to be tired, anxious and even
to grieve the loss of a child. We are also prepared love,
care, nurture and provide safety, security and stability.
We have faith that God knows what is best for our family. We trust HIM.
God is answering our prayer; just differently than we had expected, than we had originally hoped.
God is answering our prayer; just differently than we had expected, than we had originally hoped.
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A couple of very profound messages that encouraged us along this path…
1) Scripture:
We are currently studying Roman’s 12
in our small group and so much of it resonates with us in regards to foster
care…
Roman's 12 urges us
to offer our bodies as living sacrifices, to use our God given gifts
such as serving, teaching and encouraging, to honor others above
ourselves, to share with people in need and to practice hospitality.
Additionally, Luke 9:23 Jesus calls us to live a life of sacrifice. He said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up is cross daily and follow me.”
2) This powerful video, Removed, went viral a little while back. This video was written and created by a
couple who were in the process of becoming licensed foster parents. They found that many people’s reactions to their news of becoming foster parents were
that of concern, “wow are you sure you want to do that” or “I could never do that
it would be too hard”. They realized
that many people were viewing foster care from their adult perspectives as
opposed to the perspective of the foster child and created this to serve as a
voice for the children in foster care.
3) We had viewed this video together and were so struck by the example
that couple number 2 displays, but most humbling were the husband's words: “I don’t know how
you’re going to face God at the end and say, ‘You put us together, and what we
decided to do with our marriage was get comfortable.”
Those words were so profound for us, as we were just relishing in the
fact that our children were becoming easier, more independent and that the likelihood
of a “more secure” financial future would be greater with only two children. We are getting comfortable in our life right now and that's not necessarily wrong, but to ignore this calling for the sake of comfort certainly just doesn't feel right for us at this point.
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Articles we found helpful…
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