Thursday, March 24, 2011

Leap of Faith

"It's complicated, expensive and you never know what you're going to get." My mom quickly voiced the concerns I'd hidden in my heart for years about adoption.

Brian had shared his heart for adoption early on in our marriage. I'd let him talk a while and then have another baby. His talking and my non-answering grew after almost three years of trying for our 4th child. He never pressured -- just shared his heart.

I can tell you I was NOT seeking God's will about adoption last spring as I worked through an in-depth study of the Book of Esther for the second time. (Learned all kinds of different lessons the first time around!) We were looking at what might have changed in the few short verses between the Queen saying, "I can't go to the King. I'll be killed!" and "Fine, I'll go. And if I perish, I perish."

Our teacher asked us to consider what we were currently afraid of and after some thought I honestly answered "nothing." I said to myself what I'd say to anyone else I'd hear something like that from. "Are you kidding? How can you be afraid of nothing?" It occurred to me as I took a closer look at how I'd built my life that I feared nothing because I never said yes to anything I didn't think I could do extremely well. I didn't do anything where I thought I had the possibility of failing!

So the next question was this: what had I not allowed God to even put on the radar? A few things came to mind, but adoption was so clear that a few short months later I was on the phone with Mom sharing our process. I couldn't disagree with anything she said. It just took me a dozen years of marriage, three kids and two times through Esther to realize that LIFE is complicated, expensive and you never know what you're going to get.

Life with Jesus is an adventure and adventures sometimes require a leap of faith. Our adoption story isn't anywhere near over, but I can say I never thought I'd feel such peace in the midst of such uncertainty -- like halting in mid-leap, but knowing your safety net will never fail. If you know where your security lies -- the leaps are so much easier.


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