I'm so tired of having to tell my family and friends bad news. I am so tired of asking them to pray for us because we are in need of it. I am so tired of hearing and trying to acclimate to bad news. I am just so tired...
And yet, once again, the news is bad. It's actually very bad, and I don't know how to feel yet. On Monday Angel called me to talk in person. Her blog sums up the
gist of it well:
http://www.rutledge6.blogspot.com/So, the chances of Kelvin and
Hawa or any other Liberian children being able to be adopted are very slim. They have always been poor chances seeing as how the last 18 months have gone... but now they are most likely
not to be able to leave Liberia. We have known this was a possibility... it is not news to us in that aspect. We just always have decided to trust and hope that the Lord would make it work out. We will continue to trust and hope in the Lord... but I don't know what to ask or think anymore.
Anika, Asher and I cried together as we started to mourn the loss of our sweet kids being able to be here with us one day. It hit the kids hard this time. They have always been so resilient... and in these past three years of uncertainty and disappointment, they have remained faithful and trusting. I love their example. I was able to encourage them to see God's goodness even though things seem so sad... and it ended up a sweet time and an opportunity to have a teachable moment. But we're all weary.
Anika is so sad that she may never meet Kelvin and
Hawa, and Asher just cried and cried and told me he just really wanted a brother. My heart is so heavy and broken over the fact that my kids, and some of yours, have been faithful to ask the Lord for this adoption for such a long time, and the Lord has not honored them with a miracle. If I'm not careful, that makes me a bit angry. I want them to taste God's faithfulness, and I know they taste it through our example to them, but this is almost too much to bear. Why won't the Lord answer them and bring their brother and sister home?
Once I shared the news with Jason, we had very little to say. We've been in this place so many times before. We've said all the words, cried it all out, and thought all the thoughts before. There is almost nothing left that we haven't repeated so many times that we just held one another and talked about how this is no different than it was before, not really. We never had control before, we never had any promises that it would work out in our way, we never could look to Liberia or governments or agencies or ourselves to make any of this happen. It has always been, and will always be, God alone who can accomplish anything. So, nothing has really changed except for the fact that reality is clashing with hope in a much bigger way now.
I don't know where to go with this, or what to feel. Do I continue to be optimistic and hope for the miracle that I KNOW God could do? Do I accept this new reality and gracefully move on to what God may desire to do with us next? I don't feel certainty about what the outcome is supposed to look like, so I am not sure what to press toward.
In June, Angel will either be able to meet with some people in Liberia and sense that they will work with her to make adoptions happen, or they will continue to shut her out and not answer her calls. In the latter case, our
agency will have no choice but to close down the Liberia adoption program. They will continue to partner with
ACFI and their ministry to the orphans, but without the ability to facilitate or entertain adoptions. They will still try to allow a foster care situation for our children, but we'd essentially be asking a Liberian family to raise Kelvin and
Hawa from here on out... and we can't assume that's possible. If there is no option for this, they will return to the orphanage. This breaks me, and it makes me scared and angry.
Speaking of June, we will still be going to Liberia. We will still spend time with Kelvin and
Hawa, and we will do everything in our power to love them and convey to them that they are important to the Lord and to us, that we would do anything to be with them, and that we will always be part of their lives in some way. But, it will be hard. I can't even think about it. Saying goodbye and not knowing how many more months it would be until we got them home was going to be hard enough. Saying goodbye and not knowing if we'll ever see them again, and most likely never as their Mama and Daddy will be beyond what I know how to deal with. Way beyond...
I am sobered. I am sorry for the factual account, but I don't know how to feel yet. I have to fight becoming hard and angry these last two days. I fight blaming Liberia and their leaders. I fight confusion and lack of understanding. I fight having a pity party and thinking of all the times we have had reason to cry in the last 3 years, of all the children that we have desired to be parents to... I could name so very many. I tend to get angry and bitter just to stay afloat and not lose my mind. But, I am fighting that anger and bitterness because I know from experience that God does a much better job at keeping me afloat. He needs me soft and pliable and broken... so here I am.
The afternoon after speaking with Angel, I found several places in my bible where I had stopped reading the time before. Often, God uses the very place I happen to be in scripture to encourage me in a very specific way, and he did it again on Monday.
Psalm 108:5,6, 12, 13
"Be exalted O God, above the heavens, and let your glory be over all the earth. Save us and help us with your right hand, that those you love may be delivered... Give us aid against the enemy, for the help of man is worthless. With God we will gain the victory, and he will trample down our enemies."
Hosea 6:1-3
"Come, let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence. Let us acknowledge the Lord; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."
I do feel torn and I do feel injured. I am in need of that rain, and so it is a beautiful thing to be reminded that he brings it, eventually.
This morning, I couldn't sleep after 5:30, and so I for some reason began thinking of the beginning of this journey. About a year after I sensed that God would have us adopt, Jason and I were sitting in the sun outside in the back yard, and regarding adoption he said, "I don't think it's a matter of
if, but
when." As I thought of that, I wondered if God was trying to remind me that it's still not a matter of
if, but
when. So, I asked him (because I know that may be true for adopting kids at some point, but am unsure about my Liberian children), "for Kelvin and
Hawa?"
And I got this very real, but strange sense to look up and to my left, with my eyes closed. If I had to tell you what I think he was telling me, it would be that he was saying, "Look
at ME, look
for ME." It was like he wants me to remember that this isn't about knowing the future with Kelvin and
Hawa, or even about adopting his kids and obeying his desires... it is about keeping him as our focus and knowing that if our eyes are on him, we will not fail.
I write that with tears in my eyes. I've said it before, but it remains true, that to obey him is a sacrifice... and it is HARD. To be obedient, even when I feel like raging and having an attitude and feeling sorry for myself, is HARD. To be on the verge of tears all the time, but never really able to sob because I KNOW and am choosing to believe that God has good for me and my children is HARD. But that knowledge gives me hope and keeps me going. It gives me strength and peace. It gives me the will not to give up and crawl in a hole and sleep all day. So, I press on because he is good, and worthy and because he holds my world together.
And so I choose to say, "Blessed be the name of the Lord," not because it's easy, but because it's true. I am weary though, and it is too easy for me to feel differently from moment to moment. I can feel so strong and secure, so hopeful for the future (even if it is without Kelvin and
Hawa)... but an hour later I can feel so cynical and bitter, and ready to quit this whole adoption thing. I want to be able to keep fighting this fight, and I have confidence that I
will, simply because I KNOW that God has burdened Jason and I with his orphans, and while we might want to quit on ourselves, we can't quit on them.
