Enough

God has brought me down this road again.  This road where I can’t write, sleep or think about anything else but what He wants me to do for Him.  I have to say I don’t like it.  I like being blindly obliviously (how is that for alliteration?) and traipsing on my merry way, kind of skating through life.  If we are being honest here….I really do like to skate through life.  Now Jesus has me wrestling with insomnia again, waking up at 4 am when I do sleep, concentrating on little and praying off and on all day and all over a child.  One child. 

He did this eight years ago when we were seeking to adopt a baby.  But I am not seeking anything right now.  The Lord is seeking me.  This is different but the love I feel for the child is the same:  all consuming, protective and downright instinctual. It came out of nowhere and without warning.  As my husband said, “She kind of snuck up on us, didn’t she?”  Yes, she did. 

I really don’t have patience for the people in my life who frown and say, “Oh…honey you can’t save them all.”  Or, “Why don’t you just quit while you’re ahead….you have enough children already.”  For one thing, I am not in control. God will say when I am done.  There are MILLIONS of children out there that need me, that need you….need all of us.  It is time to quit making excuses and do what the Bible commands us.  We are commanded to take care of the fatherless.  The small things I do will NEVER be enough.  They don’t make a dent in what God wants me to do. So, no, it will never be enough.  Never.  Until I am six feet under….Never.

But for this one child, right now….I patiently waitfor God to kick down some doors.  I patiently will love her until He tells me what He wants me to do.  But it will never be enough.

Ike's birthday

Every birthday, I think about Ike's birth. I wish I had been there to see his beautiful face for the first time. Sometimes I feel robbed of those first moments. It is a fleeting thought because I know I have a lifetime with him and his birth mom, sadly does not.

My first impressions of Ike were that he was absolutely precious with his shock of strawberry blonde hair sticking straight up and his blue eyes squinting at me. He yawned and tried to stretch his tense arms but his withdrawals from drugs/alcohol would not allow it. I put him on the bed to change his diaper (he came straight from the hospital) and I noticed he looked like he had not been changed (his little shirt) in two days. He was filthy.

It seemed like he was aching or sore so I put him in a warm bath (from his hips down) to ease his discomfort and poured warm water over him. He almost sighed with relief and tried again to uncurl his limbs. It helped. Doesn't a warm bath always help? I put soft clothes on him and fed him a bottle. If the words don't move you-to see him finally like a baby should be, warm, clean and drinking warm formula, well, it was a thing of comfort. He was mine as if it had been branded into my heart.

I cut off his hospital bracelet, washed the shirt and blanket he came home in and kept these treasures for him to have from his birth mother. But I have the sweetest treasure.