18 May 2010

Our birth mother changed her mind. She texted her case worker last week and has been incommunicado ever since. Under pressure from her family, she has elected to raise the baby after all. He'll be born by c-section tomorrow.

On the afternoon I received the call last week, I saw my fleecy pull-over lying on the floor of my bedroom. I wanted to put it on to comfort me, but it was a hot day. I thought, "I need to put on Jesus like a fleecy sweater." And, He has comforted me.

I'm still sad and tomorrow will be a hard day for me. But, I've had time to come to grips with it. Time to struggle with hope and to wrestle with what to pin my hope to. Sometimes I have fought in prayer for that baby to become mine against all odds. For obstacles to be placed in the way of this plan, just as they were placed in the way of the abortion attempts early in the pregnancy. I have prayed for the birth mom and her father (who demanded the change of direction). I have prayed that no matter what happens, no matter who ends up raising this child, that there would be zero regrets, zero resentment, and zero rejection. I wouldn't grieve for the mom and baby so much if I could be sure that they will live without those three Rs.

And, as trite as it sounds, I know that God will bring us a child and He will fulfill His promise to me (to exceed my expectations) in another way. At first I couldn't believe that. I was so certain that this child was the fulfillment of the promise. And, I do believe God meant that baby for our family. I don't really understand the interworkings of His sovereignty and our free will any more than anyone else does, but I can believe that God wanted that baby to come to our family and that human frailty caused it not to happen. I also believe that He can and will still fulfill that promise. The bar of my expectation has been raised a lot since He made the promise and even more since He allowed me to taste a fulfillment of it, but He is so much more than my mind can contain. He can blow my mind again. And again. And again. I don't know how He'll do it, but I KNOW He will.

When I first got the news, I didn't know what to hope for, what to believe for. Now I do. I just have to keep believing the promise He gave me. He showed me He's totally capable of exceeding my expectations. Somehow, that taste of His glory makes me even more sure that He is going to fulfill His promise. Though I am disappointed that this chapter is not ending the way we thought it would, somehow it has strengthened my faith. Somehow I can believe and hope better than I had been hoping and believing before we rode this section of the roller coaster.

I guess that's something of the mystery of faith.