This picture represents healing for my heart. It’s been such a journey with this child and his family. Its hard to even describe in words what this moment was for me, but I had to capture it (with a pseudo selfie). Our story with this child didn’t go the way we thought it would, in fact it was vastly different than anything we could’ve imagined. When he arrived on our doorstep (literally), with the social worker, at 4 months of age I fell in love instantly, believing he would be ours forever. Not to sound completely naive, we were told that the chances of adoption were quite high. And at that time, that was our desire, to adopt two children from foster care, complete our family and live happily ever after. But this story didn’t end like that, he was removed and returned to us multiple times over the course of 4 years, and each time we thought this would be it, he will finally be ours. But in the end, he wasn’t - and I can say now that I am grateful for that. The moment I learned that he wouldn’t be ours for the final time, it broke my heart but it also broke me of MY will and MY desire and MY plans for my life. It was then that I knew the Lord used this for His will and His plans to be done. That’s why I can be grateful now. In the process, the Lord opened my eyes to show me His heart. His heart for the broken, the downtrodden, the minority, the abused, the addicts, the felon. He revealed the importance of healing and restoration within families, the need for support, encouragement, guidance and hope. He changed our hearts to mirror His for His people. Now, this child gets to be raised by his mother and his father. And because of our relationship with his father, as of recently, we get to see him. So this past weekend we spent time with him, 5 years from when we first met and a year since we’d last seen him. I was resting on the couch, and he came over grabbed his blanket and snuggled up next to me, just as you see in the picture. I wanted to sob and hold him close and squeeze him but instead I thanked the Lord and relished the moment, and I felt the Lord healing my broken heart, as we laid there together. Then, I thought of Romans 8:28 and how the Lord truly does work all things together for His good. He is so good.
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