Unexpected Reaction

Thursday took me by surprise. It took us all by surprise and I have been trying to figure out how to describe it in a way that makes sense. Last week I shared about the new care center where our older children will be transferred to if they are not adoptable, or if no families are looking for children in their age range, or with special needs after age 6. It is a fantastic organization and I know in my heart that they will give excellent care and love to our children, but, to be honest, it was torture to let them go.

As a mother/father, when you have a newborn child, you immediately begin to dream about what his/her future may look like. You may think of the fun days where you will teach them to ride a bike or play catch, you may think of those milestones of their first steps or first words. Suddenly you find out that the child has special needs and will not be able to fulfill those dreams and desires of your heart and you have to mourn those. The child is no less special and often, I have heard, the new realities are even better that the dreams. I feel like this analogy is the best I can use to describe the feelings of our staff. I have NEVER seen so many tears or heard so many sobs among our staff, volunteers and even one of the children during our farewell ceremony. Each of us longed for these children to have a family. When a new child comes in, we begin to imagine what it will be like one day when they are reunited with a family member or adopted. It brings us such immeasurable joy on those days, but now we are in the process of mourning those dreams.

It is because we grew up in families and wanted it for these 4 precious kids. It is because for 5 years, one boy watched his friends all be adopted and begged us, "When will it be my turn?" It is because of the several times we rushed to the hospital to save one girl's life, and we longed for her to have a mother's touch because her time on this earth is likely to be short and it has been a hard life. It is because of one boy who fought and fought to live despite years of being malnourished. He is so young and has never known the joys of a real family, only the neglect of a relative. One girl, whose history is unknown, and who has struggled to bond with the staff at Beautiful Gate, and now that she has, she sobbed that she was given away.

It only hurts because we are all comparing our dreams to what we think should be their reality, but God's plan is better than ours. 8 years ago when a sweet little boy was born, God knew that the best place for him to grow up was going to be in care centers in Lesotho, Africa. Maybe he will grow up to be a man who brings great things to this country and needs to stay here so God's will can be done. I cannot do God's job and I cannot worry about this because God's plans are always better than we can imagine.

So I end this with the words of God Himself:
"Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails." Proverbs 19:21