FIVE!

God surprised us with the news of Benjamin's coming on Christmas morning 2004. I remember crying through the afternoon into the evening after we came home from Christmas festivities. We knew God was sovereign and that children were a blessing, but I felt like a complete failure as a mother at the time, and so utterly in over my head. It was not my timing, our finances weren't like I had hoped, and my lists were too long. Thank God He knows better than me. That sweet news was the beginning of a continual stripping of my soul, my pride, my longings.

I was telling my friend Cally, whose about to have her first baby, that I really do enjoy the drugs of labor. God gave us a curse, but He also gave us some help with that curse. Well, with Benjamin, my epidural never took, and I remember every moment. For whatever reason, I feel like his entire life has been like that. I love each of them. But Caleb's years have flown, and Daniel's are a blur, but Benjamin's moments are frozen in my mind. I remember right after I had Him thinking, "He's not mine. He's yours. You've known him from the beginning of time."

Most know that on the night of his first birthday, he became sick, and within two weeks had dropped from 19 to 12 pounds. It was two of the most disgusting, and heart-wrenching weeks of my life, and it was only the start of two years of sickness, tests, and doctor visits. The cancer word was mentioned. Our first Cystic Fibrosis test came back barely positive; the second negative. And finally, he was diagnosed with "EG", a complex digestive disease.

If you know Benjamin, you know he is a fighter, and he hasn't lost one ounce of that. I'm convinced God has a purpose for the intensity and passion that's bottled up inside of him, but it's a journey of being on our knees, watching that unfold. One moments he says, "Mommy, I adore you madly," and the next he's telling me he'll find a way to escape forever. And it's usually those exact words.

Everyone says Caleb is Jamie made over, and he is, and Benjamin is me in the highest concentrated form. I see his sin, and cringe at the places I know he may one day walk, and I become giddy over the imagination I know God is developing in him.

Often, after he makes a really poor choice, he'll look at me and ask, "Do you still love me now, Mommy?" I think of myself with my Father, hiding in fear of what He'll think of the darkness of my heart. I think of our first parents, Adam and Eve, hiding in the garden, from the purest relationship they would ever know, and I fall to my knees and answer him, "More than ever."

He always replies, "I love you, too, Mommy."

I'm so blessed.

Sigh...

When "my" senior high gals walk away from our Bible study, and enter the grand unknown of the college world, there's one mantra I believe they'll always hear me saying in the back of their heads when they think of me, regardless of the nutty things they picture me doing...."You were meant for more than this." When I say that to them as I hug their necks, it's not as much for them, as it is for me. It's a method of preaching the gospel to myself, because I so quickly forget and slip back into the mundane view that this place is my home.

Last week we had some of the graduated seniors over for dinner. Jamie and I had the gift of sitting back and watching as they laughed and goofed off, tickled and played with my kids. Some of them have been in our lives for eight years now, and I'm so honored, and the Father whispers once again that I was made for more. My relationships were meant for more then the precious, twisted glimpses of heaven they offer.

One of our consistent prayers over the last two years is that God would transform us as much through the process and journey He takes us through, as He does the end product. Faithfully, and sometimes frustratingly, we've seen Him answer that petition over and over. We are being transformed through the journey of relationships, joy and grief. We've seen the Father bring Himself glory through the successes He graces us with, and the failures with which He so lovingly humbles us.

We've seen this truth as He's grown in us the vision and passion for educating the boys, as well as with our longing to be part of orphan ministry. I've stomped my foot at times at His pace and ways, but His fresh mercy and faithfulness every morning gently reminds me that His purposes in bringing Himself glory are much bigger than I can dream.

We know we're called to the journey the Father is leading us into. We're knee deep in adoption papers, and just as deep in foster care preparations, but our hearts have never been more at rest for what's ahead. After months of longing and praying, we've really come to the place where we believe God is still leading us to pursue the daughter He has predestined to bring into our family, and we are just as certain He is leading us to the place where we can live in ministry to birth families in crisis, by welcoming children into our home, and loving birthparents with the mercy and grace of Christ in us. We've been made aware it won't always be comfortable, and it won't always be convenient, and we're certain it will more of a challenge emotionally and physically than we can imagine right now.

But, we also know that the only place we long to be is where the Father is leading us, and we're certain this road we're taking will lead us even more deeply to the conclusion, that we were made for more.