The great wait

A friend recently shared a quote with me that I keep thinking about: "The need is your call."

Since March, Ryan and I have been attending meetings and filling out paperwork for Christian Adoption Services, the agency we're using to adopt our third child.

Our reasons for adopting are many, and typical of me at least, they might sound more practical than revolutionary.

First and foremost, we believe Scripture and what we know about Jesus affirms our decision to adopt.

Jesus loves children. Jesus tells us to love children and to care for orphans. Jesus has given the Thomsens more than we need, with the intent that we share with those in need.

Since March, I've also learned that when everything in your life is bent toward something--your resources, your time, your desires, your faith, Scripture, your husband--it's unnatural to go the other direction. So that's where we find ourselves: taking the next, natural step on this narrow path of faith we call life. (That's not to mention a close friend who is blazing the trail with the same adoption agency and has proved invaluable to me, five-year-old Will who prays for a baby brother or sister, and Christian friends who affirm that adoption seems right for us.)

Last Wednesday, we turned in the last of the paperwork and officially embarked on this very strange pregnancy otherwise known as adoption. A pregnancy that, for us, could last a week or nine months or longer. Instead of birth pains, we'll have waiting pains. Instead of my water breaking, we're going to get a phone call.

If you're reading this, we probably know each other, and that gives you permission to remind me later of the things I'm about to say: When I'm not lassoing my thoughts as I should, I dream up situations that worry me. Of course I do. What if I don't bond with the baby? What if the baby has an illness? What if the birth mom changes her mind? What if the birth father comes around after the fact? Basically, What if it's not easy? 

Here's what you can repeat to me later in a text or email or straight to my face: I have eternity to be comfortable. I can reserve convenience for later. For now, I'm trusting I'll feel the Lord's pleasure during the newborn baby days and during the identity-crisis teenage days, and during every day of parenting three children in between. And I'm also trusting and hoping that none of you have to get in my face later because our new baby will in fact be a great fit in our family--in ways I've thought to pray about and ways I haven't.

Our church just finished a sermon series on sharing our faith. I, like most other Christians I know, struggle with following Christ's command to make disciples of the nations. While it's not our only motivation to adopt, Ryan and I are excited about the opportunities that adoption will afford us to share the gospel with people in the grocery line, at the gym, and on the playground. The simple truth is that we are adopted, too.

And that's really the beauty of it all. Jesus inherited a disease-ridden, wayward child when He adopted me. I hope recognition of this and gratitude for it will help me as we embark on this minuscule model of a much greater reality.

And then of course there's the sentiment I expressed at the beginning of this post: Need. If there are babies that need loving families, who's going to do it if we don't?

Practical? Maybe.

But when practicality lines up with Scripture lines up with desire lines up with circumstance, there's no way to go but forward.

And so for now, we wait.

And jump when the phone rings.