Fear, Our Unwelcome Co-Pilot

At times, for survival’s sake I have to close my eyes and create a distance to buffer reality just enough to pretend like nothing is wrong.   Blogging seems to open my eyes, engage my emotions, splay my heart wide-open, and demand reality.  It forces me to acknowledge that things here, on this side of eternity, aren’t right.  I remember that the world is broken.  Children hurt and ache for love.  People cry out for help, and they need God. 

Last week, I realized that I’d boxed the entirety of my feelings and shelved them for the duration of about 4 months.  This small fact broke through when a year and ½ old email with the faces of three small children resurfaced in my inbox.  Each of the children in the photos pleaded for something.  The oldest boy (aka defender) entreated us for a safe place and people he could trust.  The girl (aka little mum) begged to know the simple joys of being a child.  The youngest boy (aka wanderer) only desired to belong.  I had put those compelling pictures to the side to hedge the reality of their needs, which are the needs of so many others.  But no more. 

We’ve said all along that we would go where God leads, but we had no idea fear would be our co-pilot.  We fear what is to come.  We fear what will be lost.  We fear not being enough to these three new children God’s called us to love.  So we’ve prayed, and prayed…and we’ve found it’s easier to stand and pray and watch with a great distance separating us from the hurt that exists than it is to fully engage.  I fear feeling their suffering, but God’s called me to that, too.  How can a mother and a father, a sister or a brother, love completely without sharing in common agony?  SO we choose, today and tomorrow and from here forward, to acknowledge and remember Defender’s, Little Mum’s, and Wanderer’s reality.  As we wait for the day they become ours, we will love them by holding them, their stories, and their hopes for a future close to our hearts.

For those who wonder, continue to ask, and pray diligently:  no official referral, which means no court date, and no news of the terrific trio coming home anytime soon.