It's Time

(I’m listening to Jason Gray’s “Nothing is Wasted” as I type.  It’s perfect, and I only wish you were listening, too, while you read.)

4 years ago, our trio lost everything familiar.   Their first family.  Their village and family home.  Friends.  They lost all they had known.  Their hope was waylaid.  They no idea there was still more loss in store the day they were taken to a government orphanage.

Our trio had a brother.   He was older.  He cared for them and guarded their hearts.  He was with them when they left their home and entered the orphanage.  And then he wasn’t.  He was gone.  He should never have been separated from them.  That’s not the way it is done, but sometimes it is. 

Despite the healing and restoration we’ve seen, our trio still grieves the loss of their brother.  And we’ve mourned with them because that is what family does… We’ve prayed together for their pain, for the wreckage of loss, and for their tears and hurt, and we’ve begged God for restoration. 

We underestimated God.  We never imagined God’s answer to our children’s pain and privation would be reuniting our children under one roof as one family with a mama and a daddy.  We had no idea HE would choose that.  It seemed so far fetched. 

Here we are.  Our new son in Ethiopia is our trio’s biological sibling.  I love that we’ve prayed for him since the moment we knew about him.  I love that we will actually have the privilege of seeing those prayers worked out in parenting him.  

Our children have been apart too long.  It’s time.  And I am reminded nothing is wasted.