If you have you have short attention span or limited time, just know that the Lord has provided graciously for our family and we have matched with a beautiful little miracle baby (pictures to come in next blog). She is 10 months old and just precious. To "match" means that we have received photos, a medical file, and some basic information on the baby, and have told the agency "we're in!" - and on Friday, June 8th, we received the e-mail with the official confirmation from the Chinese government that we were accepted and that in approximately 6 months we will be able to travel to China to bring precious Kate home to all of you - her family. She will need medical attention for a severe cleft lip and palate, but is healthy as far as we know other than that.
If you are still with me...this is James writing tonight for the family...I would love to share my heart, and my side of the story thus far.
Adoption was not on my bucket list. Really, not even on my radar at all for that matter. But over the past year, God has opened my eyes to the need and I felt it really just made perfect sense for our family. Liz is kind of sneaky cool in so much as when she wants something, she just prays that God would make it my heart and my idea, and then she just embraces the idea when I present it. Until I read her responses to the home study I did not realize how long she had wanted, and prayed for, us to adopt. Needless to say I received an enthusiastic yes when I first brought up the idea last year!
It has been an interesting journey thus far to say the least. For me, the biggest challenge has been moving closer to the suffering. Becoming a father to Anne and Molly has filled my heart with love and compassion that I feel deeper in my chest than anything I have ever known. Sometimes when I watch them eat I think that someone's Anne and Molly do not have food. Sometimes when I hold them I think that someone is hitting their Anne and Molly. When they cry out during the night, I can go from asleep to up the stairs in 7 seconds. I'm fast. But even as I type somewhere there is child crying out and no one is answering. It might even be Bethany Kate's cry. Look, I don't want to be a drama queen with this and play on your emotions, or mine, which are probably far more fragile than yours anyway. But you need to understand this part of my story to understand my heart, which if you are taking the time to read this, I want to take the time to be honest and transparent with you. So ever since Anne was born when I have had these negative thoughts about the plight of children, I have mostly been able to block it out. The depth and severity of the pain to even think about it seemed unbearable and depressing and crushing to me. So I pushed the thoughts out of my mind, focused on Anne and Molly and our quiet sweet little lives where I see God's goodness and blessing so clearly. We are not perfect parents, but our girls are loved, fed, prayed over, held, encouraged, protected, and treasured each day. When we began the adoption process, it forced me to have to face some of the suffering of children. I feared wading into this for several reasons. I feared that I would not be able to handle the suffering as I moved closer to it. As it became part of our lives and wasn't just a thought that I could block out. Knowing one baby by name in the world and knowing where she lives and what is and isn't happening to her is somehow more painful to me than just glancing over a newspaper headline that there are a million orphans or whatever in the world - because I am now more connected to the suffering. I was fearful of what the suffering would do to my view of God. For those of you who I have not met or do not know, I am a Christian. In short, I believe that God created the world and that God is a perfect being. I believe that I am not perfect, and that God gave His son Jesus as a gift to the world that through the life and death of Jesus that I could have a relationship with God. But I have to tell your that my view of God is as a loving and kind God, and I was scared of being too close to the suffering, for fear of turning on God with the inevitable "Where are you and why do you allow this? - why is an Anne or Molly abused, hungry, unloved?" I feared a coming of crisis of faith, if you will, that could shake the foundation of my life. If God is not real, or if He is not good, I've got a problem, people, because my life is built on believing both of those things. I feared putting it to the test coming face to face with hurting children, which is the suffering that hurts me the most.
Monday, April 16th, was the day that we thought we would match. China was releasing that month's list of available children, and we were expecting a phone call around midnight that night that we had matched with our chosen child. That morning, I left out of the front door and down our sidewalk to my truck. Right in the middle of the sidewalk was a rose - not yet opened - perfectly cut at about 6 inches. It was small, fragile, and my first thought was what a tragedy that this rose was cut off from it's bush unopened and so small. But that thought was immediately replaced with how special that God would leave a rose for me on this special day - a rose for Kate. What better way to show me His love for Kate than to leave a rose for her? I picked up the rose and took it to work and put it on my desk in a cup of water. During the course of the day, the rose began to open, fed by the water in the cup and the sun coming through my office windows. I felt so comforted and reassured seeing the rose....that God's hand was in this process....and that His hand was on Kate. On the day that we were moving closer to the suffering, we found God moving closer with us.
As you know from reading Liz's posts, we did not match on that day like we thought we would. But I kept the rose. Everyday I was reminded by the rose that God is with us on this journey.
However, recently I was was thinking about the sadness of the orphans...and thought about the rose again. The rose should have been on the bush. Connected to it's mother. Growing, blooming, a part of the plant, surrounded by other roses. I thought about the orphans. The rose that had brought me so much joy and comfort suddenly seemed a sad reminder of orphans not connected to their parents, community, their siblings. But then I felt the Lord say to me..."but I left it where you would find it"....and instantly I thought about the orphans in China, whose parents take a risk by leaving the children where they will be found....so that someday they can be adopted.
Friday night, June 1st, we hosted a marriage communications class kick off party at the park across from our house. It was a sweet night of marriage and friendship. Liz and I love to host, to set up, to clean up, and we love that tired but happy feeling of having everything put up, in order, the girls in bed, and a chance to collapse on the couch weary but content, and share a few moments together at the end of the day. Just as we had settled in, 9:15 PM the phone rings - it was our wonderful agency contact (name withheld for privacy) who is shepherding us through this process. She tells me she might have a match for us. She told me all about Kate. I took the phone call on the porch as to shield Liz from any heartache if I knew at the beginning it wasn't a match. But from every one word that she said, I knew this was our baby girl. I came back inside to Liz jumping up and down and screaming "What did she say?!?!?!" - to which I naturally responded "who?" - I'll post a video at some point of what followed, but it includes Liz throwing things at me. Before you call me names, please know I only let that go on a minute before holding out my arms, tears in my eyes, and saying "we have a baby....we have a baby...." and embracing her....she repeating - half questioning half saying - "we have a baby?"....it was a sweet moment in our lives. We raced to the computer to open up the e-mail with all of her information. There was a lot in there obviously, but the part I want to share with you is that...pause as the tears begin to flow here...but Kate was left at the gate of the orphanage and the file made reference to an unusual occurrence in which there had been a note pinned to Kate with her birthday on it, presumably so the orphanage would know exactly how old she was and maybe even someday that her adoptive parents would know her birthday, a rare case with Chinese orphans. At that moment, I felt the Lord say..."see, I left her where you would find her." I'm crying as I write this....
I don't know why, or how, the rose got separated from the bush. I don't know how or why Kate's mom couldn't keep her. But I know that God left them where they would be found. I know that He put them where they would be scooped up, watered, fed, cared for, loved. He left them where they would blossom. He left them for me. I'm scared of suffering. I'm scared of being close to it. But God is saying to me not to be scared. I am part of His plan for healing. He is saying to me it is okay to come closer to the suffering. I will find Him there - working among the orphans and the hurting. He is not far away like I feared He might be. He is there. He is there. He is good.
Thanks for letting me tell my story so far....I will try to wrap up quickly and succinctly....but if you have made it is far I guess you are in it for the long haul. I bet five bucks if you are still reading this that you have knocked out War and Peace as well as Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire at some point.
LIZ - when I started typing 2 hours ago she looked me straight in the eye and said I do not want you writing a bunch of nice things about me. Several years ago she was in the hospital and she said the e-mails I wrote with updates made her sound "too good" and she didn't want me writing how great she was. So I left her out. But I don't have to say anything - you all know her - and most have read Proverbs 31 - God has blessed me immeasurably with her.
WHO IS GOING TO CHINA - we don't know. It might be me - which is funny since I have never been out of the country and until recently experienced healing from God, I wouldn't fly on airplanes either. If I go and Liz stays home, God has already anointed a legion of family and friends who have offered to go with me. We'll keep you posted, no pun intended.
HER NAME - BETHANY KATE? So...kind of weird...but Liz and I feel strongly that God is calling us to name her Bethany. We don't know why. Several times in the Bible God had names picked up out for His people. Even Jesus. He told Mary to name her son Jesus. We believe that is what God has chosen for her. Even weirder, I know, but we also feel a peace and calling for her to go by her middle name Kate. So, Bethany Kate Wessel will be her given name, and she will go by Kate. Thank you for loving us so well as we try to be obedient to what God is calling us to do.
YOU - Congratulations to YOU on your new baby - through your love, your friendship, your prayers, you have chosen to adopt Kate as well. We are under no illusion that we are going this alone. You have chosen to love us, to love her, to embrace us, to embrace her, so we celebrate her as your new granddaughter, niece, sister, playmate, and child. Thank you for being willing to adopt her. She needed a family. She needed a Church. She needed community. You have given her that.
ME - I am done blogging now. This was my first. I'm as over it as you are at this point. Liz will be back in charge from this point forward. Thank you for listening to me. Let's continue to prayerfully come together as God's children, move together towards the suffering, meet Him there, and allow Him to use us to bring healing. Let our lives be ruled by love and not by fear.
Thanks for letting me tell the story of a rose for Kate.
