Here’s a shocker for you…I’m horribly impatient. Horribly. You, too? ;)
For example, Scott and I dated for two years before he proposed. Two years. Twenty four months {twenty five, actually}. I knew less than one month into our dating that he would be my husband. Yet it took nearly two years for him to get on one knee and ask me to be his wife. As much as I’d love for y’all to believe that it just magically happened, it didn’t. The truth is that I gave him an ultimatum. He had until the end of January 2002 to propose to me or else. What else? Good question. Was I really going anywhere? Nope. But, I sure faked it {although I’m sure he knew better}. Oh and he stretched it out, too. With less than two weeks left on a four month ultimatum, he finally did it. We were married six months later. Horribly impatient, I tell you.
Thankfully, my Father understands this side of me well. Except the ultimatums don’t work so well on Him. I painfully find time and time again that His schedule is not mine. His plans aren’t mine. His desires for my life aren’t mine. His are far better.
Take joy for example…
If I’m being completely, brutally honest then I would say that after losing Annabelle, I truly never believed I’d ever have pure joy again this side of Heaven. I believed that for years. But, then there are those moments that slowly sneak in where I’d feel it…purely and raw with emotion. At first, I hated it. I didn’t want to ever be filled with joy again. I was afraid it meant that she was meaning less than she should. Then, I realized that it’s only the enemy scaring me into believing that. Our lives, our family is forever changed because of her. That will never change. And she wants joy. HE came for us to have joy…yes, even this side of Heaven.
The grief can still hit me like a huge swell of a wave so quickly that I don’t even know it has until I’m completely submerged and curled up in gut-wrenching pain. But, I’ve learned to get back up a little quicker. I’ve learned to let it hit me and not fight the grief. I’ve buried my own glorious little flesh of a baby girl and it is supposed to be suffocating. But, it doesn’t stay that way forever.
There’s a new dawn each day. And with it comes…joy.
A joy that is intended for this life…only to be enhanced and all the more perfected in the Next. But, it can come now, too. And, it should.
Adoption is slowly bringing a new joy into our home. A joy that I pray is never about us and our plans but always about His. A joy that fills our hearts and blesses others’.
My Jesus is working on me. He’s leaving me questioning the sometimes torturous waiting as we journey so much closer to finding our Andie-Grace and yet smiling at the hope of what is to come. I know His plans are better. I know His timing is perfect. I just have to wait for it. Oh, and dear friends, this is where I falter. I want her and I want her now. I know she is alive. I pray she is loved and fed and warm. I want her to know she is wanted and that the One who created her is always with her. I have no doubt that Jesus whispers these words to her as she waits for joy to come, too.
{a few glimpses of joy in our home…Thank you, Jesus!}
“I will extol You, O Lord, for You have lifted me up,
And have not let my enemies rejoice over me.
2 O Lord my God,
I cried to You for help, and You healed me.
3 O Lord, You have brought up my soul from Sheol;
You have kept me alive, that I would not go down to the pit.
4 Sing praise to the Lord, you His godly ones,
And give thanks to His holy name.
5 For His anger is but for a moment,
His favor is for a lifetime;
Weeping may last for the night,
But a shout of joy comes in the morning. “
Psalm 30: 1-5
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