Worthy

We adopted J when he was 18; he had been in our house since he was 15 through foster care. J has not lived in our house for the last 18 months and we have not seen him much. He's had periods of unemployment and homelessness. Through all of that I believe that he relied on friends to provide shelter and food. He did not ever ask us for money or for a place to stay.

J is leaving for basic training today to become a US Marine. We had talked with him enough to know that he was on track for a start date in January of next year and was working to pull the date up. We were a little surprised when he dropped in yesterday to tell us that he was leaving today.

In that conversation he also let us know that he wants to do this all by himself and doesn't want it to seem like it was something we helped him accomplish. He doesn't feel like he has any successes in his life that he can point to and say "I did that on my own."

He also said he doesn't want a family right now. He also, not so clearly, said that he doesn't feel like he can live up to our expectations (as he perceives them). As part of that he doesn't want us to come to his graduation from basic training, but admitted he may change his mind. Ultimatley he doesn't feel like a part of the family because he doesn't act like the rest of the family, and in fact has made decisions that make his life hard.

There are so many parallels in J's story to so many people's relationship to God, and I've touched on some of those (see previous posts).

J knows in his head that he is our child by adoption but and still doesn't grasp it in his heart. His perception is that we have expectations of him to be something he is not, but hopes to be, and that there is no way we can love him as he is. If I can't accept myself as I am, how can someone else accept me and even further, how can they love me? And even if J does not feel it in his heart it does not change how we feel about him as our son.

The times with J living here were not necessarily all the best times for him or us. There was a lot of tension, turmoil, and problems to help J deal with and we learned a lot. That was a decision we made and we have no regrets about sticking with him through things. Not too many other people did, except the ones that dragged him through with them.

Most of us, if we think about it, don't feel worthy of God's love. How can God love me, especially when He knows everything about me? God loves us no matter how we feel about him, whether or not we feel the need for Him in our lives or feel worthy of that love.

So many times in our lives when we have trouble we are helped by God in ways that we don't even realize. In the times we do realize it we are thankful and make promises to fix things. The other parts of our life where things are going well and we are celebrating our successes we often attribute to ourselves. We want all of that glory and don't want to give any of it to God. So we go on with our life, trying to do it alone and fix things ourselves, and we don't allow God to celebrate with us.

Please pray for J as he goes through basic, that he'll make it through and that through it all he will begin to understand that he is worthy of love and that none of us do anything alone.

Adoption day!!!

Today was David's adoption finalization. It was definitely cool and fun, even more so since we know what to expect having done it three times now. That didn't take away from the excitement or joy.

We are so glad to have David in our lives. As I mentioned in my previous post, David in a lot of ways may not live up to the world's standards or expectations; but then again he may surprise all of us and bring glory to God who brought him into our lives.

Just in the last two weeks David has started preschool and started to crawl. He also is bearing weight on his legs and can stand if someone helps him balance (which is where he started with sitting and crawling).

I believe strongly that God sees us in the same way. He doesn't see us in comparison to the world's standards, but to his own, and it is all through his love. He helps us to balance while we work through each step in our growth and rejoices for us (even more than we do ourselves) when we reach new heights.

New Experience

In the last few months we have been working on adopting our third child from foster care, and tonight we finally signed the petition to the court and will get a court date tomorrow.

As all kids, David is unique amongst our family. It isn't his skin color or his gender, it is his development. In many ways David is delayed, behind for his age; although delayed may not be the right word because that implies that there will be a point in time where he will catch up. Like a flight that is delayed can make up time in the air.

So, as a father, my expectations and points of joy will be different for David than they are for my other kids. Of course I was ecstatic when my kids learned to walk ; I will be ten times more when David walks because I know how much harder it is for him. In many areas David's potential is less than others; but that is balanced by his potential to experience and give joy to others in simple ways.

This got me to thinking about how God looks at us, his children. He gives us different gifts and combinations of gifts, he gives us different experiences, and different abilities. One person's potential to learn Bible stories, understand Greek, etc., is different than another's potential to feel God's presence. Neither is invalid, it is different. As humans it is in our nature to try to compare ourselves to others and the easiest things to compare are the tangibles.

How great that God looks at the intangibles (though He created us so all things are tangible to Him) and sees us as we truly are (through the good and bad he sees us as He created us - Good)!

For all of us, just as earthly parents, God expects us to live up to the potential he created in us!

(OK, tangent on physics and energy - potential energy is only useful when it is converted into kinetic energy (motion / work))

Slugbug!

You may have made it several years as a kid before you were introduced to the game "Slugbug!" (or some call it "Punchbug"). If you're not familiar, this is a game where your brothers / cousins / friends, while passengers in the same vehicle, look for VW beetles.
The prize for being the first to spot the car is the pleasure of slugging your competitor in the shoulder. Hard.

This game became more difficult to play in the 90's prior to the release of the new beetle. And to think that if the new beetle didn't come out the game may have died along with it.

Before the game you didn't see any of these VW bugs. Anywhere. Or at least not as many. Once the game started, they were everywhere. So if you were lucky enough to spot it first, you got to be the puncher. If you were slow, well your shoulder reminded how many VW beetles were on the road that day.

And just because you didn't see them before doesn't mean that the cars weren't on the road; you just didn't see them.

The same could be said for God's presence in the world. Once you start looking for it you will see it. And just because you didn't see it before doesn't mean it wasn't always there.

I wonder sometimes what our adopted kid's slugbugs are - what are those things that she is pre-conditioned to look for; anger, violence, yelling, arguing, physical abuse. No matter how far away she is from the game she has the sore shoulder to continually remind her that slugbugs are out there. Even though they don't make those cars where she lives now. Maybe over time she will stop looking and the ache will go away.

Parental controls

We have always thought that A had been raised (until she was three) in a very permissive environment in that she was treated as an equal to the adults. In fact, her bio mom called A "Mommy" as a cute nickname and would follow her orders at times, even allowing A to beat her. Even without a degree in psychology most of us can surmise that this is not a healthy relationship. These days A struggles with control and with authority and often tries to play the part of the parent by using our words directed towards us. And she is constantly in need of assurances that she is safe and secure. How safe could a 3 (4, 5, 6,) year old feel if they were completely in charge?

Our culture, our society, preaches this same message to all of us. Be your own boss, control your own destiny ; obtain enough stuff or buy the right body wash and you can be happy and have all you desire. "If it makes you happy..." How safe and secure can we feel if we think we are completely in charge? Sure, we can go for long periods of time believing that and acting that way. But even if we get all that we desire, it isn't necessarily all we need. (Side note, a pet peeve of mine is when I'm in line at a fast food place and the person in front of me places their order with the words "I need a big mac, fries, quarter pounder, ..." Nobody NEEDS those things - these are WANTS...)

In the end though our culture fails us, it doesn't give us safety and security, and we need to know that our Father is looking out for us, loving us unconditionally and providing what we need.

Puzzles

I have done quite a bit of traveling for my work (and sometimes for fun) over the last ten years. Most of the time when I fly I try to bring along something to read and/or listen to, and sometimes I read a little faster than I planned. Thank goodness the airlines provide their "in-flight magazine" for our reading enjoyment. There are articles that highlight the features of Tulsa night life or the great restaurants of Omaha.

Sanwiched between these journalistic revelations and the various airport maps, customs form instructions, and menu of available drinks, there are a few sodoku puzzles as well as a crossword.

The magazine that I pick up always has puzzles that have been started by a previous passenger. Started, not finished. And they didn't finish because they made some mistakes. They may be close enough that the words fit in some places but the blanks in the "down" entries don't have a chance of being right. I spend some time working through the obvious errors; but there are some that I can't clean up. I don't know what they were thinking and I've only got an hour on the plane wheels-up to wheels-down. It is frustrating that I can't get the puzzle completely fixed; if only the puzzle had been blank, maybe I would have had a chance.

It's like that with H sometimes - I feel like I've been given an incomplete crossword puzzle and somebody has messed up a big chunk of it. I have to go back and try to fix the wrong words and I only have so much time, I worry that I won't be able to complete the puzzle.

You're safe...

I'll never forget one of the first nights that A was with us. Our younger daughter was throwing a tantrum (as two-year olds can do at times) and I scooped her up to remove her from the family area and take her to her room. There she could thrash about and have her tantrum while everyone else was in relative quiet.

A asked my wife "what is he going to do to her?" Given her experiences it was a reasonable fear to have.

So here we are almost four years later, A has been in our home this entire time. She has had tantrums, time outs, and we have had to restrain her from time to time. We've never given her the same experience she had from the past (OK, I will admit there are times of yelling that I'm not proud of, and certainly don't help the cause). Through all of this we tell her our job is to keep her safe.

A's outlook on the world is one of doubt and fear, because of what she has experienced. It is hard for her to believe that she has someone who loves her and looks after her, to keep her safe. And there are a lot of times that she says she wants us to go away, she wants to go back to her old house which she has fond memories of...

It reminds me of the Israelites on their trek in the desert..."At least we had food in Egypt. Have you brought us out here to die?" This same group of people had a loving God that had rescued them from bondage and it was hard for them to see that God was taking care of them.

This same God provides us freedom from bondage to Sin, yet how many times do we want to go back to our old house, how many times do we forget that God is really taking care of us. NO matter how many times we see it happen and know it to be true.