We are the walking wounded

We are the walking wounded.  We are everywhere, behind you in the checkout line, 3 seats over in church, our kids go to school with your kids, we grew up together and laughed and loved before life became hard.  Our wounds don’t all look the same.  Some of us are innocent, some of us guilty.  Some of us have scars from this broken world, what was done to us, against us.  Some of us battle depression, an assault in our heart and mind.  Some of us the wounds come from words like, cancer, heart attack, death.  Some of us the scars are from other words like affair and divorce.  Some of us have followed a calling on our lives, taking us away from family, friends, and country, where days can be long and tiresome and results less than we hoped.  Some of us the call is in our own homes, pain so close you can touch it every day.  Some of us are mothers who have held our babies only in our hearts; we wonder who they would have looked like, the sound of their laugh.  Our wounds are different but the same.  They keep us up at night, they make Christmas hard.  Memories are our best friends and worst enemies, they sneak up on us, bring us to tears in a moment.  They make worship a holy experience.  They make us hold others at a distance.  They bring judgment, condemnation.  They make us who we are, how we see the world. 

There are some who share my wounds; their children have known me as mom.  Theirs, like some of ours, are wounds of choice.  They have chosen to satisfy their flesh, they are addicts of drugs, men, self.  Some of us have chosen to deny self, to satisfy Him who called, though it cost our hearts we follow.  Our wounds are shared.  We will miss the same children, the same smiles, the same sticky fingers.  We will whisper their names out loud in the night to not forget the sound of it on our tongue.  We will carry these scars our entire lives, we will always be mom and yet never be mom again. 

I pray He is with those who share my wounds….those that miss the same children I miss.  I pray they look up and find Him close, because He is.  He shares our wounds and loves the same children we love. 

We are the walking wounded and we are everywhere….but so is He.  He has overcome this broken world; He brings words of hope and peace.  For some of us He brings healing in this life, for some just the promise of it in the next.  For some of us He is found in the middle of the pain, when we can’t go on on our own, He is there, He binds are wounds and whispers His love.  He renews, He restores, He redeems.  For some of us comfort is in visions of babies being held by a Man with scars in His hands.  He is there in the night, He is Emmanuel.  He dries our tears.  He makes worship holy.  He brings others to our side.  He condemns every tongue that rises against us in judgment, for our righteousness is from Him. 

We are the walking wounded, different but the same.  We share wounds in this broken world….and by His wounds we are healed.

I used to say we had an adoption miracle, that the Holy Spirit did a miracle in our bonding with Hope, the magic kind of miracle.  I realize now that I was wrong....sorta.  I was selfish and blind and well, a bit ignorant.  Shane and I have always been a little embarrassed at how easy our transition was, like we were the poster children for a successful adoption.  Hope was 15 months when we met her and I'm pretty sure it took all of 6 hours for her to be completely attached, giggling, laughing, and snuggling, it's been over 7 years and we have never looked back.  And for years I have never thought of it as anything other than answered prayer that our transition was so smooth.  I thought only of Hope's birth mom, Emilia, as someone who grieved for her.  We pray for Emilia, we think of her and her heartache in letting go of her beautiful daughter, I wonder at the life she imagined for Hope, the life she knew she couldn't give.  I mourn for her loss and am thankful for her sacrifice, she alone is who I think of in the category of loss.  I take that back, there was one moment where I felt for another, a young lady whose name I may never know, who I have one picture of from Hope's final days at the orphanage.  I remember when we got it, so many years ago, I noticed the way she held Hope, the way her hands gently rested on her head, the look of love and loss in her eyes.  But if I'm honest I looked for a moment and then had eyes only for my daughter, I forgot her as soon as I saw her.  I had been waiting 13 months from our first picture of Hope and we were in the home stretch and all I knew was that she was almost mine. 
But now here I am, with a look of love and loss in my own eyes and the Lord reminded me of that picture from so long ago.  He showed me that He did do a miracle in our adoption with Hope, that the Holy Spirit did indeed allow us to bond with Hope in amazing ways.  He showed me that He used a beautiful young Haitian girl, who was willing to love a child that was not hers as if she was.  He asked her to love with all her heart even though her heart would break when she left, He whispered to her that He needed her help to give Hope a foundation to give and receive love.  He told her no one may ever know or acknowledge her pain, that her sacrifice would be great and she may never see the fruits of her heartache and she said yes.  You see when the Lord reminded me of this I was crying out to Him that He was asking too much of me.  How could He ask me to love so much knowing I would say goodbye?  Most people run from pain and here we are at a dead sprint toward it.  I wanted to close my heart, even a little, to not let these precious children who call me Mommy have any more.  I didn't want to watch Maris be a little mommy, speaking sweetly and reminding them how much Jesus loved them, I didn't want to see Kruse asking me what Soren was wearing so they could match and running around the house giving piggy back rides, I didn't want to see Hope in her new role as big sister, building forts, dancing to the Fresh Beat Band, pushing babies around the house, at break neck speed, on their little cars.  I didn't want to watch the twins jump up at the sound of Shane practicing worship to yell "Daddy, guitar" and dance at his feet, to see Starlea's face light up when he walked in the room.  I didn't want to see it because I didn't want to miss it everyday for the rest of my life.  I was tired, physically, emotionally and spiritually.  I was standing in my kitchen telling Him all the reasons I couldn't give any more and then He whispered, in the way He always does when I finally stop talking, I need you on the other side of adoption now.  He opened my eyes to our adoption, He showed me the miracle was that someone was willing to love a little girl with all her heart and that is why she was ready to receive my love.  It was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard and the only way that I knew we would get through this pain.  We are doing for someone else what was done for us, we are the miracle....not in an arrogant prideful way....in a broken, beautiful collision of love and redemption and His kingdom coming here and now. 
Everyday I learn more about the cost and sacrifice of foster care, we live in the tension of the beauty and heartache, every moment is sacred.  I know what those precious children looked like when they entered our home, you would never recognize them now.  They are healthy and happy and social and confident and silly and stubborn and they have found their voice, they are loved with every ounce of my being and by every member of this family and they are ready to go home.  I'll never forget the joy of bringing Hope home and in 2 days I will watch another family experience that joy and I have faith that they will also have a miracle, that they will feel like a family in the magic miracle sort of way.  I still don't know how to live in a world where I am not their mom, I still can't imagine not waking up to twin chatter, to never have Soren's chubby fingers on my face, to see Rayah love, to not have Starlea smiling at me at 5am.  The pain is still real and at moments paralyzing, but we endure the pain with our eyes fixed on Jesus.  He promised that when we bring into our house the poor that are cast out that He will guide us continually, He will satisfy our souls in drought, and strengthen our bones and make us like a well watered garden.  I'm clinging to His Word and His promises.  I'm on the other side of adoption now and that is where He needs me and my family and so that is where we will be.  And in case you are wondering there is a new picture hanging in Hope's room, a picture of a beautiful young woman who loved my daughter first.