This weekend, The Garden’s Leadership Team got away for our second annual retreat.
I’m still finding words for all Father did over the weekend. He told me specific things He was going to do in each heart and how He was going to move us as a team deeper into His. Just like always, He did exactly what I felt Him say He would do. I believe our team walked away marked by the love of God in a way we never have before.
I glanced in the mirror one night when I was putting by children to bed and suddenly remembered that I didn’t grow them in my belly when I saw our reflection staring back at us. It might sound weird that I forget that my children are adopted, but I do.
Because to me, they’re just my children.
When I was 16, I went down an aisle during a mission’s conference and told Jesus I would follow Him to the ends of the earth, I said “yes” to go wherever He said to go. I thought back then that looked like a remote village in Africa, with children from the orphanage all piled up in my lap, and red dirt covering my clothes. And while my heart beats wildly for those children, my mission field is in my living room.
I was wiping bottoms one day and sweeping goldfish off the floor, and God reminded me of that fall day all those years ago, when I said yes to Him. And I realized I didn’t have to go to the nations to mother the vulnerable, I was staring them right in the face.
2018 was so beautiful.
We started 2018 with a deep sadness. So much disappointment was felt in 2017 and our foster son that had been with us for six months left very abruptly. But we welcomed 2018 with full hearts, expectant of all God had for us. We heard Him say this year would be a year of harvest. And we definitely saw that. It was beautiful. We saw the first fruits of all the good seed we have been sowing for so many years. It was a year I’ll deeply cherish.
She turned five today. Five.
Five whole years loving a miracle. Five whole years of so much joy. Five whole years of being a mama.
Five feels hard. I say this every year, but for real. She might as well be driving. Hold me, Jesus. She’ll go to KINDERGARTEN next year. I can’t take it.
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