We've had some situations like this come up before. Sometimes you hear of someone who is pregnant or some other situation where there is a need for a child to be adopted. All of those instances have been dead-ends (obviously, otherwise I would have another child, duh!), and so I went into this news with a grain of salt, not anticipating anything really.
This time was different though. It was a little bit harder to swallow than other things. As it turned out, this little girl wasn't being relinquished for adoption, although with the little bit of history that I heard, it sounds like that is what will be best for her. That's what was difficult.
It wasn't even that I wasn't going to bring her home. It wasn't that I felt like we were the right family for her and I was disappointed that she wasn't going to join our family. Those thoughts weren't even an issue for me.
It was knowing enough about the situation, and enough about the foster system in our country to know that the road ahead of this little one will be a lot tougher than it would be if she were adopted. That's what broke my heart this week.
I began to think anew about the choice that my own birth mother made. I don't know the circumstances of my birth or the issues that surrounded her. The most important thing that I do know is that she let me go. She made a choice that most likely tore her apart inside, but she faced what was most hurtful and difficult to give me the best that I could have.
What she did has had arguably the most profound influence on my entire life. Her selfless act put me into my family where I heard and received the gospel, and as I think about every circumstance in my life from the places I've lived, to the people I've met, to the very family I belong to, all can be traced back to that one moment when she resolved to let me go.
Her choice points me to God's love, a love that is willing to give everything so that I can live. Her choice teaches me that parenting should always look selfless.
Birth mothers are the unsung heroes of adoption stories. We look at the families, and the journey they go through to decide to adopt and walk through the process. We marvel at the transformation in a child's life when they go from being an orphan to a part of their new family. But we often overlook the amazing, powerful and important decision that a child's first parent makes.
(Sometimes an adoption doesn't look like that, I know, but in most cases there is someone who is letting go.)
So looking through the lens that I have at the situation that was dropped in my lap this week, I guess maybe one can see how this one got to me. Because I personally know the impact of a selfless act in my life, and because I know what kind of life I was potentially saved from, my heart breaks when I hear of a little girl that isn't given what I have been given.
Why? I don't know. I don't know what God has in store for this little girl. I don't know what he has in mind for his glory in her life. I do know that he knows. He knows exactly what he is doing, and he will do all things for his glory.
That is the only comfort I have as I think about her future. Because my God is so big, and strong and mighty, I know that comfort is enough.
Lord, you know every detail of S****'s life, and all the people in it.
You have a plan for her,
and I pray that you would protect her and that she would learn your truths at an early age.
Lord, I pray that the truth of the gospel would take root in her heart so that she can face every situation knowing that all will be worked for your glory.
Protect her heart.
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