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When you say yes

“When you say YES to adoption, you are saying YES to enter the suffering of the orphan, and that suffering includes WAITING FOR YOU TO GET TO THEM. I promise you, their suffering is worse than yours. We say YES to the tears, YES to the longing, YES to the maddening process, YES to the money, YES to hope, YES to the screaming frustration of it all, YES to going the distance through every unforeseen discouragement and delay. Do not imagine that something outside of “your perfect plan” means you heard God wrong. There is NO perfect adoption. EVERY adoption has snags. We Americans invented the “show me a sign” or “this is a sign” or “this must mean God is closing a door” or “God must not be in this because it is hard,” but all that is garbage. You know what’s hard? Being an orphan. They need us to be champions and heroes for them, fighting like hell to get them home. So we will. We may cry and rage and scream and wail in the process, but get them home we will.”
–Jen Hatmaker

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  • Cath Butlin May 2, 2013, 9:32 am

    Everytime i see a new blog post in my email box from Tiny Green Elephants, I think “Yay!” . it is always the email i love to read first. Why? because your blogs are like manna in a desert. We are in the process of getting approved here in the uk to adopt from Bulgaria? Russia? and there is noone we know here in the UK doing the same! We are alone here in our journey. In fact most people think we are mad! This one I read today particularly gave me that boost of joy that I know that I know that I know we are doing the right thing! Thank you , you guys…from across the Atlantic…keep ’em coming…they are a life-line. xxxx

  • Jed and Kimber May 2, 2013, 2:57 pm

    YES YES YES!! We are in the process of moving our family to Ukraine in November to serve orphans with special needs and our motto all along is “Say yes to the next thing”. His plans are so much higher than ours. His ways are SO MUCH better than our ways. All He asks is that we say yes to what He asks of us. We don’t have to figure out the end result. We just have to put one foot in front of the other.
    Love it.

  • Sherry May 3, 2013, 3:22 am

    Gotta love Jen Hatmaker. I assume you’ve read her “after the airport” Amen Sista!

    And you’ve become my most favorite-ist blogger recently. I love watching your brood grow, and looking to see how you encourage more to fight the fight. You’re an inspiration!

    Having been there, the process sucks. But it’s DREADFUL for them. We know that to be true. Memories started coming out around 8 months home. Orphanages are no place for a child. It’s just not fair. Ugh.

    I’d like to share this tomorrow, thanks for the post! (I know it’s not your writing, but your pictures add such depth)

  • Rebekah Sanderson May 3, 2013, 9:23 pm

    Is THAT REALLY Elijah? No way! The miracles love can perform!!!

  • Ann May 5, 2013, 5:29 pm

    I cannot properly express to you how much I needed to read and see this today.

    I am hitting mountains of snags (though at least not a closed country, thank God–Canadians are still adopting from Russia, and I intend to be among them) and although objectively I can see that these snags are a part of the process, that they have the best interests of these kids at heart . . . it’s starting to look very dim from my end. As in, “maybe I can’t bring her home” type dim. It’s all a bundle of financial, locational and provincial setbacks that are working against us right now, and I am scared for her. And that is hard.

    Thank you for sharing this. Thank you. I needed it today.

  • Mamabear May 6, 2013, 5:38 pm

    James 1:26 calls ALL Christians to care for widows and orphans, but not all are called to adopt. Many see the plight of orphans and have compassion. Adoption isn’t a “Christian-duty-nice-thing-to-do” kind of thing, but about how God chooses to build families. It is a privileged miracle when God sets the desire to adopt in one’s heart – a privilege not many get to experience.

    To choose parenting is to sign up for the messiness of tears, pain, frustration, screaming (theirs and ours), hanging onto hope for the future when the present doesn’t give much reason for hope, not backing away from but leaning into and embracing every discouragement, expense, injury, and crisis – doing whatever it takes to keep them safe, bring them home. Some kids are wring-your-heart-out messier than others, no matter how they join the family. Sometimes the future an “at risk” adoption is a grown up girl who is a kind, compassionate, responsible, well-adjusted, well-educated adult. Sometimes a “low risk pregnancy” brings life-long special needs to a family. It’s a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get. And I wouldn’t trade any of it for the world, for each path brings its own unique blessings.

    I’m so grateful to God that he answered the prayer of this mother’s longing heart with a beautiful daughter born halfway around the world. And that he graced me the indescribable gift of this privileged miracle called adoption.

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