This week, we found out we were #1 on the waitlist at our adoption agency. This is a HUGE milestone in our adoption journey. One that we didn’t know if we would ever see. As I reflected on the news, I experienced what it’s like to see Jesus’ word hold true – a word he gave me months back – that His word holds true. Seven weeks ago, he asked me to wait before emailing our agency again. So I waited. And every week, I found myself wondering if this would be the week I would sense I could email them or if they would email us.

Through those seven weeks (can you believe it was seven weeks?! The number that symbolizes completeness, perfection & divine holiness.), we prayed about movement, for government officials handling the documents, and specifically for visible movement. Movement that we could see.

In a simple, yet exciting email, we were told that two referrals had been matched to two families and that those families were taking their next steps in their adoption journey. They also invited other families to reach out to schedule meetings with them to discuss our individual cases. 

When I received the email, I had just finished painting and was going to move on to my next daily task. Upon walking to get my phone, I noticed the email and immediately had to step outside for some fresh air. All my emotions and feelings were coming to the surface, and I just needed to get out. I read the email and couldn’t believe what this might mean for us. We were number three on the waitlist after a family made the difficult decision to withdraw from the program. I didn’t want to get my hopes up, as your number on the waitlist only means so much. If a referral comes through that doesn’t meet your requirements, they will match that child with the family that best meets that child’s criteria. Because of this, I didn’t want to assume we would automatically be number one.

So, after seven weeks, I emailed the agency. Even better than that, once I emailed, I got a follow-up call to the email they had sent directly after receiving mine. Our country admin called to schedule our meeting with them. She also wanted to let us know that we were now #1 on their waitlist! If you are considering adoption, please, please, please find an amazing agency that will stand with you and for you. Our country admin was choked up and told me that if she kept talking about how there was finally not just movement but monumental movement, she would start crying again. She informed me that the staff was just overcome with emotion about this recent movement.

I really appreciated their authenticity and their candor. It truly shows how much they care about the waiting families in the program, as well as the orphans and the country we are adopting from. It’s truly a breath of fresh air to be with an agency that works for you, with you, and for the betterment of the countries they work with.

When I got off the phone call with our country admin, it felt surreal. I started calling and texting everyone with the news. Throughout those seven weeks of discipline and obedience to not email our agency, I would go to God and ask again, “Is it time? Can I email?” But what I didn’t expect was that I would be sent an email and that email would be an answered prayer.

Seven weeks ago, without knowing it, I chose to walk at Jesus’ pace. I stopped trying to control all the information and knowledge I was taking in and figuratively gaze at Jesus. When my gaze wandered to a dry desolate place, I would confess, and turn my gaze back to Jesus. He led me through the last seven weeks and He has led us as a family through the last four years. I was so overcome with emotion because not only did He answer our specific prayer, but He also was faithful in His word. I chose to accept His invitation to not email the agency. I knew that it wasn’t giving me assurance emailing them every two weeks, but I needed a dopamine rush of control to keep me going.

About three weeks into the seven week stint of discipline to hold fast to God’s invitation, He taught me that walking at His pace is much better than running at a hare’s pace. I sat with the tortoise and the hare analogy for a month, praying and listening and learning. What I didn’t realize in the mix of walking with the tortoise (Jesus), was that when I accept the invitation from God, He will be faithful. He will be faithful when my faith waivers. He will be faithful to bring me to the next part of the journey. And through it all He never left me. He never let me be alone. He never gave up on me. When something would come up, a fear, a doubt, or a question, He unburdened me, absorbed whatever false belief I was walking in and gave me back my true identity in Him.

When God gave me that vision of me as the hare, I was running fast but going nowhere soon. I even, as the hare in my competiveness, looked over at the tortoise and had a prideful attitude that I was better than Him, that I was beating Him. But that’s what living in a false identity does. It causes you to compete, and be prideful. And the devil loves that. He loves when our gaze drifts just a little so that He has a chance to root down in us a lie that will surely grow if we don’t catch it fast enough.

As I sat down to reflect on the news of being #1 on the waitlist, I started to journal. But the only thing that came to mind was the old hymn “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing.” In that hymn it says “Here I raise my Ebenezer, Here by Thy great help I’ve come.” I couldn’t get the song out of my head. So I decided to take that as a cue and go and paint an Ebenezer. In 1 Samuel, Samuel built a stone monument to commemorate God’s help in winning a battle against the Philistines. Ebenezer is Hebrew and means “stone of help or stone of remembrance.” But the Israelites did this as well to commemorate and remember God’s faithfulness in the wilderness. When the Israelites crossed the Jordan river on dry ground, Joshua ordered 12 men, one from each tribe to take a stone from the dry riverbed and carry it with them to Gilgal to make a memorial there. But they also were ordered to create a memorial in the middle of the riverbed as a memorial for the miraculous crossing.

A stone of remembrance serves as a physical reminder of God’s power and faithfulness. As I painted these rocks over a few days, I got to remind myself of all God has done in the process. This one is going to be framed. It’s such a good reminder to remember what God has done. As a human with a fickle mind, I so quickly forget that God has not left me. He didn’t bring me this far to peace out now.

So, here I raise my Ebenezer, only by God’s great help are we here today. #1 on the waitlist. My trust deeper and more rooted. Walking with Him, at a tortoise pace. Because He knows when we need to get there and more than likely we will learn something of great value on the way.

Read More LoDown

A Lesson From Creation: The Tortoise and The Hare

Waiting for an Adoption is a Wilderness

The Season That Looks Empty: How Dormancy Shapes Who We Become