When God Changes a Dream

Have you ever mourned the loss of a dream? As you stared at the reality of what God was bringing (or not bringing) into your life, have you had to face and accept the truth that the thing you thought you really wanted or needed just wasn't going to be granted? Do you know the feeling?
As I've walked this strange, surreal road of second child infertility, God's done some unexpected, often painful work on my heart. Lately it's been harder, but better. Huh? ok...
Reed and I have taken some steps toward adoption. God has continued to open our hearts and minds to the idea of adoption. The more I've learned about it, the more I regret that I hadn't pursued it before now. But I'll get to that later.
See, my controlling, selfish little heart wanted a soft, perfect, healthy, expected birth of a baby who looked just like his mommy and daddy. One that we would nurture perfectly in it's infancy, keep anything harmful or potentially dangerous away. One that would be ours. One that would not draw any undesired attention to himself (or us). Then we had dinner with some friends who adopted and what they told us scared the pants off of us. We went to bed that night a little shell-shocked. But that's because they're real friends and they were really open which is just what we needed. That's when the dream smashing began.
So I had already given up the "looking like mommy and daddy" part of the dream when the reality of infertility really set in and I began to even allow myself to think of adoption. But that night I realized that the "being ours" part was going to have to be given up as well. Our friends told us that adoptions now were all "open" or at least "semi-open" which means that you know the birthmom and she is a part of the process. They described to us how particularly as Christians, they were faithfully pursuing the birthmom in order to help minister to her and show her Jesus as well as keep that connection there for their child. Whoa. I have to share my baby? Can I even call him/her my baby? But then, God started asking if I thought Evy was MY baby? No, she's not. She belongs to God and He allows me to teach her about Him, raise her and love her, but ultimately I'll answer to Him about how I did with His kiddo. And how is that different from sharing a baby I decide to bless you with through adoption? sigh.
To gain even more insight, Reed and I attended an adoption conference with a ministry called Abba's Heart. It was so good! There were three breakout sessions we attended. The first was just sort of a roadmap of adoption which we kinda already knew from our friends. The second was about trans-racial adoption. Man, that couple was amazing! I'll have to write a whole other post about that... The third one was led by a staff person with the agency we've decided to use. Her name is Cindy Seay with New Life. She was fantastic! She talked very openly and personally about relating to the birthparents. Reed and I both had tears in our eyes. Now that "not drawing any undesired attention" part is being challenged. The more God speaks to me about this next baby of ours, the more I seem to be unable to answer this question: "How can I say no to any child that needs a family?" Because of it's race? Because of it's health? Because of it's ethnicity? sigh. God values the little ones that He so carefully knits together in the womb. And whichever child He chooses for us, how could I say no?
But here's the real point of it all so far for me. The point of all of this that I'm telling you. It's that I'm not just giving up a dream. It's not disappearing into thin air leaving me broken and bitter. It's getting bigger. My heart and my compassion and my view of a Christian's purpose for life are growing dramatically! Even more so my faith. Because, as each Christian adoptive parent has told us thus far, I'm not just "giving up" each piece of this fleshly dream of mine. Though not without pain and tears, I'm giving it to God and trusting Him to take me farther and deeper and wider than I thought my heart could go. Trusting Him to be enough to fulfill every dream. So with each step I am seeing my way to trust Him, to give my all for Him, to tell others what He can do, to allow Him to change me to be more like Him.
And I know that if He can do that for this dream of mine, God can take any of our dreams and do the same. Watch, submit, and see.