The one who calls you is faithful (1 Thess. 5:24)
I’m thinking about gratitude today.
It’s been one year since my home has been closed to foster care.
The five years before that were a tumultuous journey.
Years full of purpose and fire, full of a call that I couldn’t escape.
Years that brought, without a doubt, the most joy and the most heartache my soul has known this far.
Years that brought me my babies and also the hard realization that all the Little Ones are not mine.
This year has been quieter.
As the seasons have changed, I’ve been reminded of the faithfulness of the One who calls.
I want to raise an Ebenezer.
To mark these places.
Give me faith to trust what you say.
That you’re good and your love is great.
We sing these words this morning and my heart flashes back to sleep-deprived hours of singing them on repeat by the crib of a screaming Little One who had known too much chaos, too much transition already.
Tonight that Little One scurries around with a gaggle of other kids, dancing and running wild to Jesus-music.
Tonight as we snuggle he tells me to sing the Jesus-music louder.
So I do.
***
There were days when the waiting was excruciating.
Days when I yelled and pleaded to be done.
The promise is not that this story will end the way I hope,
I wrote on one of those hard days.
But that the Holy Spirit will come in power.
Friends, I watched him do that.
I watched the church show up to love me and my children well.
Walking with me into the halls where despair lost and love won.
Dragging me off the floor when I just couldn’t anymore.
Showing up and doing a thing.
Again. And again.
***
As the air turns crisp again and the twinkle lights shine on the long winter nights,
I remember Little One’s first Christmas.
And the gaping hole in my heart not to be part of that day. That story.
It was one of the darkest seasons of my life.
I know this is not how the story ends.
I wrote, undoubtedly choking on my own words.
I know joy comes.
In a very real way, I know Emmanuel.
Friends, it was not how the story ended.
Joy has come.
Joy is asleep in the other room.
Joy is the unruly tribe that foster care has brought me.
A motley crew we are—diverse in practically every way.
Sharing eyes and stories, bloodlines and passion.
We have walked through dark days together and celebrated wildly on happy ones.
My life is so full.
***
I’m thinking about gratitude today.
Grateful for a quieter year to remember.
To tell the stories.
To raise the standing stones.
Today I can tell you without a doubt that the One who calls you is faithful.