Fostering Fear

It’s the final day of Foster Care Awareness Month so I thought I'd share this...

I’m no longer really inclined to try and convince everyone to foster children, or to open their homes up to kids from hard places. There are a variety of reasons families can’t (or sometimes, won’t). Amazing folks are helping serve humanity in all kinds of unique ways. Fostering and adopting are just a couple responses, of course.

I do pray, however, that thousands of more families and individuals feel prompted to consider the almost 450,000 who are in the foster care system in the U.S. It’s an urgent and pressing issue.

I hope people are freed from the bondage of fear that so easily consumes, a bondage I know well... Fear to step out of a comfort zone, fear of the loss of control and ease, fear of all the unknowns.

One of the most life-changing lessons I’ve learned as a foster (and now adoptive) parent is this:

In the trenches of fostering, I started to wonder how much I actually knew about trusting God when I was continually finding myself weighed down by fear. (Not enough space to write ALL the things one can be consumed by, and not the forum to share the details of my children’s difficult stories).

But, through a million ways, big and small, the Lord reminded me that I can hand over my fears to Him. That’s the key to freedom. Day by day. Moment by moment. 
And that process makes you stronger -- The continual handing over of heavy burdens strengthens those muscles and you begin to feel the truth- He’s got you. He really does. His power IS made perfect in our weakness.

This journey has broken down all my illusions of self-sufficiency. 
And in its place I’ve been left totally dependent at the feet of Jesus, asking for his power to work through me on a daily basis. Useless without Him.

Turns out, the Lord isn’t just providing a safe place for these children in our home, but is simultaneously revealing the beautiful and overwhelming reality of His love, provision, and trustworthiness to me as I see it all with entirely new eyes.

Turns out, living at the feet of Jesus, desperate and dependent, is a really good place to live.

So, while I’m not trying to convince anyone to foster, I sure hope some of you experience the amazing privilege.

How My Change of Heart on the Highway Changed Everything

A few years ago I zoomed down the highway, silently fuming at a woman who I felt such bitterness towards because of her treatment of a child I was caring for at the time through foster care. Her poor choices were affecting not only the child, but my own life in some difficult ways, and I was looking for someone to blame.

I had been told by others and readily believed this woman was a “hopeless case”.  She wasn't going to change. She had always been this way and always would be. Her life showed nothing to the contrary. It was riddled with devastation.

Honestly, if I had really thought about it, I was probably glad others considered her a hopeless case. I probably didn’t want her to have a shot at redemption. She had messed up too much.

Nonetheless, I offered a quick, silent prayer to God, but any sense of compassion felt miniscule.

Suddenly, right there on the highway,  I was struck by Jesus’s words from scripture:

“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” (read more here)  

And in the same moment the Parable of the Good Shepherd came to mind.

Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ (more here)

I was taken aback. I had been planning to fume a little longer but all feelings of anger vanished.

So the Doctor exists for the sick. The Good Shepherd goes after the one sheep who is lost.

Jesus is all about the hopeless cases.

It was a moment of clarity in a situation that wasn’t distant but affecting me deeply, daily. God was giving me eyes to see brokenness, and to offer love where I naturally felt hatred. My heart was instantly changed toward that woman. I hurt for her. I saw her as a beloved child of God, lost and alone. I wanted to tell her how much she was loved by her Creator. I so badly wanted her to know her value and worth.

And of course, it only takes a second to recognize we are all the hopeless people. We may have varying degrees of stability and privilege in our lives. Some folks suffer more than others in situations beyond their control. Some make really bad choices.

It’s only by the grace of God that we can be people of Hope. Some of us know this with all our hearts because we have experienced the power of His rescue. And heartbreakingly, some will never know.

As a person of hope, the responsibility is mine to look at what the world calls hopeless cases and pray they will be touched by Hope. Sometimes hope might be offered through an actual relationship and the meeting of needs. In other circumstances, the fruit will only be felt from a distance as my own heart changes, and hopefully theirs.

Living with a transformed mind and heart in Christ gives us the rare opportunity to love supernaturally, in a way that doesn't quite make sense.

Living in a suspended state of anger can be captivity. Releasing it to the Lord, handing over our heavy burdens to him brings freedom.

It means being open to a changed perspective when we only see a dead end.

It is so natural and easy to love my good friends and those who are like me. It’s quite another thing to choose LOVE for my “enemies.” It’s kind of where the rubber meets the road, though. Do my actions reflect my beliefs? Jesus said to love my enemies. These are some powerful and revolutionary words right here when you take a moment to contemplate their implications:

“But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic either. Give to everyone who begs from you, and from one who takes away your goods do not demand them back. And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.”

No matter what our stories or who our lives are connected with, we all experience “enemies” of one kind or another. I talk to my children about this a lot. We talk about how holding on to bitterness and anger only makes us ugly. It’s in releasing those feelings to God and trusting his justice, timing, and provision that we are released from the ugliness, and free to beautifully live without being tied to anger.

I pray this for our family --  that God would continue to give us the eyes and hearts to see people as He sees them. I believe it will change our lives.

---

Don't Reject the Significant for the Sensational

We've added a fourth child to our family since I last wrote in July, hence the reason I haven't written.

Life with four little ones under five is fantastic and challenging and insane and a dream come true. However, I haven't figured out how to "do it all," nor do I intend to. So a good number of things, like writing, move to the back burner while I press in here and focus on the items high on my priority list. 

To have the opportunity to raise our little blend of biological, adopted, and currently fostered children (a true coming-together of several hopes and passions) is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and my commitment to running this stretch of my race well only intensifies with time. 

Of course, I fall short of "well" every day, and occasionally hide in a locked bathroom. My days are far from glamorous. But glamor is for the birds. Give me fortitude and perseverance and patience. 

My husband and I have a mantra: Don't reject the significant for the sensational. 

When days (or nights) are spent on this work that feels tiresome, repetitive, meaningless, and totally unnoticed, there's this unique opportunity to see a gift. There is great value and beauty in the humble and small things in this life. 

And of course, the real truth is that the work of raising tiny humans to grow into kind, brave, compassionate, thoughtful, engaged adults (Lord-willing) is not at all a small thing. It's not menial work below an education level or pay-grade.

As I write, heated times are escalating in our Nation. Yet I believe hate is combated when we each steward well that which is entrusted to us by promoting and exemplifying love. I am committed to dedicating significant effort towards raising children who pursue compassion, look for the needy, sit with the hurting, live generously, and default to seeing others' worth.

And if those lessons begin with my example before them- in the changing of diapers, rocking away tears, listening empathetically to fears, apologizing when I'm wrong, welcoming folks into our home, and serving up yet another meal- then I commit to persevering with constant prayers for strength, finding the joy that is promised in the midst of it all.

I will no doubt look back on this season as an exhausting and rigorous one, yet one so uniquely full of beauty, depth, and growth. I may feel like I daily reach 'empty,' but the Lord is always, always faithful to sustain me, fill me, and strengthen me again.