In India my team and I partnered with an orphanage for children and young adults with special needs. And oh my goodness, my heart exploded for the entire time we were there. We played, led VBS and bible studies, painted murals, took videos and loved on the kids, volunteers and staff.
The Lord taught me a few things and stretched me in a few ways.
1. I will adopt
I love the idea of having a big family, and I’ve always been open to the idea of adopting and fostering. Throughout my time in India, the Lord spoke into my future family and made it clear that adopting and fostering is a part of His plan for me and my family. He has led my prayers from “Lord, if it’s your will…” to praying for my children and our ability to love them unconditionally, for their parents to come to know the Lord and find His grace and love, guidance in the legal process, for the social work field to be flooded with passionate and equipped individuals, and for the American Church to be empowered and mobilized to open their hearts and homes, despite all the fears and reasons why not to do it.
2. Loving without possession
Knowing that the Lord has called me to adopt, and then being in an environment surrounded with adoptable children that so desperately want a mom and dad, my heart was exploding. I had to let the Lord show me how to love the kids without thinking about them being mine. To love them as Christ would, not just because they were cute and I wanted to take them home. That was hard. And I’m still working on it, I think it’s a lesson I needed to learn that goes beyond orphans and adoption, but the root of it is loving selflessly without having a heart of ‘what could this person do for me.’
3. Loving is seeing
They did not need us there. Truly. The kids, staff, anyone. But it was such a joy to be there purely to love them. Being able to sit and play with a child and give them all my attention was such a gift for each of us.
4. There is a time to plan and a time to pray
India has wifi. Good wifi. And with that I spent time with Andrew dreaming with the Lord about our future, wedding, and marriage. It was great, incredible even. But there was a point where the Lord called me out and challenged me to stop planning for three months, and only pray into it. Praying into our wedding to make it as God glorifying as we can, praying into marriage and our ministry as a couple. And heck, that was hard, but it has been so good.
5. Joy in surrender
India started a season of surrender that I still find myself in, I wrote a little about it in my last blog, The Cost. And through it all the Lord has been teaching me that there is joy in surrender.
In a book called All In, the author says “Going all in and all out for the All in All is both a death sentence and a life sentence. Your sinful nature, along with its selfish desires, is nailed to the cross. Then, and only then, does your true personality, your true potential and your true purpose come. After all, God cannot resurrect what has not died. And that’s why so many people are half alive. They haven’t died to self yet.”
