Confession: I fell in love when I was 19.
Sure, we stopped seeing each other, but it never really went away.
I was living in Ramona, California volunteering at a camp for 5 weeks running a joint snack-bar-and-gift-shop. The man who was there to preach for the 5 week session had his family with him, his gorgeous wife and their 3 sons. The middle son is the one who stole my heart.
He always made me laugh, his emotions were always genuine, he would just sit and hold my hand or walk up to me just to hug me, and he always smiled when he saw me, lit up when I walked in a room, and I loved it.
He had my heart.
His name is Zac, he was 8 years old at the time, and he has down syndrome.
That was the summer that God gave me the strangest desire I could imagine having: I wanted a downs baby.
I thought about it often, I made it known. I just couldn’t comprehend how much patience God would teach me through having a child with down syndrome.
Children with downs are all happy or all sad, there isn’t an in between. They don’t fake emotion, they tell you exactly what they want as well as they can communicate it; and you cannot “react” to a person with downs. By that I mean your response has to be a response, not a reaction. Like anyone else, downs children will sometimes do things that are frustrating and painful. You have to respond in love, though, always.
I wanted to be pushed that way, I wanted to love more than I thought I was capable of.
I remember talking to Zac’s mom about it and she told me about a day that she’d had in college when she realized she could maybe handle raising a child with a disability, and then God gave her one. As she was speaking, I was thinking, “I’m having those same thoughts…is God gonna give me a child with a disability?” I had never considered that I could hear from the Lord, I didn’t talk to God and expect Him to talk back, but there was a peace present that made me confident that one day I’d have a downs baby.
When we walked into the orphanage the first day, she was there. My precious little promise was given to me for Christmas!
I picked her up, she wrapped her arms and legs around me, and we stayed that way for what feels like the entire month. If I'm being completely honest, she’s kind of a brat. Her hobbies include occasionally biting and hitting other kids, stealing their food, showing up in places she knows she shouldn’t be and smirking when she gets caught, peeing on the roof, peeing in the courtyard, etc…but she’s my promise.
When I pick her up, she throws her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist like she’s trying to permanently attach herself to me, and then giggles in my ear. When I put her down, if I don’t immediately distract her and then slip away, she just sits and silent tears roll down her cheeks. When I hold her and I tell her that Jesus loves her, she feels loved, and I know it.
It's weird how God works sometimes. He gives us the desires of our hearts, but first we give Him our hearts to be moulded – so He gave me a desire to love on children with downs long before I even heard about The World Race; but He gave me that desire so that when I got here, I'd be able to give the girl who He'd promised to me the love she needed for Christmas. I needed her, and she needed me.
A few weeks after we arrived, the unbelievable happened: I got ANOTHER Christmas gift, a baby girl who also had downs.
When she first arrived, it seemed like she only slept when she was being held – so I did just that. I held her.
and held her.
and held her.
and I truly think if Jesus had been at Sarah's Covenant Home this month, He would've done the same thing.
So, I didn’t stand on the street and preach the Gospel in India. I didn’t walk into villages and cast out demons, or lead worship or share a testimony or teach at a church service. I didn’t help to begin any kind of service program that will help to stabilize an economy or feed the masses. I didn’t build a shelter for the homeless.
I took naps with a baby girl with down syndrome, and cuddled and blew bubbles and shared my lunches with an 8 year who also has down syndrome, and it gave me a Christmas more blessed than I could've imagined.
*Photos by Scott Milam and Bri Danese*
