Desires of My Heart

Psalm 37:4 "Take delight in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart."

For years I think I only heard the last part of that verse. A verse that seemed to promise that because I have desired becoming a mom my whole life that it will happen. God wouldn't allow me to have that desire and not fulfill it, right? I feel entitled to motherhood because of the way that verse has been preached to me. I have felt that since I am a Christian and that a pregnancy has been my great desire that God will give it to me, that the desire must have been placed in my heart by Him. Honestly... I just don't know anymore.

I read this verse again a couple years ago and the beginning really stood out to me. This verse is conditional! Many promises God gives are. If we want what He promises we must first do our part. In this verse? In this verse He calls us to first take delight in Him. Just think about that: Finding delight in the Lord. It sounds like a place of peace to me, peace and joy and... Satisfaction! To me taking delight in the Lord would mean realizing that He is all I really need. You take delight in the Lord and then, THEN, He will give you the desires of your heart. What will the desires of your heart be at that point? Good chance they won't be anything selfish. You see I don't think of that verse the same at all anymore. I no longer think it means God will give me what I want. No I think it means if I seek Him first and take delight in His presence and all that... He will give me the DESIRES in my heart. He will point me in the direction He wants me to go by giving me a love for something I may never have even loved before. Selfish desires will fade away as I am filled with selfless desires to please Him.

This foster care journey? Oh my has it been an adventure. And I don't mean just the being a foster mommy part, or their cases being a roller-coaster ride stuck in limbo land wondering where they will go and what will happen to these kids in the end. It has been an insane ride emotionally and spiritually as well. I look back at myself...3?...4?... months ago and I don't like what I see. So so selfish! I didn't know I could think such mean thoughts. Thoughts I am ashamed I ever thought. If you are a Christian and you believe everyone deserves forgiveness... Believe anyone deserves another chance... If you think no one is a lost cause... Become a foster parent. There are so many things we say we believe, things that when we stop and think about it it's how we know we ought to feel or whatever, but how often do we get a chance to put it in action? The woman at the well that Jesus spoke to? Imagine sitting at a bus stop and a woman who is obviously a hooker comes by hanging out next to your little pavilion. What do you do? You definitely don't talk to her. You probably avoid eye contact. Good chance you get up and walk away, you can find another bus stop. You condemn her with your actions without ever having said a word to her. Jesus? If He had a cigarette He'd ask her for a light. He would find some way to engage her in conversation and when she walked away He would encourage her for a better future instead of condemning her for her past. When Jesus told the woman at the well to "go and sin no more" that's exactly what He was doing; encouraging instead of condemning.

You know I used to wish these biological parents would fail? Whatever they were struggling with I didn't wish they would overcome it. Didn't wish them a happy future. Didn't wish them success in their lives. I wished they would fail. I wished they would give in to old temptations. I wished the past to continue to repeat itself over again in their lives. I wished them failure. Just to fail once more so I could keep their kid for myself, after that they can straighten up and have a good life, but not now, not while it means this kid could go back to them. How horrible is that?! How ugly and nasty our flesh can be! Think any of those thoughts were from God? No. No instead He grabbed me by the shoulders, looked me straight in the eye, and said, "I. Love. Them.". And I cried ugly tears because I knew it was true and I didn't want to believe it.

Since that moment I have changed. Have I never thought such things again? I have, but those thoughts have become fewer and further apart. When I told someone a little while back about a parent getting a job, that person told me they won't keep it. And I had renewed hope that the parent would fail. I walked away without comment thinking happily that maybe I still would have a chance to keep this child. I think if that was said to me today I'd have a different reaction to it. Because now? Now I am almost afraid to share the joy I feel in the success of the parents. Why? Because I'm afraid someone will take it away from me. I want to feel this excitement for them. I want to encourage them and not condemn them. And when others wish them ill, when others condemn them, I want it to upset me. I want to be the one to stand up for these parents when no one else will. I want to plant seeds of hope in them when others make them feel hopeless.

You see, my prayer is no longer that we will get to keep this child, though everyone assumes that's what it is and it is their prayer for me. No my prayer is that if we don't, that my excitement will overshadow my grief. That though my heart breaks that it would be overflowing with joy. To see a family reunited should be a blessing! And I should be happy to be a part of that.

I want a child we get to keep. I dearly want that, but that doesn't mean it's this one. And it doesn't mean it's the next one. And really it doesn't mean that it'll be any of them. Maybe that desire is there so we will better help others keep their kids. Maybe we'll get to see many families reunited and because of our encouraging words and actions we will have helped those reunions happen.

It is a confusing world this foster parenting stuff... lol.

Bar Stool vs. Church Pew

This video inspired this post:

I keep going back and forth about how I feel towards the bio-parents of our baby. It is so easy to go along with what everyone else says about them and expect (and sadly hope) that they will fail. And then God knocks me upside the head and reminds me that He loves them. And then I have to reshape my whole thinking again.

I've often thought of the woman at the well. It doesn't mention kids, but there is a good chance that she may have had several. Maybe these kids she didn't have anymore. Or maybe there were many abortions involved... I don't know.. It doesn't mention kids, and it doesn't matter if they were a part of her life or not. But I think Jesus would have treated her the same either way. 

WWJD? I don't know what to say to these bio-parents. I understand since they are a part of my life that it is a good chance to be a witness to them... But I don't know what to say. They are nice enough. They are never mean to me. Small talk is as much as we ever have. 

Yesterday our minister preached on Jesus' love. He mentioned the verse where the woman was caught in adultery, where Jesus told her to "go and sin no more". He said instead of condemning her He encouraged her. I never thought of it that way. It's so simple. Easy? Not necessarily. But it is simple. And it is what He would do. And I think I can work with that. 

I often ask people to pray for these parents, but we also need prayers for our hearts to be where God wants them to be. I'm tired of flip-flopping what I think. I want to give them hope. I want them to know that their child is well cared for and loved, but I don't want them to think we wish them to fail, and I don't want to wish them to fail.

Foster parenting really makes you think more about the bar stool and the church pew. No matter where someone is sitting themselves, it is really hard to find someone who doesn't immediately put these parents on the bar stool. And it breaks my heart for them. Most of the time people will live up to what you expect of them. For sooo many to expect them to fail because of their past... I can't imagine where I would be today if at my darkest times people had done that to me. 

(By the way, I don't think people on bar stools are bad. If we had any bars around here that could be us, lol. I just continued to use that as the metaphor because of the video.)