New Goings On

So...blogging once every 6 months is okay--right?

We are moving out. We haven't sold our house. We are hoping that when me and the mess-makers are out, it sells. We will live with my sister-in-law for a month and a half. Jason comes home. Then off to Louisiana.

And, oh yeah--we got our referral on Tuesday.



Let me tell you the story: Kids were puking, house was NOT being packed up. I decided to call Holt and find out where we were on the waiting list. Just for a nice distraction. So, I call and find out that we aren't on the list at all. A few months ago, we had discussed putting our case on hold until November. This was to make sure Jason would be able to travel. I asked to be put back on the list, please. I explained that we would likely have more than enough time to travel. Our very wonderful case worker said, "Just to warn you...referrals are coming in really quickly. There actually isn't a list right now." Ok. That's great...I'm thinking a few months is fast.

So I get off the phone and go in my room to pray. Something has been bothering me about our adoption. I knew that we didn't get to choose the sex of the child. And, in complete honesty, I knew that I would love a boy or a girl JUST the same. But I hadn't told God, that for some reason...I wanted another girl. So, I asked. I started praying something like this, "Dear God. I know you already know my heart--but I need to get this off my chest. I want a girl. I don't know if that's bad or not. But, it's true. Holt said referrals should be fast...so I just thought you should know. Amen."


TWO HOURS later Holt called and said, "We have a 7-month old girl for you."

Wow. God, you're quick.

I also think it's highly appropriate that Reagan's referral came so fast. All my deliveries were super speedy. Our first son took 1 hour and 45 minutes. From the first pain, to his first cries.

Even though our lives are more than crazy; ice cream gets put in the fridge, kids have to remind me that it's time to feed them again, and I get confused what each of my children's real names are.

God is good.

So, so good.


p.s.
I'm not kidding about the crazy.

Fort Polk

I've decided I'm not much of blogger. But here's another update:

Dreaming of Italy? Wondering what bike rides along Germany's countryside might look like? Belgium? How about Leesville, Louisiana?

Wait. Back up. You mean New Orleans, right? Maybe Baton Rouge? Nope. Fort Polk. An hour from anywhere. Hot as heck...and not at all what I had in mind.

God, didn't you here me? I said, "OVERSEAS!" You've been on a roll. Jason's degree: check. Desire to adopt: check. Travelling: check. Traveling to Europe: un-check.

I know that I will get over it, and enjoy our first duty station. But, honestly...I need a couple more days to wallow in my self-pity. I've never cooked crayfish before. I wonder if that is a mean stereotype?

Fort Polk. "FORT POLK!" The name doesn't even sound exciting...

On a happier note. God IS good. And, I do have faith that He will bring me through this...just as He always has.


Fort Polk. Jeez.

The difference between slavery and abortion Pt. 2

(Continued from, "The difference between slavery and abortion Pt.1.")

 (These are one of a set of nine wax plaques to show the dissection of the female figure and fetus development. Vienna, Austria. Early 1800's. On display at in the Science portion of the South Kensington Museum in London.)

What confuses me is the difference between the two. I hate slavery. I hate that so many lives have been destroyed or lost by it. I HATE seeing what slavery is doing to African people TODAY (i.e. LRA and other terrorist organizations). Young boys are stolen in the night and taught to be ruthless killers before they have lost all their baby teeth. Young girls are kidnapped and raped to be used until they are so broken and hopeless that they pray for death.

This is our America's past. And, is our world's current horror.

What confuses me is how we can be such a self-consumed society, that we fail to see the sin in destroying our own offspring. When the sperm enters the egg; it instructs cellular division AT ONCE. DNA is complete. We don't tell the baby to form, we don't monitor the development at that stage. It's too intricate. Life is set in motion. Usually, because we have chosen to participate in an activity that sets it in motion. Sometimes the activity is not chosen. Even among many Christian women…the blessing of a life inside them is seen as more of a burden and inconvenience; than a jewel of great price.

We rally for a, "greener" nation. We buy, "Earth Friendly" bags and proudly display them in the grocery store. We recycle. We walk to work. We worry about whether our children will live in a climate so cold they will freeze; or so hot they will be scorched. We contribute funds to help the salmon (at least here in Oregon). We scowl disapprovingly at the person smoking in a proximately that will taint our own children's airways. We grow sad at the thought of forests and wetlands disappearing as the sacrificial virgin for new homes and shopping centers.

We regulate and control ourselves in so many ways regarding our Mother Earth. We are willing to sacrifice and work hard to help her. We are disgusted by people who litter. We talk incessantly about providing a better world for our children…and that it won’t happen unless we work at it today. Yet, what children will even be left to enjoy anything if we keep flushing them down the toilet? It seems like our sexual activities should be consequence free. It is admirable to use restraint and walk to the store—rather than to be lazy and drive. But, NO ONE should tell any of us when or how we can enjoy our bodies.

Even if that enjoyment means that 1, 2, or maybe even 9 months later, a child will need to be burned to death by salt, torn out of the womb by a vacuum so powerful that the baby’s body parts look like they have been put through a blender, or pulled out by a foot, partially delivered…only to be grasped by the back of the neck by the concerned doctor’s hands, and then have his or her brains sucked out of a small hole made by scissors at the base of the neck.

We become awkward when the discussion of abortions comes up. We would never condemn a woman to carry a child she DIDN'T want, to term. We would never assert our values and beliefs onto someone else. We are too afraid to draw lines in the sand. Perhaps because we don't think the pro-life agenda should be a federal mandate. Perhaps were are just too afraid to say anything at all because this conversations that has so many facets.

About one million of our own children are aborted every year.

I can't help but wonder if, a few hundred years from now...when science has allowed us to see even more of the pain the unborn experience. The brain waves that are stopped, the cries that are muffled. If we will look back at our, "Modern America," today and think, "We were such fools! Why didn't we ACT sooner?"

And the grief that accompanies the, "sin," that slavery brought to our nation...will be felt for our unborn children. Sacrificed for convenience, for equality, and because we were too afraid to offend.