Choosing to see God's hand

I can honestly say that I know God has been working on me over the last year - in truth, He's been preparing me my entire life for this. But only over the last 12 - 24 months did I start to realize it. Kirsten and I have both wanted to have a family for years. We married and figured we'd wait a while before trying to have kids so we could get to know each other better, grow in our marriage and our faith. When I put it like that it sounds so noble, but the fact is I don't think I could have handled being a father early on in our marriage. Ephesians 2:8-10 - For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith —and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. See, God has a way of putting things in your life for a reason. I've always known that, but knowing something personally provides a different outlook. I'm quite certain that Kirsten was born ready to be a mom, it's been her greatest desire for all of her life and one that God has uniquely prepared her for in advance. Her educational background is in Child & Family Development, when I first met her she was working in the Youth Department at church. Since then she's worked for a youth crisis shelter, been a child-protective social worker and now a nanny. I don't know anyone who loves children more than Kirsten. I on the other hand have never been one to want to hold babies, not because I've felt any awkwardness about holding them the right way or not wanting to deal with them crying - its just been something that I hadn't done. The idea of having kids has always been a part of "my plan" for life, it was a major motivating factor in marrying Kirsten - I chose her as much for what I knew she would be like as a mother as I did for what I knew she would be like as my spouse. I knew she would raise my children the right way, teaching them to love God, others and life. So our picture for what our life as a couple and later as a family has always included children. We have always known that we wanted to have the kind of house that is noisy with little feet running around, trips to different sports activities, vacation bible school and family vacations in the summer. We, despite the fact that as a class of vehicles - we don't really like them, want to be a minivan family. That has always meant at least three if not more. Recently I have become enamored of our good friends Dave & Kasey's son. Ben is a little "fat man" that I've had the pleasure of watching grow and change dramatically over the last 10 months. He's the first child of a close friend that I've actually been able see the awesome differences that each new month brings. I can see the joy and pride that he brings his parents and the love that they have for him. I enjoy every moment I get to spend with Ben. I think part of that is because he's such a fun little guy and another part is because Kirsten and I had started trying to get pregnant around the same time that Dave & Kasey were trying. For those of you who didn't do the quick math, that was about 19 - 22 months ago. So as you can tell, it's been quite a while that we've been trying to get pregnant. It's not easy to come to the conclusion that you're infertile. It's hard enough dealing with the fact that the natural process that takes place for millions of couples all over the world, isn't happening for you. But add the label of infertility and it doesn't feel very good. Then again, if we have the right attitude, we know that God has a reason for this. Is there some anger? Absolutely there was, but not much and definitely not anymore. For some reason, God gave us an insane amount of patience to go through this journey. I've never had to "wait" this long for anything in my life. Shoot, our engagement was only 9 months. I wasn't anxious as a teenager to get my license - I actually put it off until I was 17. So this process of waiting and then disappointment each month really started to get old. Not because I was so anxious to start our family, but because I wanted to give Kirsten the opportunity to have the job title that she most wants - Mom. We have, since the first month we started trying, prayed that God's will would be done in this area of our lives. We've trusted His time table and knew that at the right time He would bless us with children. About 12 months into it we knew that we should visit a doctor and try and get some answers for why we weren't having success. We went which was an experience that officially labeled us as infertile. Infertility is defined as a couple's inability to become pregnant after 1 year of sex without using birth control. We had tests run, Kirsten even had surgery to unblock a fallopian tube. But at the same time that all this was going on, God was working on us in a different way. We started to realize that maybe we weren't going to get pregnant - and maybe that was okay. We started to think about adoption. The clues were all there, part of it was our desire for family, coupled with our lack of success in getting pregnant. Part of it was Kirsten's background in social work. We know firsthand that there are children that need a mommy and a daddy. We started seeing more and more how this thing that we could look at as a curse, might just be a blessing. This thing that for some people becomes the defining issue in their lives, could for us be the open door to a calling on our lives. We know that this is what we're supposed to do. We came to that conclusion some time ago, but kept waiting and trying "one more month". Finally we decided that now was the time to move on this. We told our families what had been going on, and the process that God has taken us through and where we feel He is leading us. So, we've started the adoption process. We've definitely got some ground to cover, but it's happening. This means we'll be parents, our parents will be grandparents, our siblings will become uncles and an aunt. We're not limiting it to just a baby - we've decided that we'd like to adopt a sibling group - that means multiple kids. (Right now we're saying up to 3 max, with the oldest no older than 5 or 6) There's a lot more of this story to tell, but I wanted to get it out there. The truth is I haven't posted much because I knew that this is what I wanted to share next. The cool thing through this is that we're okay - not just okay, excited about the next chapter of our life that is just being written. It's still sad that we've been unsuccessful with pregnancy but, it's a joy to know that we're fulfilling our purpose by starting all this. I'm sure that Kirsten will be writing about this too - when she posts you can read her stuff at gitgan.com/kirsten. We're totally open to talking about this or answering questions. So if you want to know more, let us know. If you think about it - pray for our kids. We're going to adopt out of the child welfare program here in the states. So our kids will have some issues. Even if you've never read Everybody is Normal Until You Get to Know Them - you know that we all come with baggage. We're all marked with the "As Is" label. But our kids will have been taken out of a bad situation and have some needs. Please pray that they'll be learning to heal and that their foster parents are helping them well until they become ours. God only knows if they still might have to go through the worst part before they can get to a point that we can adopt them. I'm sure they are out there already and they need your prayers as much if not more than we do. p.s. - I'll tell more as the process moves along. I'm sure I'll be back to the humorous aspect of this blog in short order as well. Thanks again for reading. Technorati Tags: Adoption, Infertility, Gitgan, Faith, Minivan