Lessons in Adoption Part 2
For years, I tried to push back the notion that God wanted us to do more. I kept telling myself that it was fine. I would often think that I was doing enough, or at least I am doing something. But I knew that I was not where God wanted me and my family to be.
In 2007 we completed building our house that we currently live in. At the time, it was Marcia, myself, Mattie, and our newborn Ella. Our home that we just completed was a 4-bedroom home. In our minds, it was perfect. Each child would have their own room, and when family came to visit, they would have their own bedroom. Although not in our plan at the time of construction, I now can see where God was just simply making room not only in our hearts, but in our home for an addition that we had no idea was coming.
When I finally reached the point of submission with God (in 2009), I knew that I was not the only person going to be influenced by this decision of adoption. I knew I had to discuss this with my wife, Marcia. This was not something I could go into waving my sword of submission and expect my wife to just humbly bow her head and say yes. Nor did I want to approach it like that. Marcia and I have always worked as a team. We have always talked things through and made decisions together. For this to work, and not risk tearing our marriage apart, I knew she had to be on board. I must admit that I was very nervous about approaching her with this. The reason being was that in January of 2009, Marcia went to work for herself. She had a lot of pressure and added stress on her. I knew that I was probably asking her to make an even bigger sacrifice than me. So, I prayed about it and asked God to give me the words to say to her and the right attitude about it.
I finally got up the nerve to approach Marcia about adopting. My biggest fear was that she would go along with the idea but deep in her heart be completely overwhelmed. I did not want her to have any fear, sorrow, resentment, or any other negative feelings about taking this huge step. As we talked, I explained to her about my feelings, and how I felt God leading our family in this direction. I asked her not to try and give me an immediate answer. I wanted her to pray and think about it as long as she needed. I told her that once she felt she had peace with adopting or not adopting we could talk again. We decided that I was not going to bring up the topic of adoption again unless it was her prompting the conversation. I wanted her to talk to God and not me. It was critical to me that she be at complete peace about it one way or the other.
Marcia spent several months praying about it. I have to admit, I was getting anxious. In 2010 we made a return trip to Banff, Alberta, Canada for our 10th anniversary. Banff is where we went on our honeymoon. We had a great time. The night of our actual anniversary, we went out to eat to celebrate in Banff. We had a nice dinner and talked about how this trip compared to our first trip. Then at the end of dinner, Marcia told me she had an anniversary gift for me. Of course, I promptly got onto her, as we had already agreed that the trip itself was our anniversary gift to each other. She stopped me and said that it wasn’t that kind of gift. It was at that point, Marcia told me she was at complete peace that God wanted our family to adopt. I can’t explain the amount of relief that I felt to know we were on the same page in regards to adopting. We were both so excited to get back home and start searching for an adoption agency and deciding where we were going to adopt from.