time

everything about xue zhu's situation screams, "hurry!" everything. her heart condition. her institutionalization. her age. her distance. her loneliness. our impatience. everything. 


so last week i did what seemed obvious: i began to push the agency on the timing. i asked questions like, "is there no way to move this along?" and "can't her medical needs be reason enough to expedite the adoption?"  they were reasonable questions and we asked them with great hope.   maybe no one had actually thought about going faster.  the answer we received, however, was not one of agreement and hope. we, instead, actually landed with our feet pointing in the opposite direction. it became clear that the timeline we were working from was not the same as the agency. this wasn't about faster, this was about slower.   all along we thought the process would take about 6 months from the time we started pursuing xue zhu in july. in our minds, that was clearly december...maybe january.  this is important considering we were told she needed another surgery before her 2nd birthday (february).  what became clear through all my pushing and questioning, however, was that we had 4-6 months once our dossier was "logged in" in china.  friends, our dossier won't be in china until (maybe) november . four to six months from november? are you kidding me? is this possible? how was this miscommunicated? why? why? why? where is God's perfect timing in that? 


how could we ask these expectant questions only to end up traveling further away from this child. nothing about this makes sense to our desire to rush in and rescue...to make right...to solve...to soothe...to comfort... to control. we found out this information 8 days ago. i haven't been able to write one word about it until now.  somehow even typing it into this silly blog makes it real.  as i type this morning, i can feel the discouragement in my very fingertips. the pounding of each key seems to mock my plan, my way, my wishes. and yet as i write even these words, i can see before me, in black and white, the wrong way my heart is bent. "my plan? my way? my wishes?" all week long it has been a struggle surrendering to the fact that this is not my story. this is HIS story and HE is writing the next chapter.


i can attempt in my emotional and human and very shortsighted ways to believe i know what needs to happen when...i can formulate an outline and i can type up a timeline...but i cannot write the next chapter. this is for Your Glory O Lord. even this little, lonely, abandoned china baby is about Your Glory, Lord. i know that in my head. but my heart asks fearfully, 

"how far must i go to be stripped of myself in this process?  can we not just agree and accept our control issues and sign on a dotted line? can we not just work this out quickly and then head into china with all engines firing? O Jesus, we know time is in Your hands. You, are the Alpha and the Omega.You hold all things and all time in Your hands. You have even promised to 'make all things beautiful' in Your time. why is that so hard to trust?

"but i trust you, O Lord; i say, 'You are my God.' 

my times are in your hands."  ~ psalm 31:14-15

my times are in His hands. xue zhu's time is in His hands. the timing of our adoption is in His hands.  will we, tightlyscheduled-timedriven-clockoriented-impatientpersons-clockwatchers-calendarcontrolledhumans, will we ever really get it? can we get that he holds all time? that our God is not only the Keeper of Time, but the Creator and Author of Time?

"when i was woven together in the depths of the earth,

your eyes saw my unformed body.

all the days ordained for me were

written in your book before one of them came to be."

~ psalm 139:16

yes, His story... told in His time...written in His book.