a mother

this week i have thought often of zuzu's biological mother. i am sure february 5th did not pass by without her remembering the daughter she left alone in a hallway. i am sure there is still much grief and pain involved. i cannot imagine the depth of her brokenness. we may never know why she chose to abandon her 5 month old daughter. it could have been as selfish as the inconvenience of a child or it could have been as selfless as hope for medical care and a brighter future. we don't know for sure, but i would like to believe the latter. she was left wrapped in a blanket with a small note attached. she was left in a hospital corridor, not an alleyway. and though i cannot fathom abandoning a child, i also cannot fathom being penniless in china with a sick child. with little hope for medical care. with little hope in general.  i cannot fathom having no one to help. no place to turn. my heart breaks for this grieving woman. she may no longer hold her daughter, but she holds the scars and the wounds and the guilt. i would imagine she clutches much of that loss tightly to her chest, even today, two years later.
      oh, how i wish i could tell her about this crazy family of six living in alpharetta georgia -on the other side of the world -waiting for her little girl.  i wish i could tell her how we already love her... we already long for her. how we so desperately want her. i wish i could invite her into the rooms we are readying...the place we are preparing.  should she be a guest at our dinner table, she would hear talk of a little girl for whom we wait.  should she observe bedtime in our home, she would surely hear the prayers of four children asking God's protection and healing for a child we call bella.  oh, how i wish to tell her how on that day of abandonment, her little girl was not abandoned.  how she was not alone.  i would share with her my confidence in a Heavenly Father watching over her even in that hallway...especially in that hallway.  His eye was on the sparrow. His eye is on the sparrow...and i know He watches over bella grace.

Why should I feel discouraged, why should the shadows come,

Why should my heart be lonely, and long for heaven and home,

When Jesus is my portion? My constant friend is He:

His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me;

His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.

I sing because I'm happy,

I sing because I'm free,

For His eye is on the sparrow,

And I know He watches me.

“Let not your heart be troubled,' His tender word I hear,

And resting on His goodness, I lose my doubts and fears;

Though by the path He leadeth, but one step I may see;

His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me;

His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.

Whenever I am tempted, whenever clouds arise,

When songs give place to sighing, when hope within me dies,

I draw the closer to Him, from care He sets me free;

His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me;

His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.