An Outhouse By Any Other Name...

Oh, boy!  Do I have a story to tell you!!

But first...two disclaimers:

1. I totally have Krystal's permission to share this story with you.
2. This post will likely anger you.  Either you will be enraged by my point of view (sorry 'bout that!) or you will join me in my own outrage.  Nobody leaves this place without singing the blues!  :-)

If we've been together for a while, you already know all about my journey through the desert of infertility.  You know what?  No one really takes you very seriously when you look back on that struggle while, at the same time, there are eight children making all sorts of noise telling each other to be quiet right in the next room.  (Only seven of them are mine, if that makes any difference.)

Truth be told, even I have a hard time taking my story seriously anymore (though, believe me...it seemed pretty serious then!) because I've watched my daughter Krystal fight the infertility wars for more than four years.  Frankly, this is a show I would give just about anything not to have to see.  And while my problem was easily solved once we knew what the problem was, we have known since Krystal was a teenager what her problem is...but that doesn't go far toward fixing it.

She has a condition called Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS), which you can learn more about here.  In short, it is a hormonal disorder that has a long list of possible symptoms...and potential complications.  Including infertility.

Now...I don't want to cause a big flap over the treatment or non-treatment of fertility issues.  I have dear friends who weigh in on both sides of this argument, and you wanna know what?  It's not a hill worth dying on.  No one is going to heaven or hell based upon her position on this.  It simply isn’t a doctrinal issue.

My Mary...then and now.

I saw a doctor when we couldn't figure out why we hadn't been able to get pregnant; I see a doctor when I am pregnant; I take my kids to the doctor when I think they need something more advanced than mommy-care.  

When I felt my foot bone snap, I didn't invite the deacons over to anoint it with oil and then watch to see if the bone healed miraculously.  No…I went to the hospital, and I asked my prayer chain friends to join me in praying for swift healing.  

When we fell under heavy conviction that we had defied God by getting a vasectomy after Jamie was born, we ultimately found a doctor who would repair the damage we had done.  

All this to say...I think doctors are a wonderful blessing from God.  And Krystal and Nick have been seeing a reproductive endocrinologist for a while now because, without pharmaceutical assistance, Krystal just doesn't ovulate.  You need that if you’re going to have a baby!

The tricky part is that the difference between not ovulating at all and ovulating to beat the band is, evidently, a thin, biochemical line.  So Krystal got to the doctor yesterday to discover that she has three ripe follicles...and two more that might be close enough to come out and play.  (That's five, in case you were an English major also.)

After taking attendance, the nurse who was getting Krystal's preliminaries together looked at my daughter and asked, very matter-of-factly, "Would you be willing to selectively reduce?"

Allow me to translate that for you:

"If we are able to help you get pregnant this cycle and you are blessed with more than a couple babies, would you consider KILLING SOME OF THEM?!"

OK...I'm not a complete cave-dweller.  I know this takes place.  I know it happens every day.  But there are just some phrases I never expected to have uttered in reference to my potential grandchildren!

Mind your step there…I don’t want you to trip over my soapbox.  A broken foot hurts!

After the nurse left the room (and after a barrage of incredulous and sarcastic text messages), the doctor came in and canceled Krystal’s cycle.  By this, I mean that the doctor isn’t going to do anything to help them conceive this month…and he went so far as to order her not to attempt this stunt at home (because some eggs are poppin’—doctor or no doctor!).

[As a basis for comparison, last cycle there were three mature follicles…and no pregnancy.  So the odds of ending up with high-order multiples here is pretty small.]

Would the doctor have proceeded with the cycle if Krystal had indicated a willingness to selectively abort?  It seems so.  He did mention that it’s an unpleasant experience to do so.  (I had no idea that the momma is awake and watching the whole thing on ultrasound!  Unbelievably awful!)  But it’s pretty clear that Krystal’s life-affirming answer cost her a lot of wasted time, money, and emotional upheaval this month.

That’s my girl!

Remember Samuel Armas, the 21-weeker who held hands with his surgeon?

Do you remember Bobbi and Kenny McCaughey—the parents of the septuplets born in Iowa in 1997?  This is a couple who was told that they were foolish not to “selectively reduce” the number of babies Bobbi was carrying.  Here’s what I love about this story:  God already knew He was going to bless them.  His plan was that, against all medical odds, all seven of those babies were going to live!  If they had followed the advice of doctors, maybe the three babies selected to live would have been born healthy…or maybe the McCaugheys would have lost all seven.  But God had plans to give them a miracle, and they never would have known it if they had allowed fear or worldly “wisdom” to direct their decision.

What a powerful thing to remember…no matter what we’re tempted to respond to with fear rather than faith!

Bobbi once responded to an interviewer’s question about selective reduction by gesturing around at her children and saying, “Well, come to our house, and tell me which four I shouldn’t have had!”

Thanks to intensive pre-natal care and advanced ultrasound, Bobbi knows exactly which of her children would have been “reduced.” 

Sobering.

Our new granddaughter Sammi Jo, at 13 weeks in the womb...and at 1 week out!

Now I sit here at the end of my post, where I usually try to offer some sort of summation to wrap things up.  Sometimes (and by that, I mean often) I get a little off-track somewhere in mid-blog, so I like to feel that I’ve brought it back around before I leave you confused.  But today, I don’t really know what my fine point is…

In part, this was a rant.  (Thank you for flying with us today!)  I’m so heartbroken and weary of watching month after disappointing month go by with no baby for Krystal that I’m just mad!  I’m angry that a doctor can refuse her the treatment she has paid for because “We’ll trust God to work out the details” doesn’t really line up with the field of reproductive endocrinology. 

Furthermore, I’m irritated that medical personnel think they have the right to take it a step further and try to dictate what happens in the bedroom of grown-up married people.  Excuse me!

I think I also just wanted to be able to publicly point at Krystal and Nick and say, Yes…there you go…here are people who live what they say they believe!  And I’m proud they’re on loan to me!

But at the same time, I’m so sad for all those mommies and daddies (and grandmas!) out there who have chosen to follow medical advice on this one.  Some choose to selectively abort out of ignorance (how?!), and some know exactly what they’re doing.  Some have life-long guilt over the decision, and some claim that they believe they did the right thing.  But all of them have lost something.

I have a dear friend who had her own terrible struggle with infertility, and she and her husband finally reached the step of pursuing in-vitro fertilization.  They are so dead-center about the lives of their children that they provided for their unborn babies in their will!  If something tragic had happened before they were able to implant every last frozen, tiny baby, there was someone who had agreed to carry those babies and give them a chance at life.  Wow!  That's the stuff, right there!

Blessings!

Missy

For You formed my inward parts;

You wove me in my mother’s womb.

I will give thanks to You,

For I am fearfully and wonderfully made…

Your eyes have seen my unformed substance;

And in Your book were all written

The days that were ordained for me,

When as yet there was not one of them.

Psalm 139: 13, 16

Sorry...I just had to have one more grandbaby picture!

For this Child I Prayed (& Sam Makes 10!)

If you are at all familiar with our story, you know that we have ten children.  Yes...ten.  Six I received in the delivery room; two I received at the altar; and two I received at the courthouse.  Honestly, because this is the way the Lord has orchestrated my child-bearing, it's something I really don't think about all that much.  I simply have ten children.

But I think that, in order to really give God the glory, I should take a pause more often and seriously think about this family He has created...and how He has chosen to go about putting it together.

When I wrote about my struggle with infertility, I probably should have mentioned my very earliest thoughts on adoption:  I really saw it as second-best.  I mean...I saw the value and beauty in it for people who had exhausted every possible avenue of having a baby conventionally...but what I wanted more than anything else during those dark, frantic months was to have a baby that would be a little bit Sweet Jimmy B and a little bit me.  If I may be really, ridiculously transparent, I won't even say that I wish I had known then what I know now about how it feels to have adopted children...because I wouldn't have listened anyway.  I was that single-minded in my nearly-idolatrous focus on having a baby.    

And what makes it all particularly irritating is that I should have known better even then!  After all, by the time I was out of my mind with the frustration of not being able to get pregnant in a timely fashion, I was already the proud owner of two daughters acquired, not in the delivery room, but at the altar...and I knew I was crazy about them!

I'll use any excuse to haul out this picture because I LOVE it!  

Here are the three girls with whom we started our adventure...

only many years later!  Aren't they beautiful?!

Sometimes I’m not the smartest person I know.

But with several years (and several children) came (slightly) greater wisdom, and as I mentioned in my post about our first foster-child Mercy, we learned before she was six months old that she was going to be a big sister!

When our social worker Ryan gave us the news and asked if we would be willing to accept the new baby as a placement in our home, we were surprised...but not terribly so.  And really, with as many as nine kids in the house at any given moment--and with four of them being under the age of five--a new baby just didn't seem like a big crisis.  In for a penny...in for a pound!

Every child in our home has a pet name, 

and Sam has been Bub almost from the get-go

I think it is probably a common pattern that parents whose children are taken into foster care usually start strong...they work very hard at the beginning to do whatever it's going to take to get their children back.  But over time, it is very difficult to maintain that level of diligent victory in the battle against a well-established stronghold...and that is the pattern we saw with Mercy's birth-parents.  As time had passed, their supervised visits with her became less and less frequent...then they started missing appointments...then they just sort of fell off the radar entirely.

So, by the time we learned that they were expecting baby #2, it had been a few months since anyone had heard from them.  But they had evidently come to the realization that their only hope of being able to keep their new baby was to return to Lutheran Social Services and ask to try again.

Now, I’m not really a violent person by nature, but during this time, I gave some fairly serious consideration to picking up street-fighting as a new hobby.  It’s good to learn new things, right?  And, frankly, I was made to deal with several people during a pretty short span of time who desperately needed to find themselves on the receiving-end of a little kick-boxing practice.

For starters, I have to confess that Mercy’s biological parents were very, very difficult for me to love when they returned after their lengthy absence.  There I was--almost completely lulled into the confident belief that she would soon be ours to keep--and then they showed up again…acting as if nothing was wrong with their behavior!  Like it's no big deal for parents to go bye-bye about the time their child learns to sit unassisted and then reappear once she has learned to walk!  Sure!  

And to make matters worse, they seemed to think everyone should be ready to embrace the notion that they were living back on the straight and narrow…ready to be wonderful parents to their two children!

I wanted to throw up.  I’m sorry!  But I really did!

Know who else was just begging to be a punching-bag right about then?  The OB staff at the hospital where Baby Sam was born.  You know…the OB staff that had been notified by the Department of Children and Family Services that, upon the birth of this baby, the nurses were to call the DCFS hotline immediately, give the baby a drug test, and NOT send him home with his parents.

Nothing like being 0 for 3!

To make matters crazier, Sam was born during Labor Day weekend…so it wasn’t until Tuesday morning, when Lutheran Social Services’ office opened, that anyone even knew what had happened.

So I received a call from our social worker Ryan, filling us in on what was going on.  (He’s a brave man.)  Talk about a flood of emotions!  We were excited at the prospect of possibly having a new baby in the house by the end of the day…but horrified by a lot of other possibilities.  Chief among them:  What if the kids’ birth-parents had seen their chance and decided to cut their losses (Mercy) and run with the new baby?

That day was a complete blur in a lot of ways.  We started the church prayer chain and called every big sister and grandma we owned.  We prayed feverishly.  I spent a lot of time on the phone with our licensing worker because baby would make seven kids in the house under the age of 18…which meant we had to apply for an expanded foster care license from the state of Illinois.  (This couldn’t be done before there was actually a baby to place into foster care.  Evidently the state of Illinois doesn't understand that a person's a person, no matter how small!)  For hours and hours, no one had any idea how the day’s events would pan out.

Finally, late that afternoon, the phone rang…and Ryan asked me if we were ready for a baby.  He had been found at the home of his parents; he had been checked over by a doctor; and he was on his way.  I think we would probably have to look back to Greek or Hebrew to find the word for the sort of rejoicing that occurred in Stately Bennett Manor that afternoon.

It may seem funny to some people that I perpetually have a running mental list of baby names…but when you’ve played the name game as often as we have, it seems prudent to always have a few names in the holster.  You just never know when you might need one!  And I already had a boy name on-deck.  Ready to go…no doubt about it!

But when Ryan arrived with this tiny new baby boy—a child who may have had as many prayers lifted up for him in one day as any other child of mine received during an entire, prayerful nine-month pregnancy—I took one look at him and knew that, if it turned out to be God’s will that we keep him, his name had to be Samuel instead.  Because for this child I prayed!

Sam and Mercy, within days of his arrival

And let me make it clear right now that our church is a baby-loving bunch of folks!  They will delight over a new baby like you wouldn’t believe!  But I’ve never seen anything like the reception Sam received when we carried him into church the Sunday after he arrived…because they had been praying for him with as much passion as we had!  An entire congregation knew they could claim a share of the joy of this new member of the family.

And don’t you just love it when God lets you see how miraculously He has worked on your behalf?  I think there are some things we won’t find out about until we get to Heaven…but it’s so sweet when we get a glimpse in the here and now…

Remember that expanded license we had to apply for in order for Sam to be placed in our home?  In passing, the licensing worker at Lutheran had mentioned that, if the paperwork couldn’t get pushed through state headquarters that day, the baby might have to be placed in temporary foster care with someone else until the license came through.  At the time, it sounded like nothing to really worry about, and there were so many other things to be concerned about that day that we didn’t waste time stewing over the red tape…we just prayed for it to clear and moved on to other things.

At the end of the day, we learned that the social worker in charge of state licensure had never before had an expanded license go through in one business day.  She had even had cases where grandparents had to see their grandchildren placed into temporary foster care for extended periods of time because of bureaucratic snags.  An entire office of social workers was amazed!

And we got to point toward the power of prayer…and to a God Who loves orphans…and Who delights in exceeding our expectations.

Blessings!

Missy

For this child I prayed, 

and the LORD has granted me my petition 

which I asked of Him. 

Therefore I also have lent him to the LORD; 

as long as he lives 

he shall be lent to the LORD.” 

I Samuel 1:27-28

Don't worry...there was no high voltage involved in the making of this picture.  

Daddy was just having a little post-bathtime fun with Sambo's hairdo!

One False Move...

Before we return to our regularly-scheduled blog posts (poor Sam...bringing up the rear as usual!), I would like to invite you to join me in yet another celebration!  This could become habit-forming!  Did you bring cake?


Perhaps you will recall from my very first post that I have been struggling recently with a little problem.  Maybe this will ring a bell:

Oh, yeah...it's all coming back to you now, isn't it?  Broken foot!  (Not the best move I ever made.)

I've had plenty of time in the last nine weeks to keep a running list of all the things that sort of stink about hobbling around on crutches.  It's a pretty impressive list.  But near the top is having people ask me what I did...and not having a good story to tell them.

Here are a few I tried out just for giggles:  

• Who knew sky-diving could be so much fun?!  Totally worth it!
• Down-hill skiing...you pay your money and you take your chances!
• He needed a good kick in the pants!  What kind of person carries a concrete wallet in his back pocket?!

Some people even offered me good suggestions like "Oh, did you slip on the ice?"  


I wish.

Do you have any idea how humiliating it is to have to look people in the eye and tell them the truth when the truth is that my foot fell asleep while I sat for too long with my legs crossed?  You'd think I would have mastered walking across the kitchen floor by now.  I spend an awful lot of time in there!  I've even had the same kitchen for 6 1/2 years, which is some sort of record for me!  I ought to be able to navigate it with a reliable degree of safety.

Nope.

But nine weeks, one surgery, and many, many muttered complaints later, I finally get to rejoice at a reunion I have been looking forward to with nearly-breathless anticipation:  The reunion of my left shoe to my left foot.

As some would say, it's a terrible picture, but an excellent likeness.  Who cares?!  Big, dumb boot off...shoe on...crutches gone!  Yeee-haw!

Now, to really celebrate this occasion in the manner it deserves, what I should be doing tonight is dancing or roller skating...or down-hill skiing!  (Or how about that cake you promised?)  However, it is a disappointing reality that, well, my foot sort of aches at having been invited to be a load-bearing structure again.  And it's a bit swollen.  And it doesn't quite work right yet.  

Despite the seeming evidence to the contrary, this is not a list of grievances.  Really.  Almost not at all.

In fact, several weeks ago, when struggling with the earliest days of my new sedentary lifestyle, God convicted me that, if I played nice, this could be a time of great spiritual refreshment.  Did I play nice?  Mostly.  Did the Lord have some things to show me while I was more still than usual?  Definitely!

Don't worry...I'm not going to turn this post into a sermon or a master's dissertation.  But He did show me one thing in such vivid color that I can't, in good conscience, NOT share it.

Serving in ministry as we do, we have seen all too often how one false moral move can bring grave and lasting consequences to the lives of God's people.  Over and over again, we have learned of a potentially dangerous sin problem in the life of a brother or sister; and on those occasions when we have had to confront them (which is just what we hope others would do for us if the corrective boot were on the other foot), the results are usually similar.  Every time we try to reach out to a struggling Believer with loving concern, we are met with denial.  They virtually always refuse to admit that there is a problem.

Finally, after months of deception, they usually realize the gravity of the disaster with which they have been flirting...and they turn their backs on that sin.  But unfortunately, all too often, their very private sins still end up becoming very public, and they find themselves reaping the whirlwind.  

So one day, I was going through the ordeal of showering and getting dressed on crutches, wearing a big heavy boot, on a slippery bathroom floor, and one such situation involving a dear friend came to mind...and I suddenly saw the parallel in our situations.

Both of us made a very simple, very foolish mistake.  It was the decision of a single moment in time, really.  And if we could, we would both go back and do it over differently, because that one false move has had painful, lasting

consequences that have ended up affecting those around us as well.

Obviously, my fracture wasn't a sin issue.  (It was more of a stupid issue.)  But it hurt!  And surgery was no picnic!  (Someone please remind me that I just can't do sedation with a nerve block!  Doesn't work for me!  Knock me out!)  


During my tenure on crutches, things around the house (a LOT of things around the house) have fallen apart, despite the fact that my children have had to step up to the plate and do a ton of stuff they aren't really licensed to do.  And my poor husband has had a cripple for a wife.  Plus, I suffered some nerve damage when I twisted my foot, so I'm going to have ongoing problems with sensation and function for...well, maybe a year.  All because I stepped wrong on a foot that was asleep.  (A piece of that cake might help make me feel better right about now!)

The dear friend who came to mind while I was getting dressed that morning has, admittedly, made a bed for herself that she is now finding incredibly uncomfortable to lie in.  Her marriage may never fully recover; her children have been made aware of some of her behavior; her relationships with other family members and friends have been damaged--perhaps beyond repair.  All from one wrong step.

It has been a graphic reminder to me of how important it is to give careful thought to the paths for my feet (Proverbs 4:26).  Just like I didn't get up out of my chair with the intention of twisting my foot and ending up in the emergency room, no one wakes up one morning, pulls out her to-do list, and writes "ruin as many lives as possible with one really foolish choice."

See, I'd like to think that I could never find myself in the spiritual ER...that I love the Lord too much to disobey Him to such a dangerous extent...that I'm smarter than all that.  But 1 Corinthians 10:12 says, "So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!"  No one is immune.  Least of all me.

And so, with a pretty good limp still going, I have faced the truth of my own fallibility.  I have seen the greatest potential enemy of the future God has planned for me...and she looks a lot like me!  So I have reminded myself anew the words of Jeremiah 6:16...

This is what the LORD says:

   “Stand at the crossroads and look; 

   ask for the ancient paths, 

ask where the good way is, and walk in it..."

I think, brought to it's finest point, all I really needed to know about this facet of the Christian life I learned singing songs in Sunday school.  It's about as simple as "Be careful, little feet, where you go."  If I will ask where the good way is, He loves to tell me!  If I go where He leads, He will guide my steps.  If I go my own way, I shouldn't be surprised to find myself hurting.

For the Father up above is looking down with love, so be careful, little feet, where you go!

Blessings!

Missy

The LORD makes firm the steps 
of the one who delights in him; 

though he may stumble, he will not fall, 

   for the LORD upholds him with his hand.

Psalm 27:23-24

I Break for Babies! (Obviously)

Call it an amusing coincidence:  After my last post's lengthy confession of my borderline planning-pathology, I have broken with my plans for this post in order to seize a God-given moment...and invite you to join me in rejoicing!


The morning after I published my post about our daughter Mercy--pointing ahead to our youngest child, Sam--I received a call from our #3 daughter Kayla, who was two days short of her due date.  She had gone for what she hoped would be her final pre-natal appointment before the baby arrived...and, oops!  The midwife accidentally ruptured her membranes!  


I love a happy little accident!  :-)


Now, my children are extraordinary eaves-droppers, so the moment they heard the tone of my voice, they pieced together what that call was about...and before the phone was completely hung up, the whole house erupted into pandemonium!  


I realize I used that same description to illustrate our family's reaction to happy news in my last post, but the truth of the matter is that we're not a people known for our calm restraint...so, it's an accurate picture of our excitement-response more often than not.  


Then, when the initial burst of adrenaline was exhausted...when the squealing and the bouncing had quieted a little...we stood in the living room--all nine of us--and lifted Kayla and Baby Sammi up to the Lord in prayer.  I realize, of course, that God hears us in our isolation just as clearly as He does when we're in a crowd...but sometimes there is just nothing like gathering the herd together to pray for one of our own.  Powerful stuff, that is!


Then we received more great news:  We could help Kayla the most in her war effort by going and picking up our 3-year old granddaughter Jayla.  No problemo!

Here she is at her birthday party two weeks ago.

I mean, really...if you're going to have to wait around for your newest family member to arrive, you might as well at least enjoy a little pleasant distraction!  


Sometimes I feel sort of bad for our grandkids because we still have so many little children at home.  We're totally in parent-mode, so they probably don't get away with quite as much as they would with grandparents who had moved completely into spoil-mode.  


But the flip-side is that coming to visit Grandpappy and Grammy Bennett means having LOTS of other kids to play with!  Everybody's happy...and the old folks don't have to throw their backs out trying to keep everyone entertained.  It's a nice system!


And fortunately for all of us, Kayla is a force to be reckoned with in the delivery room!  So, even though she would probably beg to differ, we didn't have to wait long at all to receive our first look at Samantha Jolynn Damer...Sammi Jo to her friends!

Don't you just love cell phones and picture-messaging?!

Here's what made it extra fun for those of us who couldn't be at the hospital to rejoice in person:  We got to show Jayla that picture!  Precious!

And here's something else that strikes me as an extra blessing from the Giver of all good gifts:  Big sister Jayla was born three years ago on Resurrection Sunday...and Sammi Jo was born during praise team practice!  So there we were--Sweet Jimmy B on guitar, me on my tambourine stool, son-in-law Nick getting his bass ready to go--when that picture came in!  We got to stand in the sanctuary, woo-hoo-ing and enjoying a family hug, surrounded by the rest of the praise band...who managed to restrain themselves for just a second before they joined us in celebration and praise to God for a safe delivery.

I'm so glad I'm a part of the family of God!  Can I get an Amen?!

And then...best of all...this morning we got to take Jayla to meet her new baby sister.  What a joy to be with her when she first held this baby she had been talking about for such a long time!  And as the owner of a sister myself...as the mother of seven sisters...it was almost more than I could hold to know that I stood on the precious ground floor of a brand-new sisterhood.  Too sweet for words!

As we rode the rapids of an unusually exciting 24-hour moment in time and slowly coasted back to the frenetic pace of our normal rhythm of life, I was dumbstruck by all the blessings that had been poured into such a relatively tiny space.   The big stuff is obvious:  a healthy mommy and a healthy baby.  But there was so much other stuff too...and some of it won't mean much to anyone else, maybe, but to me it felt like being sent on a treasure hunt by the One who best knows what blesses my heart.

I got to feel like I was a part of Sammi's arrival because Lyndsay (daughter #2) so faithfully texted me every step of the way until her thumbs were sore.  I got to see my son-in-law Ryan overwhelmed with love for my new granddaughter...and my older granddaughter...and my daughter.  I listened to daughter #1 (Krystal) in her excitement at seeing her new niece, rejoicing with her sister.  I got to hear Jayla, singing a little song about "Sammi Jo...Sammi Jo..." in the back seat of the van. I started my day with the slinging of waffles to seven noisy children and two noisy grandchildren, all gathered around my kitchen table together.  

Then I realized, as I was leaving the hospital with my husband, that I never once, during our whirlwind courtship, thought about being grandparents together one day.  That was silly of me, because this pretty much rocks!

Especially when we pulled out of the parking lot, and he looked at me and asked if we were going to stop for coffee before heading home to the troops.  He asks such silly questions sometimes!  :-)

Blessings!

Missy

Children's children are a crown to the aged...

Proverbs 17:6a

Planning for Mercy (or "Everybody Needs Somebody")

Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails.  (Proverbs 19:21)  


One of these days, I'm going to embrace that truth with both arms and get it right on the first try!  


I look forward to that.    


See, I'm pretty good with planning, if I do say so myself.  For example, there's just not much I enjoy more than plotting out the homeschool year...unless it's planning a trip!  Oh, yeah...that's where I'm a Viking!  I've organized some pretty sweet chore charts in my day too...and sticker-graphs for kids who need to remember to practice their piano lessons or learn how to keep their Pull-Ups dry at night.  


Furthermore, every week I actually sit down and create a menu of what we're going to eat at every meal for the next seven days...and then I make a grocery list of what I need to buy to make that happen.  And if all that wasn't enough proof that I'm the world's biggest geek (or at least Henderson County's most boring neurotic), I might as well tell you the worst:


On my computer, I have documents saved called "Packing List" and "Master Shopping List."  I produced these documents so that I wouldn't have to reinvent the wheel on certain organizational tasks--thereby streamlining my planning processes.


I may be beyond the reach of conventional psychotherapy on this one.


All this to say:  I'm a planner.  And I love it!!  Frankly, in my line of work, it's a good thing.  If you tell one or two children that you don't know what's for dinner, they're not happy; if you tell seven or eight children that there isn't even a dinner idea on the horizon, that's enough for a pretty respectable mutiny.


So I can make a fairly good argument rationalization that this is a gift from God...a proclivity given to me by Him to enable me to perform the tasks He has set before me.  


But boy-howdy...it's a rut that's awfully hard to step out of when I need to step out of the way and let God be God.


May I make a confession right here?  There are many, many times that I look at my sometimes-bossy children (Where do they pick this stuff up?!) and ask them if I can be in charge for a while.  Every time this happens, I swear that, in my mind's ear, I can hear my mother snorting milk out her nose.  And I can feel God's steady, Fatherly gaze upon me.


See, I have Jeremiah 29:11 committed to memory:  "For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."  So how is it that on issues that really matter--on topics of great importance to God--I can be so sure I know the plans He has for me when I never, in fact, consulted Him?


Case in point:  In my last post, I mentioned that our social worker had tried to nudge us toward foster care when we were working on our home-study for an international adoption.  Some of the greatest hits from my foster-care-rejection Top-10 include "How could I ever give a child back to abusive parents?" and "I don't want to have to parent a child by the state's regulations!"  


Probably my biggest seller, though, received a lot of critical acclaim because it sounds so darn altruistic:  "How could we ask our children to welcome siblings into their lives and then let them go again?!"


Oh yeah...I'm good.


Sort of reminds you of my early work, "Everyone is getting vasectomies" and "Pay no attention to that still, small voice SCREAMING IN YOUR HEAD!" doesn't it?  I was afraid of that.


But, as I mentioned at the end of my last post, God's Word had finally started working its way more deeply into my heart.  (I'm sort of a slow learner sometimes.)   James 1:27 doesn't say that God accepts as pure religion the looking-after of orphans in their distress...as long as it doesn't carry with it the potential for any personal inconvenience or discomfort.  


Nope.  It reads: 


Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.


Hmmm...not a lot of wiggle-room there.


However, just because this truth was incubating in my heart didn't mean that Sweet Jimmy B had yet hauled his sea-bag on board.  Funny thing, that.  I have known a lot of women who received a Word from the Lord about something of great importance long before their husbands were convicted...and sometimes they never were.  For the longest time, I wondered why that was.  I still can't say that I know the mind of God on this one, but I do have a theory.  


I think it's so easy for us women to feel like we're right about something and then completely step out from under the ol' submission umbrella and start to nag.  And since we're so sure that God is on our side...that this (whatever it is) is His will for our family...we readily justify our own behavior.  


Our own completely unscriptural behavior.  


You can almost hear the Lord whispering, "You can't convict him...only I can...but how are you going to act in the mean-time?"


Sometimes I actually manage to keep silent.  (Exodus 14:14)  Then I get to watch God work for me...


One day, Jim was visiting with a dear couple from our church who has done official and unofficial foster care for decades:  Harlan and Edith Lain.  In the midst of their conversation, Harlan was talking about the sometimes-painful decision to be foster parents, and he said, "Jim, it's like this...everybody needs somebody."


And that was that.


SJB came home to me, told me about the conversation, and before the dust had completely settled, we were registered for the 27 hours of foster parent training.


Foster parent training is...well...a story all its own.  Whoa.


And just in case I haven't provided ample evidence that I'm a slow study, I entered into that training with a lot of notions about what sorts of placements would be best for our family.  Since we're homeschoolers, I didn't want a foster child who was school-aged because I didn't want to have to fight the education war on two fronts.  Also, I had read somewhere that it really interfered with the dynamics of the family if a foster child was older than any of your existing children.  (Umm...Mary was coming up on 6 months old at the time.)  And because we really knew best, we didn't think we should accept a placement with special physical, mental, emotional, or educational needs because of the extra time burden it would put on our family.


Who did we think was in foster care?!  We sounded like Sally Albright ordering lunch at a deli!


But...in that gentle way He has that is more loving-kind than I deserve, God began to place questions in my heart:


When's the last time you threw down such a long list of restrictions in the delivery room?  Can't you trust Me to know who to bring to the family I have created...under the roof I have provided for you?  Don't you know that I know the plans I have for you...and for a child who needs a family?  Haven't we already covered most of this trust stuff before?


So by the time we had completed nine weekly 3-hour foster-care classes, we had covenanted to embrace whatever child God used Lutheran Social Services of Illinois to entrust to us for a time.


Six weeks later, October 4, 2005, was a plain old school day at Stately Bennett Manor.  Oftentimes, I will ignore phone calls that come in during school time, but that morning the caller ID read "Lutheran Social Services."  And for a moment I thought I was going to need CPR because I'm pretty sure I stopped breathing, my heart stopped beating, and I had a contraction all at the same time!


Would we be willing to take care of a 6-week old baby girl who had tested positive for drug exposure at birth?  Would we?!  Duh!  (Some people ask me silly questions.)


The entire house erupted into pandemonium!  We cleaned...we put together the bassinet...we paused occasionally to giggle like idiots and freak out a little.  After all, we really didn't know for sure what we were getting ourselves into!  This baby had been exposed to a variety of toxins in utero.  Would she scream non-stop?  Have developmental delays?  Physical problems?  Would she be a keeper...or would we have to give her back one day?  We knew she was on an apnea monitor; we knew she had been in family foster care (which didn't work out) since she was 3-days old; we knew nothing else.  But we were finally trusting God for all of it.


When she arrived, she was beautiful!  See?

Mercy, October 4, 2005...at the very hour of her arrival.

And a week or so later, when I took her to get her picture taken, I think she was already starting to look like a Bennett baby!  :-)

Have I ever told you that Mary and Mercy are only seven months and one day apart?  Yeah...that gets people's attention for the five months of the year that they're the same age (yet obviously not twins).  If you're curious, that's my quickest baby turn-around.  Whew!

And you know, that sounds like it really ought to be the set-up for a million parenting horror stories...but it just wasn't.  Mary (whom you may remember as one of my most challenging babies) had just learned to crawl when Mercy arrived, so she was happy as a clam.  Mercy was one of the most contented babies on the planet.  And because Mary was so little when she acquired her baby sister, she never had a lick of sibling rivalry.  As far as these girls remember, they have just always been together!  And they are SUCH peas in a pod!

Here they are at about 2- and 3-years old.

Now, I won't try to make foster parenting seem like something it just isn't.  It wasn't easy to meet (and love) the people who had knowingly exposed this beautiful child to all manner of dangers.  It wasn't a dream-come-true to deal with social worker visits and parent visits and paperwork.  And it is never easy for me to handle the unknown.  But what a blessing it was to follow God into obedience in this!

Mercy's most recent haircut!

And this one she didn't do herself!

And as we adapted to having a second baby in the house, it dawned on me...


Our loving God had gently brought us around to trusting Him completely with whatever child He placed into our family...only to give us our hearts' desire:  a healthy newborn who would ultimately be ours to keep.


Only we didn't know that at the time.


And before she was six months old, we learned that she had a younger sibling in-bound.


Blessings!
Missy

James 4:13-17

Now listen, you who say, 

“Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, 

spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 

Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. 

What is your life? 

You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 

Instead, you ought to say, 

“If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” 

As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. 

All such boasting is evil. 

If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do 

and doesn’t do it, 

it is sin for them.