[Originally written in January, 2009.]
It has been just over 3 months since Emmanuel (aka Budgie) left our home. We all continue to grieve and yet we also continue to celebrate the joy this sweet baby-turned-toddler brought to our family while we fostered him for 2 years.
I want to share an example of both Grief and Joy . . .
This past Sunday morning, Peter (6) was sitting in front of the computer as our e-pics were in slideshow mode. I passed by him and sensed something was wrong. I asked him if he was okay. He looked up at me with tears streaming down his cheeks.
“Oh Mommy, I miss Budgie so much.”
I scooped him into my lap and he just sobbed and sobbed (a tenderness he doesn’t often reveal to others). As his mommy, I wanted to take the pain of this Grief from him immediately and completely. I wanted to offer him some word that would magically intervene in his heart.
While I prayed over my son, God showed me that I shouldn’t try to offer him my relief, I needed to offer him Jesus’ comfort.
So we prayed for Jesus to soothe his heart. We prayed for Budgie and his bio-mom. We asked God to protect Budgie and to bring him and his family to salvation. We asked God to give us HIS heart to help us not to feel anger or bitterness.
When we were done praying, Peter lamented that he didn’t get to say good-bye to Emmanuel.
Well, he did, but I realized that he was beginning to forget that last day. So, I reminded Peter that he did get to say good-bye and to kiss him. We reminisced about how Budgie, on that day just before he was taken away, chased Josiah and Peter around the room with his nite-nite (blankie) hitting them and giggling with his distinctly precious laughter. This caused Peter to start giggling and his smile told me he was remembering.
Seconds later, he was crying again.
Simply put, he was deeply missing the boy who had been his brother for two years.
I talked briefly with Peter about how this pain is real and crying can be our signal to draw even nearer to Jesus. I encouraged him to never be afraid to fall at Jesus’ feet for His comforting touch.
In my heart I felt a rising anger toward the case manager (again). Something I’ve battled for many months, even before Budgie left. Thankfully, God directed my thoughts to the following passage of Scripture:
Even the king’s heart is like channels of water in the hands of God. He turns it wherever He wishes. (Proverbs 21:1)
This truth, stacked next to man’s free will (equally true), doesn’t make sense to me. But this is where the gift of faith is important. We either trust our SOVEREIGN God to work all things together for good, or we don’t.
While cuddling Peter, God helped me to understand this: How else can I shepherd and train my children through the pain but that I am allowed to walk the path with them and show them the way? This is the ultimate teaching opportunity which books cannot provide. (Sincerely, this is a Joy beyond description!)
So each believer in Jesus is walking a unique journey of faith and release. Our journey includes the constant uncertainty and frequent sorrow through loss as a foster family. But whatever the circumstance, we are called to seek God’s comfort, not environmental distractions such as television, over eating, drunkenness, or any other excesses the world has to offer.
God comforts each of us in His way when we face the pain and bring it to His feet, thereby training ourselves and others who are in our influence, to seek our loving, sovereign Lord’s comfort instead of attempting to deaden the pain through secular diversions.
As for me and my family, none of what we do in fostering these dear children fits into the square holes that society expects of families. Our Jesus-centered foster family is often viewed as a ROUND PEG in a SQUARE-HOLED society. And yet through the eyes of Jesus, we are His beloved, God-designed family and we get (more JOY) to be His hands and feet. His ways are eternity-focused and so loving that most of our world cannot comprehend the magnitude. Even our regenerate hearts cannot comprehend it to the fullest. But through the gift of faith, we can accept that He has a mighty plan and we can walk through the fear and pain with His comfort.
Jesus offers us a greater blessing, an Eternal Joy, that surpasses a temporal definition.
If you’ve gotten this far in the reading, thank you for taking the time. I am compelled to write these words in order to more thoroughly process all that we experience.
My prayer is that God would choose to use some of these words to encourage you today just as He continues to encourage and strengthen me and my family.
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