Can I just tell you how brave you are? You are amazing. You have been courageous to see injustice and then to initiate compassion. You have left the side lines and been willing to go into uncomfortable spaces to offer tenderness, affection, and love.
You have been compassionate, and compassion is always courageous.
Can I remind you how empowered you have been by God’s Spirit to go into the world and care for His children? You have not chosen an easy road, you have chosen a path of great resistance. You have felt it….battle fatigue, but kept pressing on anyway. You have the heart of a lion.
If I’m honest though, many times adoption has made me feel less than that. It’s made me feel very weak and ill equipped. The paperwork shuffle, nail biting, the waiting process that adoption is, has revealed many sins lurking inside this heart of mine. Even more than that, parenting in general and the the unique parenting that happens when these dear children come into our home has revealed some big cracks in my character. When life is smooth, I feel like I have things pretty well under control. When I get under fire, well….. I guess that’s why fire is refining, all of the dross becomes obvious as it floats to the top.
On those weak days, I need reminded about this mission of ours. Us, me and you, we have been brave. We made the courageous choice to act on compassion when we jumped head first in this adoption river. In reality though, we have to make that same brave choice each morning. Life is hard, adoption is hard. It is an act of grace, totally on God’s part, and we can’t expect to get through it well without a large infusion of His grace in our lives.
Colossians 3:12 tells us that God desires His people to clothe themselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. How can I ever show this kind of character in the day to day when parenting often has me begging for mercy? Yelling at my kids is easy, flying off the handle because I’ve had enough is easy, keeping these Godly qualities in my heart and on my lips….that’s hard. It takes courage. It takes courage because the only way that it truly happens is when I’m brave enough to take an honest look at myself. I have to understand what Christ has done for me: my great need, He shed His blood, and brought me in. He says, YOU KNOW what it is like to be broken, YOU KNOW what it is like to need grace, so now, have compassion on one another. When I was Jesus’ enemy and He hung on a cross for my sin, He chose compassion. He chose to speak a blessing over me….He had courage.
May you continue to be filled with the strength to keep making the decision to act in compassion. May His mercies meet you fresh every morning with an extra portion of His grace so you can pass on the miracle of courageous compassion that he has given to us.
