Tonsils!

In between bursting with longing to get more orphans, I get to laugh at some of the stories these current two tell us.

It was spring break so the kids were relaxed at the breakfast table and pushed back their chairs or leaned forward to nibble another carrot stick, while they made their big brother snicker and me shock, aghast.

Today it was James who waxed eloquent. "Did you know that I was in the hospital to have my tonsils out?"

"Tell us about it," I prompted, aware that there could be embellishments, but knowing James, that it would be interesting. "Yes, I was in there for a week just playing around before they ripped them out."

I don't know why they put orphans in the hospital. Sometimes they just do it for 'evaluations,' some of which are psychological testings, and some are legitimate illnesses. Sometimes they just don't know what to do about the antics of a lonely child, who really just desperately longs for a hug and a kind word, or who needs to get away from bullies.

When I was there I got to visit some children from Odessa #4 hospitalized for one reason or another. I will never, ever forget the deep longing in the wide, wistful little eyes searching mine and smiling with such a loneliness, that I had to choke back the tears, and smile instead. I was glad I had some small colored squares of paper in my pocket, which I passed around. They all took their papers as though they were the most treasured objects.

One boy was a young man whose photo our Maggie had chosen with her eyes closed. It was a God ordained day, back in 2003 when a young lady we have come to know and love dearly, came to church. With her she brought a pile of cards with personal information on some kids she'd met while working in Ukraine the year before. Maggie prayed, drew a card as a penpal, and called me later that day.

"Hey, Mom, do you want to adopt a boy from Ukraine?"

"Sure, Dear. Who?" I replied.

Well, it didn't turn out that he was the one we adopted (a heart breaker, but we trusted in God) but, when I walked into that children's hospital, a bunch of kids saw me and went running upstairs, all calling loudly for Maggie's penpal to come down. Finally he came down the stairs slowly, and when he saw me, he crossed the room and walked straight into my arms like he owned me.

Later I was glad that the translator did not interpret my anguished comments. I asked him, "Do you have any family?" He stood tall and said, "I am an orphan." For some reason the statement almost did me in.

Back to the ones we have around our kitchen table....

James continued, "When I heard the doctor was coming for me, I told the other kids to say I was in the restroom. Then I hid under the bed. I held onto the springs, and when they pushed the bed to look under it, I stuck to it.

Finally they found me under there and pulled me out. I ran around the room, but the doctor grabbed me, and dragged me down the hall."

James looked across the kitchen table at me tenderly and reached over to pat my arm. "Oh, mom, I was really yelling," he chuckled, his eyes twinkling.

Now I can understand his initial reservations about sitting in the dentist chair when I took him a year ago!

"I kept kicking and waving my arms like this, when they tried to put me in the doctor's chair. Then they tried to spray something in my throat so it wouldn't hurt, but I made my head go back and forth and up and down like this." He smiled at the thought and at Rob's look of amused awe.

You need to know, this blond-haired, A-B student sitting across from me was one tough little 9 year old when he finally ended up at the orphanage. The years of street life had left him with some compromised health issues. He had a TB positive that covered his arm, one eye was damaged so that now he can only see a gray blur out of it, and the other was crossed. Once in the orphanage he caught hepatitis.

No, he wasn't about to let anybody 'rip' out his tonsils without a fight.

He continued, "They tied my feet and then my arms. Two nurses held my head still, while the doctor went in my mouth with his knife and cut out them out."

....Great story, James. I am very glad you are sitting here with us today, because from everything else I have heard, I know this tale is true.

School Boys

I just got pictures of a little guy (11 years old) now at his new home having come from the same orphange in Ukraine as our boys. It brought back memories of "Look Ma!" and bloody elbows as our two crashed into trees and each other on the driveway 15 months ago, when they first tried bike riding.

An old photo I have of James shows a small, pale boy, definitely not the one who, in those short months has shot up to almost my height. He has grown in many ways, and showing himself to be even-tempered and strong. He is well-liked at school and yesterday ran his first track meet to the cheers of the school.

The other moms and I shivered and huddled under a blanket on the concrete bleachers and yelled for him. Then it was big brother, Rob's turn. He and his good buddies ran in four relays and won bigtime.

We are very fortunate to have our children in this fine Christian school and we all know it. Yesterday I met one of the boys and his dad in Wal-Mart in the sporting good aisle. We just had to say Thank you God for these dear sons, who have a wonderful bond with each other. We think there is a special blessing of some kind upon them.

At the same time as becoming more disciplined and structured, our school continues to have that small school warmth and flexibility that we love so much: being able to come and go, to talk to teachers whenever you want, to know everyone and to care for and pray for each other's families and children, to socialize and drive to games together is something we do not take for granted.

Ski Mississippi

On Rob's bedroom wall hangs a large poster, which was a birthday gift from Maggie. It is a photo of a guy on skis in front of a big cotton combine. It says, SKI MISSISSIPPI. The cotton field is 'white unto harvest' and the skier is having a great time.

Judging by the number of people I meet in stores who are eager to talk about the Lord, it seems God may be weaving that Mississippi cotton into a banner of virtue to wave over this state. Such an exciting time to be alive...and even moreso that our family can be in on the revival!

We had thought it was the time to move North. Yes, we thought. Go back to our grandbabies, our girls, sisters and brothers and parents. It was a warm thought. I could settle back into our Big House in the Little Woods and live a nice, normal, sweet life as a Grandma, making cookies and digging in my garden.

To our way of thinking, it looked like perfect timing. All the signs were there that we should go. All except for one small thing, and James put his finger on it.

About a month ago he looked me in the eye and said, "Mom, did God tell you to go to Michigan?" "Well, not exactly," I replied, squirming. "It just seems like the right time."

If we were going to make our tenth major move, it had to be more than an intellectual reasoning that would take us there. It needed to be a 'move of God.'

The more I prayed about it, the more my stomach churned, until one morning alone in my kitchen, I blurted, "God, each time we've moved you have always given me a sure knowledge in my heart that we are supposed to go. Where is that sure knowing? Give it to me, please!"

Absolutely no peace came. The house was on the market and the sign was out front, but no peace was in my heart. We were not to go. I knew it. Bob asked me to re-register the kids for school next year.

The next day I woke with no appetite, so fasted until afternoon, when up popped a surprise email that said everything had changed. The door was fast shut. We were not going to Michigan.

My, my, faith adventures are certainly not for the languid of heart! But they are by faith, something without which it is impossible to please God, and He always rewards those who diligently seek Him.

So...we will get out our skis and learn how to ski here in the cotton fields of Mississippi, until we hear differently.

WWJD

"Tell where you went today, Mom." said Peter. So I told him part of what we did.

It was down to Amy's yellow house of hope again for another radical Bible study. On the way there Sherry and I talked about how to really Do Something for the folks in Amy's neighborhood. She had brought along a birthday card for one lady who has been knocking on Amy's door a lot lately.

It was her birthday, and Sherry thought she would appreciate a phone card. No point in giving her a Wal-Mart gift card. She has no way of getting to Wal-Mart. She really lives on very little anyway, but needs to mend relations with her kids. Hence the phone card, a gentle hint that she call them.

The card is addressed to her prison name, but Amy says, "Use her real name, not the nick name from jail," because she is believing for a whole new life for Janet.

Amy's family had thrown a birthday party for Janet, who had been amazed and happy with the cake and all. She is still hesitant to trust anyone, even Jesus, because so far everyone who she has ever trusted has stolen from her, beat her up, or worse. Soon, though, she will open up to Jesus and let go of her life in the tiny, filthy room she and her boyfriend share.

She may do so soon, too. Yesterday she was literally kicked down the steps of the building and out onto the road. That is how they treat tenants, who do not pay rent at a house of ill repute.

Now, this life is not what Janet planned. She did not decide one day she would become a dope addict. But now that she is in this deep pit, she will need Jesus to get her out.

Janet is like so many. They cannot break out of the cycle, because to do so, to get a job at Waffle House, they need a Social Security number or driver's licence. If they applied for one they would be arrested for all the crimes they have commited because they have no job at Waffle House. So Janet, like the other women, sell themselves or are sold.

Janet's problem is not a people problem that can be fixed by people solutions. Her issue is a spiritual problem, first and foremost. Any other solutions we offer will ultimately be of no avail to her. Why? Because she firmly believes she has absolutely no value, not 50 cents' worth. To cure that will take lots of prayer, love, and a flash of insight from the Holy Spirit Himself.

Richard told us today how he had one such flash. Richard was a bartender in New Orleans French Quarter for 25 years, and he knows. One day he was driving north on Highway 49, and he heard a Voice in his car. It said, "I am Jesus."

He thought he had had a stroke, but instead, in a flash he was a changed man. No one deserves such kindness. Not the prositute ladies or the lesbians or the the rich church ladies. But Jesus still would have died for our sins anyway. He loved us all that much. None of us is worthy of His dying, but there you are.

A few days after this happened, Richard was feeling so funny and fine that he remarked to a friend, "I feel as though I was born over again.... Oh, my, I have been born again! That's what happened to me! Dear God, now don't make me a Baptist!

Well, God didn't, but Richard has been to India and Malowi telling people there that Jesus is real and He can do everything He says He can do. The ladies in downtown Jackson need to hear that too. We all do.

Richard will tell us more when he comes for supper Saturday. And he says he will bring some of his interesting friends with him. He would love meeting our family and be really happy to answer some of our James never-ending questions.

I have a feeling our lives are going to be shaken up a little Saturday at suppertime.

Praise God. We can all use a bit of shaking.

Little Dima's Back

Meanwhile back in Ukraine, little Dima the lame child who keeps running away is back at the Home for Invalids. He was taken there kicking and screaming, so to speak, because he kept running away from the other orphanage. The reason he ran away from the regular internot is because he overheard someone say they were going to transfer him to the invalid house!

Our dear missionary friend will visit him there this Saturday, and I will tell you what she sees there. She has asked that I pray he is still there when she comes. I also ask for the same prayer, and one beyond that...that some parents would step forward for this little boy.

Taking a child like this sounds scary, but it isn't really. Jesus' yoke is easy and His burden is light. We find great rest in our souls when we quietly and humbly learn from Him how to parent right, no matter who our child is. I am daily amazed at the presence of Jesus touching and affirming me in what I do as a mommy. And I am no way smarter than anyone else.

I know not everyone can take in a child. But it is not a matter of wanting a child or not wanting a child. It is a posture of Welcoming a child and seeing what God may do. Whoever Welcomes these little ones like Dima welcomes Jesus Himself. Whoever takes in an orphan practices true religion, which is defined as helping widows and orphans. The poor are dear to the heart of the Lord Jesus. He takes note and He lends a helping hand in the caring for these precious people. Mother Theresa didn't burn out. She just flowed in the Spirit of the risen Christ.

Why can't we do the same? Yes, there are problems, but as I shared with a couple in Wal-mart today, whose little 4 month old boy was wearing glasses from a forcept injury, "all it does is give God another chance to do more miracles. He says he can, and He says he will." When I said that, the mother's eyes brightened and she smiled. Then they both told how God had already given them one miracle after 17 years of marriage - this little guy.

Yep, God is well...God, and if He really can't do anything about it, maybe He isn't God after all. Or.. maybe we just don't really truly believe in Him.

I just know somewhere there is somebody who would get a huge thrill out of having Dima's arms flung around their neck before bed each night, just like our 12 and 13 year olds still do to me after a year here. It doesn't get any better than this. It would be no different with Dima. I bet you it would be even moreso with a desperate little guy like him.

Yesterday I turned 59. Ten years ago they told Bob and me we were too old to adopt. But ten years later we are just fine. Go figure. With God all kinds of fun miracles are possible.

Morning Drive to School

Our drive to school each day takes us past a sparkling pond with geese, a tiny lake next to a grassy, rolling hills with a white horse barn, owned by some white folks. The boys and I stop now and then to rub their horses' snouts and give them grass.

But also scattered through the countryside are clusters of small homes, the country black families living as they have for years, in their tiny communities. You don't need to drive far down any country road to come upon them. Some of the folks still farm as they always did in the past, eating what they grow or kill.

Each morning we see their black and brown cows standing chewing placidly in the sun as it shines through the trees onto the pastureland next to a house set back from the road. Down a piece is the Missionary Baptist Church and more houses set helter skelter over the hillside and in the woods.

A couple tiny homes look just like the ones in my childhood dreams. Small, white and needing fixing up. The curtains hang lifeless in the windows and the front porch has boards that jut upwards, loose. Sigh, I wish I'd see someone at the window.

A big, slow dog wanders out onto the road as we take the curve. He turns his head my way as if to say, Drive slower! This is my road.

I do slow down and take a big breath, because I think the old Mississippi I am seeing may be fading, and I want to seal its memory.