It was Wednesday and I was baking cupcakes for our daughter's first birthday...and then the phone rang. To my surprise, it was our fostering agency letting us know that Shana had a baby brother, born last Friday, and would we like to take him? This was such a shock to us as we did not even know that Shana's birth mom was pregnant. Kevin and I both had the same first thoughts: What...in...the world...are are we going to do?! This was so out of the blue - this must be what women feel like who go to the hospital because they feel ill and end up giving birth, not having known that they were even pregnant.
We decided that we needed to tell the kids as they help out a lot and this needed to be a whole-family decision. Their reaction was one of pure joy as they jumped around the kitchen asking "when can we get him?!". I must say, we were pretty surprised with their reaction. These are not kids who romanticize what having a baby is like. We have fostered other preemie newborns. They know how tired we get, how fussy the babies can be, and how much extra they need to chip in, but still they were willing. Wow. When I asked them why they wanted to do this they just replied "Mom, we can't let him go to a family who aren't Christians".
Kevin and I still had a lot of hesitations, and needed to pray and talk things out. We dropped the two older ones off at Bible study and the two younger ones off at my brother's house and went for coffee. We prayed together in the van and by the time we got to Second Cup we were both crying and feeling like we knew which way the Lord was pulling us. As we chatted in Second Cup we talked about all of the things we are afraid of, all of our hesitations, and all of the ways this could affect our lives and our other children's lives. But then we talked about Moses. About how he was not expecting to see a burning bush that day. About how he was asked to do something that was beyond himself. About how he had to step out in faith, in spite of his fears and feelings of inadequacy, and about how God used him to do amazing things for the Kingdom of God.
We felt a lot of clarity and decided that there were two obstacles in our way of taking in this little one, but if God could clear those up, we would go for it. Then I told my husband how proud I am of him for being willing to do this, and he said it was a good thing God didn't show us his full plan for us while we were dating or he probably wouldn't have married me! Funny guy.
So today, a little more than 24 hours after finding out about this precious little guy, the two obstacles have been lifted, the shock has diminished and is being replaced with joy and excitement, and we feel a peace far beyond our own understanding. God is good.
Tomorrow we get to go see little Wil and we'll do what we did when we went and visited his "big" sister just barely a year ago in the same NICU: We'll lay hands on him and pray God's healing power over him, that he would grow up to be someone who loves Jesus with his whole being, and that he would fulfill the great plan God has for his life. But first I need to go on Kijiji and find a double stroller and another crib!
God bless! We covet your prayers for our family and our new little boy.
Kevin & Lee-Ann
Carter, Jaelynn, Hunter, Shana & Wil
