Today's the Big Day

Today is a big day for us! We get licensed for foster parenting. Since we are willing to take emergency placements, we could seriously have a baby by the end of the week! It's great how God worked in Matt's heart to bring him to this point. As I mentioned previously, he was pretty dead set on only adopting a "true" orphan. After that initial meeting with CPS, we learned that to do straight adoption would take a long time and we probably wouldn't get a child younger than 2. It was at that point that we decided we would go with the middle ground and do foster care with the intent of adoption. Matt and I saw the extreme need for kids to be in a loving, safe environment. We really felt like that was something we could provide, even if for a short time. There is a chance with foster-to-adopt that a family member will turn up or the parents could get their parental rights restored.
I had this great conversation last March with Matt's youth pastor from high school about us wanting to do foster care. His wife was a social worker for several years before she had kids, so he has an understanding of the system. We were talking about that attitude of, "I just don't think I could handle loving a baby for a while and then give them back." He put into words what I was feeling, but hadn't been able to express to Matt. He said that instead of focusing on our loss and how it affects us, we should be thankful that that child was exposed for any length of time to our love and most importantly to God's love. And people ask us all the time how we are going to handle having babies come and go. That's just not the heart I want to have about it. That's making it about me and what I want. Ultimately, that child is in God's hands and his plans are so much better than mine. I may think that living with us is what is best for a child, but God may KNOW otherwise.
Anyway, I digress from Matt's heart journey. Before we started taking our training classes, we had decided that foster-to-adopt was the direction we were going. Then throughout the classes, we were told story after story about kids who just needed a safe home, even for a short while. So, by the end of our training, Matt was saying, "Let's do regular foster care. If any of those babies come up for adoption, we'll adopt. Until then, we will love every child that comes through this door for every second they are here." It goes beyond that too, as we continue to love and pray for children that move on, even if we never see them again. We know it will be hard. We know our hearts will break. But it's so worth it to be living out what the gospel of Jesus has called us to do!