The Resources

I am not a reader.........my whole life I have read out of sheer necessity or requirement. However, not only was I now reading adoption books I was also reading three other books that definitely helped me to better understand God's love for me and his plan for my life. I began The Shack about six months earlier and ended up setting it down........timing is important in dealing with your relationship with Christ and I must have gotten ahead of myself. Anyhow, I picked it back up and could not seem to put it down at all. This book has absolutely nothing to do with adoption. What it deals with is a man that although always a Christian did not truly understand the meaning of having a relationship with God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. As it turns out I did not either and reading this book was an instrumental tool in my spiritual growth over the past year.

There is one specific part of The Shack that did speak to me about adoption when reading. At this point remember I still did not know if Russ was willing to move forward. It went like this
"Mack, if anything matters then everything matters. Because you are important, everything you do is important. Every time you forgive, the universe changes; every time you reach out and touch a heart or a life the world changes; with every kindness and service, seen or unseen, my purposes are accomplished and nothing will ever be the same again."

In summary of this resource the book is about this horrible thing called independence that we think we have a right to and the real meaning of life which is relationships and love......at least in my opinion.

The next book I was reading in between starting The Shack and then getting back to it was called Crazy Love. This book is not about adoption either. It is however, about the love that God calls us to......a crazy, restless, all consuming love.

Throughout the past six months I was praying.....hard. I wanted God to tell me if this was his calling or if I was simply hormonal and wanting a baby or to be needed or something insane like that. I would honestly look into the sky and hope that a cloud would spell out "yes" or "no" or "go". I wondered if my scare with possible breast cancer was him trying to re-direct me or spur me on. I would pray that if it were not his will that he would take it off my heart and/or definitely not put it on Russ'................I just didn't think I could move forward without Russ honestly believing and wanting this for our family.

The Shack did so much to educate me about the Trinity and Crazy Love helped me so much to understand what Faith truly is. Here is an excerpt from the book that I have read dozens of times now.

But God doesn't call us to be comfortable. He calls us to trust Him so completely that we are unafraid to put ourselves in situations where we will be in trouble if He doesn't come through. Question answered.

Another section from the book that spoke to me:
I wrote this book because much of our talk doesn't match our lives. We say things like, " I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me," and "Trust in the Lord with all your heart." Then we live and plan like we don't believe God even exists. We try to set our lives up so everythig will be fine even if God doesn't come through. But true faith means holding nothing back. It means putting every hope in God's fidelity to His promises.

The last book I will mention in this post but another that had such an amazing impact on my spiritual walk and my discerning if I was being called to adopt was the book of Esther. I was reading the book of Esther in the Bible and doing the bible study with a group of wonderful ladies from church.

I will point out several times when I truly felt God was speaking to me.

In the bible study workbook in the Intro............Scripture cannot come without effect to the receptive soul. God is up to something profound in your life or you wouldn' be holding this Bible study in your hands. He not only desires to teach you but to transform you.

At one point when I was feeling impatient with Russ and the days and weeks passing by. And guess what the study was on that week...........yes timing. Beth Moore reminds us to Reflect on the importance of knowing
1. When it's time
2. When it's time to wait************yes, this was written for me on the day I read it without Mrs. Moore even knowing it.
3. When it's time to wait for someone else's time ************I am surprised my name wasn't written beside this one
4. When the meantime is God-time

It is about God's time and not my time which is very hard for some one who likes to plan things out!

Last comes more specifically from the Book of Esther. You really need to know the story for this to make any sense but for my history I want to be sure it is here ...Mordecai told them to reply to Esther, "Do not think that in the king's palace you will escape anymore than all the other Jews. For if you keep silence at such a time as this, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another quarter, but you and your father's family will perish.

God will save the orphans whether I adopt one child or not but what would that mean for me and my family?

I strongly recommend all the above reading ............really for anyone trying to grow and figure out their purpose. As I mentioned earlier none of the books have a thing to do with adoption and yet they were the ingredients that lead me through my process of figuring out how I could bless.