A Chevron Blanket for Baby B

You know that moment as a wife when you are like, "Managing a household? I got this"? That moment when you feel confident to cook, clean, pay bills, calculate next month's budget, tend the flowers out front, and work a full-time and part-time job, all at the same time?

Yeah, me neither. (I did put pants on today and Brian served two piping hot grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner, so I'm definitely getting closer. Plus it helps I already killed the flowers last summer. I digress.)

BUT in one shining "proud wife" moment this month (outside the putting on of real pants, of course), I learned how to crochet and finished my first project!

By 'learned" I mean I found a pattern I liked that included the words "Beginner" and "Easy", and then I You-Tubed (that's a verb, right?) each stitch until I was able to fumble through the first row, then the second, and so on. Regardless, I'm pretty darn proud of the end project: a baby blanket for my dear friend, expecting her first little boy this summer.

I used THIS pattern from Southern Daisy, which I found to be both achievable enough to catch my attention and challenging enough to keep it. This coming from my vast wealth of experience from my previous zero projects, of course.

Too afraid to test my narrow limits, I decided to follow the pattern exactly. I used a 5mm crochet hook and Yarn Bee worsted weight (that's #4 medium) yarn. I chose Sky Blue, Fog, and White -- I told you I followed the pattern exactly, didn't I? -- and started with the blue to chain 142 stitches. From there I just continued with the pattern, alternating between three rows of blue and three rows of gray, separated each time by one row of white.

The blog's author stated her baby blanket was 34" x 45". Mine was somewhere in the vicinity of 25.5" x 35". Same number of stitches, same amount of yarn. My only guess is that my stitches were significantly tighter than hers. There's probably a crochet term for that. Maybe I'll YouTube it later.

For all of you as impatient as I am, this blanket moves fast. Of course, I took up this hobby because my doctor gave me an ultimatum to find a channel for the stress of working 60-hour night-shift work weeks before I had a heart attack. This blanket might just be an indication of how freaking hard stressful my last two weeks at work have been, but I finished this blanket in 14 days flat.

Despite its imperfections and losing a few inches all the way around, I love this blanket and I am soooo excited to give it to Baby B and his adorable parents! Now if only he would get here already so I can hold him. :)

Remembering Gideon

Written last night, 1/12/15. Brian captures our emotions better than me. Check out his post HERE.

Our hearts are so heavy tonight. This afternoon we received a heartbreaking email from Jessica, our social worker with Love Without Boundaries, the organization that has given us the opportunity to sponsor "our" Gideon. Typically she sends us our very favorite emails of the month, full of pictures, updates on our sponsorship, and a list of the developmental milestones our sweet boy is knocking out of the park. But today, Jessica's email was of a much different sort, the sort that made both Brian and I melt into tears and hold each other tightly in some small hope that it might keep our hearts from shattering into a million pieces (no such luck). 

Today we lost our sweet, precious Gideon.

Jessica said it was a respiratory infection and that both she and Gid's foster family were crushed by the news this morning. She reminded us once again how precious and sweet Gideon was, assuring us that he will never be forgotten by those who worked with him. I am so thankful for how personal and patient Jessica has been with Brian and me, sharing stories about Gideon and answering all our questions about a little boy we had never met on the other side of the world. She painted the picture of Gideon for us, telling us about his special relationship with his foster mama, detailing the amazing progress he was making, and always giving us a laugh with at least one picture of Gid surrounded by five or six or ten boxes of cereal (Brian and I have never figured out this funny monthly tradition other than to assume Love Without Boundaries wants their sponsors to see where their funds are going, especially since Gideon was part of the nutrition program). 

Gideon and his cereal. 

I wish I had something insightful or uplifting to say, some Bible verse that captures the hope we know we have in Jesus, some wisdom to impart on the few readers of my blog. I wish I could process and pray and blog about exactly what God is doing in all of this. But I can't. Maybe it's because I'm exhausted at 4:30 in the morning. Maybe it's because I really don't know what God is doing. All I know is that my heart is raw, our hearts are raw, and what we really want in the whole wide world is to have our Giddy back. 

I know this all sounds ridiculous really. We are mourning over a child we have never seen, never held, never met. We are grieving for a little boy who lived on the other side of the world and who never even knew our names, much less the relatively tiny sacrifice we were making monthly to sponsor his foster care. We had a few pictures, a few emails, a framed photo on our mantle, but nothing tangibly more. How do you grieve something, someone, that was never yours? How do you mourn a life you never saw lived out? How do you weep for feet that never learned how to walk, hands that were never ours to hold? How do you make sense of our world here when our heart aches, our hearts break over a tiny little boy who had defied all odds and lived up to his name "Mighty Warrior"?

Gideon shortly after being found by LWB staff. He was only 2 pounds! 

Yesterday morning as I drove home from work in Louisville (approximately 3 hours pre-Jessica-email), I talked with God, out loud, in the car. I prayed for a few different things -- strength to make it through my fifth night of work in a row, our friends having a baby, our families -- but mostly I prayed for one thing: That God would create in Brian and me one mission, one passion, one purpose. That He would wake us up to any complacency in our lives. That He would break our hearts for what breaks His. 

Three hours later, with one short but sorrow-filled email, we learned that God's heart breaks for Gideon. And so do ours. To say God got our attention today would be a massive understatement. Three hours, guys. Three hours between the prayer and the answer. Please don't miss the significance of this.

You see, our mourning, our grieving, it's not just about Gideon. It's about the thousands, the hundreds of thousands, of orphans around the world who don't have a family, who don't have someone who loves them, who don't even have basic food and water. It's about the kids who have hands that will never be held, hearts that will never be fulfilled, ears that will never hear those three blessed words: I love you. We are grieving for those kids too. How can we justify a "fluffy" budget when, for $40 a month, we can fund foster care for more kiddos in need? How can we spend our days watching Netflix and playing iPhone games when orphans all around the world have no one taking the time to speak out for them? How can we plan our future, dream about our house, talk about our careers without even the slightest consideration that countless children around the world would love nothing more than to be able to call someone Mommy and Daddy? 

We get questions literally every week about why our hearts bleed for adoption: Why would you want to adopt when you don't even know if you can have your own kids yet? Did you say thirty-five THOUSAND dollars? Aren't you curious about what your biological children would look like? Don't you believe God will give you children despite your suspected infertility and will work out everything according to his purpose?

Here is the simplest way I can answer the questions, to describe the longing in our hearts: This is God's purpose. This is God's purpose for us. You want to know why we want to adopt? 

This is why. 

Today is why. 

Gideon is why. 

Gideon stole our hearts with one picture. This one picture. 

From the first moment we saw him we just knew he was something special, that he was a part of our lives no matter how small or how far away. I can only liken it to falling in love, to that deep sense you had when you knew your spouse was the one, without a doubt, you were meant to marry. It's a wholeness, a feeling in the deepest part of your heart that all is right with the world. That's what we felt with Gideon. With Gideon, life was a little brighter, a little more full of joy. We knew from the very beginning that Gideon would never be part of our literal family; that was never the point anyway. No, our prayer night after night was that Gideon would find a family who loved him and loved Jesus even more than we did. Even knowing he wasn't ours to keep, Gideon, through his tiny life and his big smile, unknowingly prepared us for our future adoption and our future family. He taught us how to love, how to fall in love with just one picture, one smile, one whisper from God saying "That's the one." Gideon was the one. He wasn't our "one" but he was "our" precious little boy to pray for and love for a season. A much too short season, but a very, very blessed one.

We are grateful for Jessica, Little Flower Projects, Love Without Boundaries, and Gideon's precious foster parents because, despite his short life, Gideon was so loved. So loved. He had been prayed for by us, our families, his sponsors around the country. He had been talked about, bragged about, and smiled over with hundreds of friends and coworkers who saw how much we adored him. Giddy stole our hearts, our souls, our dreams. And from Jessica's email updates, he clearly stole China's heart too. We will never forget our Gid, our precious, precious Gideon. 

We love you, sweet boy, and we rest in the joy that we will see you again one day.

If you would like to sponsor a child in honor of Gideon, please visit:

 https://www.lovewithoutboundaries.com/programs/foster-care/sponsor-a-child/

Lessons from the First Year: Embracing the Imperfect Wife

I think when I was still single I imagined that married life would be just like Cinderella. You know, the scene where she awakes joyful and energetic, the birds on her windowsill soaring in at just the right moment to help her dress and finish her chores by 10 a.m. as she sings happily along. I imagined waking up to long chats over coffee with Brian, a house that cleaned itself, and the ability to make delicious dinners with the skill and passion of a full-fledged Betty Crocker.

Of course, all of these thoughts were subconscious. I didn't really expect being a wife to come quite that easily (and since I'm scared of birds, I decided early on to nix those); but I certainly expected I would embrace my role as a wife with gracefulness and perfection. Somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, I fully believed I would walk down the aisle a single girl -- barely able to use a toaster -- and skip joyfully back up the aisle a married woman who could cook multi-course dinners for a house full of guests, keep my house perfectly ready for the Southern Living photography team who would inevitably knock on our door and beg us to let them feature our home, be the kind of lover worthy of Song of Solomon, and simultaneously support our family so Brian could go to grad school without the pressure of an outside job.

When I woke up very sick the first morning we were married, sans singing birds, I should have taken the hint. But instead I started laughing, jokingly blaming Brian for what was clearly an anecdotal experience God was giving him to use one day as he counseled soon-to-be married couples in his practice. As the honeymoon drew to a close and we returned to normal life, however, I realized that life was still, well, normal. Brian still hated mornings, so long chats over coffee turned into him staring blankly across the table with sleepy eyes after I forced him out of bed. Any spare room that might have held guests was currently occupied by hundreds of wedding gifts and half-packed boxes awaiting our upcoming move (Southern Living definitely quit seeking us out, but Hoarders did seem interested for a while). And the only reason we might have had multi-course dinners was because I couldn't even plan the Hamburger Helper and the pre-packaged garlic bread to finish cooking at the same time.

I began to think I should have asked for the birds after all. I also began to think that the Psalm 31 wife clearly never slept. Ever.

Now, a year later, I wish I could say I have become a perfect wife, but I am still far from it. There are still so many days when I wake up and I realize I have absolutely no idea how to be a wife at all. There are still so many days when I seek to derive my worth (or lack thereof) from my successes or failures as a wife, as a lover, as a friend.

But if there is one thing Brian and I learned in our first year of marriage it's this: be filled with grace. On the days when our marriage reveals all of our imperfections, God is still perfect. On the days when I believe I'm a terrible wife, God reminds me I am still His precious child. On the days I tell Brian he deserves better, he disagrees and tells me he would still choose me all over again, that he will choose me every day for the rest of his life. On the days when we flood our kitchen because we don't know how to hook up a washing machine, something about the awful situation still strikes us as funny and we decide there is no better time to go swimming indoors.

That's grace. That's God's grace. And as He has taught us over and over again during our first year of marriage, His grace absolutely must be the foundation of our marriage:

Grace for my husband.
Grace from my husband.
And as often as I discount it, grace for myself.

By God's grace, I did learn a lot about being a wife during our first year of marriage: that the only difference between all Hamburger Helper flavors is the name on the box, that Brian's way of making the bed by putting the pillows under the comforter looks like we're hiding dead bodies, that sucking up spiders with the vacuum cleaner only makes them crawl back out even angrier, that pretty much any disagreement can be solved between the sheets (sorry parents, now we can go back to pretending your kids don't do that).

But despite the usefulness of those lessons, perhaps the most important one I learned is what it means to forgive myself, to embrace becoming something I had always dreaded becoming -- an imperfect wife. And as I've allowed myself to be filled with God's grace, including for myself, I've only seen His grace increase all the more.

May the second year of our marriage see even more grace than our first.

Why Adoption?

It’s a question Brian and I have heard over and over again, phrased in as many different ways as people can think to ask us, but up until now the two of us have never really given a complete answer to anyone. It’s not that we didn’t want to; it’s because we have never, with just the two of us, sat down to discuss fully all of the reasons why we love adoption. However, with our Etsy store opening later this week to raise money for our future kiddo, Brian and I knew it was time to sit down and reveal our heart for adoption to the world (or to the 17 people who read our average blog post). As you hear our story, we have tried to highlight a few of the biggest questions people have asked us over the past few months. Please keep asking us questions. Questions help us grow, help us to define what we believe and why we believe it. We love questions. And we love you. Here we go.

“So why adoption?”

First and foremost, adoption is close to our hearts because it’s close to God’s heart. James 1:27 says, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” And Psalm 68:6 says, “God places the lonely in families; he sets the prisoners free and gives them joy.” God doesn’t call all of us to adopt, but He does call us all to do something. Looking after orphans and widows isn’t an option; it’s a command to action. Maybe for you it means sponsoring another family’s adoption. Maybe it means inviting foster kids into your home. Maybe it means mentoring a kid in an after-school program who doesn’t have both a mother and a father. Or maybe it means simply and consistently tithing to a church who actively supports the cause of orphans.

For Brian and I, however, James 1:27 means literally opening up our home and our hearts to a little kiddo who needs a forever family. It means calling a child who was neither born of us nor looks like us completely our own. It means adopting a precious child because God first adopted us into His family. It’s not everyone’s calling, but it’s our calling.

Adoption isn’t something Brian and I have decided to pursue on a whim. For me, I have always — literally back to my earliest memory of my future family — wanted to adopt internationally. It was never a question in my mind, never something to debate. I think God knows I have a pretty hard time making decisions, so it was like He made this one for me. Brian, on the other hand, had never consciously made the decision to adopt before God brought us together, but there has not been one time in our entire relationship where he has hesitated or questioned the desire that has grown in his heart for adoption. In fact, I told Brian in the earliest weeks of our relationship that adoption was one of my deepest desires and we could not get married if he was not open to God leading us in that direction. When he was completely and irrevocably open to the idea of adoption, I knew God was only confirming the desire He had placed on my heart years and years before.

This next paragraph (or two) is going to be difficult for me to write knowing it will be made public to our friends and family — and probably even more difficult for you, as our friends and family, to swallow. In some ways it’s painful and in some ways it’s beautiful. In either case, Brian and I know deep down in our hearts that God will make a way for whatever He wants for the two of us and our family, even though we don’t understand fully what that means yet.

Let’s just say that my body has never functioned particularly well in its specifically-female role. During my first week of college, after over a year without a period, the practitioner at the student clinic decided to put me on birth control to “fix the problem,” stating that a year was just too long and I needed to have a period again quickly to prevent infertility and osteoporosis. So that’s what I did. Fast forward a few years to my first visit with a “real” OB-GYN not too long before Brian and I were married. True to the student health practitioner’s plans, my body had functioned “normally” with medication, but when my new OB-GYN took me off of the medication temporarily, my body just stopped doing what it was supposed to do. The doctor said that if I wanted to start birth control again before the honeymoon (we did), we unfortunately did not have time to run proper tests to find the root of the issue before the wedding. However, he said gently, should we ever want to try to have children in the future, I should expect to have difficulty conceiving or carrying a baby. He told me I didn’t have any of the symptoms that would indicate one of the more common infertility-causing disorders, but only extensive tests later would reveal whether or not we would ever be able to have children. He asked to pray over Brian and me, our honeymoon, and whatever the future for our family would be, and I let him. It was a beautiful prayer.

I almost wish I could say I grieved the doctor’s news, but honestly I always kind of knew my body would never carry a baby. Or at least I thought I knew (think I know?). But one thing I actually did know was that I had to tell Brian — before the wedding. For all of you skeptics out there, this is going to sound absurd, unbelievable even. And as I sat Brian down and began talking to him about what I had learned at the doctor’s office, I would have agreed with you. Nervously, knowing I would sound crazy, I began to tell Brian not just what the doctor had told me about the likelihood of me having trouble conceiving, but also that I have always — and I mean always — had this feeling that I wouldn’t be able to have children. Not now, not ever. Instead of being shocked or disappointed as I expected, however, Brian just looked at me with this funny look on his face and said, “Well that’s weird.” I guess my face showed that I thought he was talking about me, because he quickly laughed and said, “No, no, it’s just that part of me has always had this feeling that we would never have our own kids. Like we couldn’t have our own kids even if we tried.”  After two years of dating, there were very few things Brian and I hadn’t told each other. This was one of those very few things and was clearly part of God’s perfect timing. I had given Brian an out should he decide having his own children was a crucial part of marriage for him, but true to my loving husband’s heart, he assured me he would love me and marry me no matter what our future family looked like. (I told him I hoped the front of our Christmas card one day was him and me and our 2.5 Asian kids. He told me not to get too set on anything because God might have different plans. We both agreed to wait and see. But for the record, that’s still how I envision our Christmas card. Except one day we will actually have to decide between 2 kids and 3 kids. No halves in this family.)

Maybe those feelings in both of us, those gut instincts, are just feelings Brian and I have led ourselves to believe. Maybe they mean nothing at all, and maybe the doctor is wrong and we will conceive the first time we try. But what if God has simply been preparing us to adopt all along? What if He is saving us from the grief and the agony and the shattered hope so many of our friends and family have had to endure during their own unexpected struggles with infertility?

Or what if those feelings are wrong and we could conceive if we wanted but we don’t have any desire to have our own children? Is that wrong? Honestly, I can’t answer that question yet. The question of choosing to adopt is one I haven’t found an answer for. My heart wants to believe that if God wants us to adopt and we could put our energy and our money towards caring for children who are already lonely in this world, there can be no wrong in that. But I once had someone tell me (unsolicited) that it would be sinful for me not to use my fertility if I had it, and that guy’s words echo in my mind sometimes. I wonder if our testimony would somehow be tainted if we chose to adopt instead of adopting out of an experience of infertility.

“Will you at least try to have your own kids?”

I don’t know. We don’t know. I don’t want anyone to think it’s out of the realm of discussion or even of possibility. God works miracles — whether that’s in my body, for obvious reasons, or in my heart to make me want to carry a child around in my abdomen for 9 months. :) I have definitely caught “baby fever” lately, which makes me want to hold every child in a two-mile area at any given time. But I also definitely don’t want children of any sort right now, Asian, biological, whatever. I already killed the plant Nana gave us for Easter less than a week ago, so nurturing helpless creatures isn’t exactly my strong point at the moment.

“Why Asia?”

That’s another hard question. The simple answer is because that’s what we’ve always envisioned; those are the kids we’ve always gravitated towards. The complex answer is because that’s the culture that would best fit into the unique features and strengths of our extended family. So for now, we are consistently praying over China, South Korea, and Taiwan. Most of the decision will depend on how adoption falls into our plans for grad school and the bigger picture of life. In any case, we have to be 27 to 30 years old to adopt, depending on the country, so don’t wait on the edge of your seats to see what will happen next (though I already am…).

Which is why, for now, we have decided to sponsor Gideon, paying for his foster care in China for the next year or so until he finds his forever family. Goodness, we absolutely adore this kid. As part of the sponsorship, we will get monthly updates and pictures of little Gid’s progress. And I’m sure, as those updates and pictures come in, our love will only grow for the handsome little man who has stolen our hearts.

As this post grows longer and longer, let’s conclude here by going back to the original question: 

“So why adopt?”

Because my heart bleeds for little Gideon. Because I can’t make it through one day without having to stop and pray in the middle of my errands because my soul is so heavy with longing I feel like I can’t breathe. Because I have asked Brian every night for the past week if he thinks I will ever be able to love a baby as much as I love Gid. Because I have to follow up my question to Brian with another question, asking him if I’m crazy because I would do anything for a little guy I’ve never met and who only takes up six pictures in my entire iPhoto library. Because if I shut my eyes really tightly and focus hard enough I can almost imagine what it’s like to hold him, to touch him, to feel his tiny heart beat, to tell him how much I treasure him, to tell him that he’s mine. Because in moments I have all to myself, I dream about the day I get to carry our own little “Gideon” across the security line of the Louisville International Airport to be greeted by our friends and family who will love that little girl or little boy more than that kiddo ever thought they could be loved.

And that, my friends, is why we choose adoption.

The First Ten Days of Marriage

“How is married life?” I’ve had countless people ask me this same question over the past ten days, and as much as I love answering it, I feel like my answer is always somewhat inadequate. Our daily activities are simple enough – thank you card writing, learning to cook, going to work – but I am often at a loss as to how to sum up everything I am experiencing and feeling and learning. I have learned more in ten days of marriage than I learned in the first two and half years of dating and being engaged to Brian.  What I am about to say is by no means a complete list, or even a tiny glimpse at the intensity of the contentment, joy, and encouragement I have held in my heart since May 18. But alas, here is my first shot at describing this crazy and incredible thing called marriage.

Ten Things I Learned in the First Ten Days of Marriage

(One from each day, starting with our wedding day.)

1. I have learned that you will remember approximately four vivid memories from your wedding day because the entire day is such a blur of the greatest joy, encouragement, and blessing you have ever known.  (Thank goodness for videography.) Also, if you go to O’Charley’s in a wedding dress, they will give you free pie.
2. I have learned that waking up next to your best friend is the greatest feeling in the whole world. Even when you wake up with a cold on your honeymoon.
3. I have learned that sex is a learned skill that you don’t have to (and won’t) master in the first week. Also, it’s okay to have more sleep than sex on the honeymoon.
4. I have learned that the late night laughs, unexpected tears, and asking for forgiveness can bring a closeness even romance can’t bring.
5. I have learned that you will feel a touch of sadness on the way home from the honeymoon – your wedding day is gone forever and the guests are likely already back to their normal lives. It’s okay. Cry, smile through the tears, and then realize that so far your marriage has been more beautiful even than your wedding day.
6. I have learned that Hamburger Helper absolutely counts as cooking.
7. I have learned to let go of the things I can’t change – our living room might look like Hoarders with all of the wedding gifts, but I can survive the next three weeks.
8. I have learned that God is gracious and faithful even when I mess up, and I have to show (and be shown) that same love.
9. I have learned that the world’s expectations for me aren’t real – and that’s okay. For the first time in my life, I can look in the mirror and see what Brian and Jesus see when they look at me.
10. I have learned that living life with my best friend is more full and joyful than I ever imagined. Marriage might be a lot of work at times, but I firmly believe it’s the best glimpse of heaven we have on this earth.

For the first time in my life, I am beginning to understand what Christ meant when He said, “Whoever loses his life will find it.” I stood before Brian eleven days ago now and promised him before God that I would lay down my life for him because of what Christ did for me, and it was in that moment that I began to see who I am and what my life is in Christ. That, dear friend, is more incredible than our wildest imaginations, and makes me so excited to see what God has in store for Brian and me.

The Lies of Vera Wang

Last weekend, Brian and I decided to head to Bed, Bath, and Beyond to start our wedding registry. We were led upstairs to an office, where we were handed a binder filled with pictures of the various assortment of dinnerware the store offered. There were no prices, just pictures and their descriptions, and we were told we needed eight place settings of whatever set we chose.

I flipped through the pages for a moment and settled on a set I liked. I turned the book around to show the nice lady and to ask the price, and the nice lady said, “Oh, those are $88.”

“$88 for a set of 8? That’s not bad!” I replied.

“Oh no.” I think the lady was trying not to laugh. “$88 per place setting. Those are Vera Wang.”

The look on my face must have been incredulous, because the lady quickly added, “I know that sounds like a lot of money, but you’re getting married! You deserve it! It’s the one time to get anything you want for free.”

And so began our registry. We spent the next two hours being followed around, pressed to scan (literally) the most expensive item in each category, and pressured to meet a “scan quota” at every stop.  When we politely tried to argue that we already had a perfectly good food processor, six cookie sheets, and a quality used set of mixing bowls, our objections were met with a smile and, “But this is your chance to get the best cookie sheets. You’re getting married – you deserve this!” The best suitcase? You deserve it! The best toaster oven? You deserve it! The best pots and pans? You deserve it!

We left the store, me nearly fuming and Brian feeling nauseous. As we looked over the $3,000 worth of items we had scanned, we failed to find more than one or two that were even reasonably priced – and we needed about half of what was on the list. I just shook my head as I reported to Brian that our dishes and the $9 cloth napkins the lady had added of her own accord would alone cost over $600. Six hundred dollars.

We cancelled the registry.

Two days later, God called us to sponsor two precious little boys. Meet Abishek and Akshay.

And suddenly, it all made sense. The reason why the registry made us sick and angry was because it was a waste.  It was extravagant. Most of the items were unnecessary. And we realized with a heavy heart that it was all a lie.

We don’t deserve anything.

God gives us joy and material possessions, not because we deserve it, but because He is good. God is incredible. And you know what? He does deserve something. God deserves our praise and our giving, which He asks us to share with others.

Abishek and Akshay deserve our giving, deserve our sacrifice, because God has asked us to share with them.  Brian and I want to give as much as we can because we want these little boys to know Jesus. We want them to know that God gives us grace only because He loves us, not because we deserve it.

Don’t you worry, we will still have a registry – just at Target rather than a specialty store. We will still have some things that we want more than we need. And I will still add my KitchenAid mixer because one day I will be out of nursing school and will actually have time to bake.

But most of the items on our registry won’t be the most expensive or the absolute best you can buy. We came to this decision not because of frugality, but because Brian and I don’t want to build our marriage on “stuff” (Did you know that money and stuff is the number one reason why couples get a divorce? Irony.). God tells us that marriage is about serving Him better together than we could alone, that marriage is a chance to see the most complete image of Him we can experience here on this earth. He says, “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house.  Test me in this, says the Lord Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.” - Malachi 3:10

Brian and I want to build our marriage on God’s image of marriage, not man’s image of getting all the free stuff that you want. We want to honor God together. And we are starting by sharing Jesus’ love with two precious little boys.

And one day, if we get one, maybe God will even let me feed the homeless with my KitchenAid mixer. 

"I Ain't Never Been Loved Before"

Seven pairs of eyes stared at me and my clinical partner as we stood up in front of the group discussing impulse control. After a few people had filled in the "Impulse, Trigger, Feeling or Human Need, and Healthy Alternative" chart we had on the board, a soft silence filled the room as everyone had time to think of more examples. My clinical instructor finally broke the silence.

"So, [name], why do you think you act on all of these impulses you have? Why do you do all of these '-ing' things? Why are you spend-ing, us-ing, drink-ing? What is the feeling or need in your life that drives all of these things?"

The man, a bigger African American man who looked more intimidating than he sounded, thought a minute before he started speaking. He rambled for a few seconds, thinking of excuses and feelings, until finally, mid-sentence, he paused and said,

"I do all of these things, because...I've never been loved before."

The silence once again permeated the little storage room with its table and whiteboard, and all ten of us in the room looked around at each other. I could feel my heart sink, a knot rise up in my throat, and suddenly I understood as a second man -- a tiny man whose first wish after he left the homeless shelter was to afford a set of teeth - echoed the first man's thoughts,

"I ain't never been loved before neither."

My heart broke for these guys I had already grown to love from the first week leading group. They have taught me so much about what it means to be human and to need, truly need, for someone to simply notice them.

Every one of these guys is part of the "Dual Diagnosis" program at a Lexington homeless shelter, meaning that all of them 1) are homeless, 2) abuse drugs or alcohol, and 3) struggle with at least one mental illness. From their rugged exterior, that's all they have in common. But inside, they have something deeper in common, something that we all share: they just need to be loved.

It's amazing to me, in a very disheartening way, that the world can pass these guys off as some stereotype of the indispensable -- "Well, they are just going to spend the money I give them on drugs, so it's better for me to just keep on walking and ignore that they even exist." The world sees them as everything undesirable, a burden to society and a reason for indifference.

But the truth is we all have our junk. We all have our mistakes and our bad habits, and we just need to praise God that our mistakes and our bad habits haven't landed us at a homeless shelter with absolutely nothing left -- no family, no friends, no house, no job, no hope. The one word that came up last week and is common to all of these men is "hopeless." Even the word "hope" seems laughable to many of them, and yet, it's the only hope they have left and they cling to it, cling to it. When asked how many had ever thought about killing themselves, five of the seven raised their hands. When asked how many had actually tried to kill themselves in the past, only one lowered their hand. When asked how many currently had thoughts of killing themselves, only one more dropped their hand. That left three men with their hands raised. That left three men who desperately need Jesus more than anything else in the entire world. All of them do, really, we all do; but for these three men, Jesus is vital.

I tell you this to remind you of something that God has been reminding me: we don't have time to be indifferent. People are living and people are dying without Jesus. If you think this life is about you-- about getting good grades or going to grad school or finding the best paying job or keeping up with the Jones' -- you are dangerously mistaken. If you think you'll just serve God later, when you can more fully focus on Him, let me just remind you that Satan isn't waiting around. He wants nothing better than for you to sit on the couch waiting for God "to make His will clear to you." People spend their lives on that couch, thinking that God has to reveal some epiphany to them before they can be effective for His Kingdom. They use this "waiting for God" as an excuse for inaction, when in reality, God is waiting for them!

In fact, God has already revealed His purpose for you, and for each and every one of us! Check out 2 Corinthians 5:18-19. "All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself through Christ, not counting people's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation." This is the ministry for all of us: to share with others that God wants to bring every single one of them close to Himself through Christ! He wants us to spread hope.

Within the Church, we have a "ministry" for everything -- the "children's ministry," the "adult ministry," the "homebound ministry," the "homeless ministry," the "disabilities ministry." I am not picking at these names, because the teams need names and those are as good names as any. I am, however, saying that all too often, we think we have to be a part of a labeled "ministry" or else we are ineffectively serving the Kingdom. But God says it's simpler than that! Every single moment of every single day is assigned to us for the ministry of reconciliation, of spreading God's love with every single person we meet. We can call it the "reconciliation ministry" if you would prefer, but whatever it's called, that is your purpose.

That was your purpose yesterday, that is your purpose today, and that will be your purpose for every new moment you receive from God. Please don't miss out on that.

My precious homeless guys depend on it.