Last year, in China, we celebrated with Will and for the first time in his 14 years...
he had a birthday cake.
He wasn't quite sure what it all meant but this year...
This year, he understood the cake and the candles and the singing and... the gifts...
especially the gifts...
*grin*
So, we invited a few very special friends over and we celebrated Will.
There is no way we can make up for the last 14 years of our son's life but with the help of the One who knows Will's past, present and future, we can help him to learn and grow and trust in a forever kind of love.
So as we wish Will a Happy 15th Birthday and a Happy One Year Home Day, here are just a few things that we have learned about our son.
Will loves to laugh and as his grasp of English has grown, so has his sense of humor!
Will learned to navigate our home very quickly and loves to help. He helps to feed the dogs, unload the dishwasher and take out the trash.
Will loves our pets and just like every other kiddo (and adult) in this house, takes great comfort from their presence.
Will may be 15 but he thinks playgrounds are totally "lit" (my daughters are "gringing" as they read this - haha) and has mastered the monkey bars!
Will has inspired many friendships at school with his ability to overcome and have joy in the midst of it all and has been enveloped with so much warmth and compassion.
Will never dreamed he would be able to go to high school...
Will tolerates soccer...
but loves Karate and my treadmill.
Will has an amazing ability to hear and replicate pieces of music and according to his Band teacher, has a very finely tuned ear. He is now playing the trumpet and will audition for the All County Jr. Band in the next few weeks!
Will worries about me and how much I am eating - I am a vegetarian and he is so not!
Will loves to swim and go to the beach but showers are debatable!
Will quickly learned the joys of JuJu's house and exactly where the candy basket is stashed!
Will loves to play the WII and has learned how to set it all up, find the game he wants and play.
Will yearns to be independent, works hard to learn where things are and how to accomplish tasks but resists the cane.
Will loves to cook - and eat!
Will is learning Braille rapidly and loves to read his sentences to me like, "My room is not messy. The girls room is so messy!" Truth! We laughed and laughed!
Will is also learning English so well that the translator hardly ever makes an appearance these days. His latest favorite expression...
"Girls, chill out!"
Yeah buddy, I feel your pain!
*grin*
Will loves SPICY food and I do mean SPICY!
And despite the lack and the neglect and the harshness he has experienced, Will has a kind and compassionate heart and we pray that he is beginning to understand the truth behind the feelings and what it all means.
How could we have known...
If we had known would we have resisted the incredulous plan laid out before us?
Would we have rejected the hard, the uncomfortable, the trials?
Twenty three years ago as we committed ourselves to one another, we were blissfully unaware of what awaited us.
While I had my suspicions that I would be living the "Tool Time" life with Tim (more power) Taylor and my three sons...
I was oblivious to all that the Lord had for us.
How could we have known that after three rowdy boys, the Lord would bless us with a baby girl?
How could we have known that as we lived our lives of blissful ignorance, there were four other precious ones who waited for us?
How could we have known their suffering and their lack? You think you know but you don't, not really, not until you have lived out the consequences of their suffering and their lack and the deeply embedded scars that exhaust you both.
How could we have known how their journeys would change ours?
Twenty three years ago we could have never envisioned this life He had for us. It is so contrary to what the world grooms us to be.
We could not have known but the Lord did and as He gently drew us near, our hearts and our plans began to to look less and less like they did as we stood before the alter of our selves. As He revealed, He equipped and as He equipped, He transformed our lives.
No, twenty three years ago we could not have known that we would have 8 children, that we would travel to China 3 times, that we would leave a part of our hearts there and that at the ages of 55 and 50, we would bring home our 14 year old, visually impaired son whose complete trust in us manifests how we are to trust God, even though we cannot see and cannot always understand.
Happy 15th Birthday Will.
We are so thankful that you are now a beloved son and a brother and a grandson and a nephew and a cousin. Thank you Lord for opening our eyes and our hearts.
What if we had ignored that still small voice telling us to go...
What if the business of our lives had drowned out the beauty of His promise...
I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.
and the clarity of His directive...
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.
This fallen world leaves a residue that is difficult to wash clean, a sludge that clouds what is pure and faultless.
What if we had believed the lies...
We spent many years guided by those lies, the lies that pollute our hearts so much that we cannot see...
we cannot see their faces....
we don't want to see their faces...
because once our eyes have been opened...
we have no excuse...
once our eyes have been opened...
it may wreck us, wreck our "perfect" lives and wreck our blissfully ignorant hearts.
It has been a year since Will came home and the "what if's" haunt me...
What if...
Two little words that carry so much consequence.
What if I don't do the laundry?
Well, no one would have clean clothes.
What if I don't go to the grocery store?
Well, we would have to eat the can of clam chowder that has been sitting in our pantry for a few years now!
There are so many "what if's" in our lives but the "what if'" in an orphan's life can mean life or death and that gets lost on me most days as we struggle to maintain "normal" in a world that tells us we are so not...
but when it is quiet, the "what if's", my children's "what if's", settle in and I get lost in the reality that they faced without me and the "normal" we would be lost in without them.
Because we would be lost, still believing that we were "good" enough, still loving and living superficially and never going deeper than what was comfortable.
Have you ever seen the hurt in the eyes of one of your biological children, one who has not known true suffering, as she hears her brother and sister casually share about their past beatings?
What if her heart had never been given the chance to grow outside of her own comfort?
What if our conversations had never gone past our selves...
What if...
I think most people can grasp the dire consequence for an orphan who never comes home, but what is more inconvenient to acknowledge is the "what if" for the family, that forever family who never brings that orphan home, that forever family who averts their eyes and their hearts...
because looking into the eyes of a hurting child wrecks you, wrecks your comfort, wrecks your normal and most families don't want to be wrecked.
What if...
Our children's "what if" carried tragic earthly consequences but our family's "what if" may have likely carried tragic eternal consequences.
What if we begin to recognize that Jesus didn't die on the cross so we could live in comfort, take yearly vacations and cocoon our families from the broken-ness in this world.
