My Overthinking

Philly Area mom, Life forever changed by adoption

Come brokenhearted {guest post}

Lord I find You in the morning
Lord I seek You everyday
Let my life be for Your glory
Woven in Your threads of grace
Oh how I need You

I’m going to be honest. Meeting orphans, looking them in the eye, knowing the truth, is hard. But, nothing else brings me as much joy and happiness as being in China and holding these China babies in my arms. My heart has never been so full, and I have never loved as much as I have before coming to China. These China babies do more for me than I do for them. My life has been changed by meeting them. I’m ruined for anything else. This trip came after I had already lived in China for 2 years working with orphans with special needs. I didn’t know why I was coming back at this time, except that I REALLY wanted to. Sometimes God calls us to things, or something happens in our lives, and we don’t know why. Sometimes we will never know EXACTLY why we were called, or why it happened, but I know that God can and does make everything beautiful. If we step out and give our lives completely to God, He will show himself faithful and bless us beyond what we could ever ask or imagine. Sometimes it’s hard, and we feel like we can’t go on, but God doesn’t ask us to do it on our own strength. When I feel like I’m done, like I can’t do anymore… I can’t fall in love with another kid, He gives me the grace, peace, and strength to keep going. All I do is cry out to him and He picks me back up.

This week I didn’t want to fall in love with one of the kids but kind of knew it would happen anyway. So…

…Let my life be for your glory…

print048On the second day at the orphanage, I was sitting on the floor holding one of the kids, when a boy sitting in a bumbo chair reached around and grabbed my hand. I had just sat down and, since his back was facing me, hadn’t made my way to him just yet. But, he noticed me sitting there and grabbed my hand. I moved a little closer so I could hold one boy and also hold H’s hand. Well, that was it. When his little hand grabbed mine, I was done for. Over the next few days, I tried to hold all of the kids equally, but I couldn’t help holding H the most. He gradually started making more eye contact with me and would lean his head against mine. Oh man…when that kid smiled or laughed or put his little hand in mind, my heart seriously melted.

I am still not sure why exactly God had me come here. But I came anyway and if only for those sweet moments with H, it was worth it. There were so many amazing moments this week, too many to write about here. I am so humbled that God let us be part of his work. I feel unworthy and ask, “who am I?” that for a week, God let me hold and love his children. If I can love one child this much after a week, how much more does God love them? How much more is He taking care of them and holding them in his arms? I might not be able to hold H again, but if I’ve learned anything from my time working in a foster home and visiting kids waiting for families, it’s that God has a plan, and holds onto them when we can’t. Our time there was temporary, but God never leaves them or forsakes them. My heart is breaking, but praise God that he heals the brokenhearted and puts the lonely in families.

As I end this post, and as we pack up and prepare to travel, I’m listening to Crowder’s “Come as you are.” One line in the song is a perfect way to end, and gives us hope in a broken and hurting world.

Come out of sadness
From wherever you’ve been
Come brokenhearted
Let rescue begin
Come find your mercy
Oh sinner come kneel

Earth has no sorrow
That heaven can’t heal.
Earth has no sorrow that
Heaven can’t heal.

____________________________________

Chrissy Kelly

Chrissy Kelly

In the past 7 years, Chrissy has traveled to Brazil, Australia, and Papua New Guinea, but no other place grabbed her heart like China. She spent 2 1/2 years working at Shepherd’s Field Children’s Village, a foster home for special needs orphans, located outside of Beijing. While on staff there, she homeschooled for a family from the US, helped with visitors, and worked with the chinese staff handling donations and supplies. She went to China with the plan of only staying for one year, but immediately fell in love with the children and knew that she would stay longer. With the desire to continue advocating for waiting children and serving as He calls, Chrissy joined the Sparrow Fund’s team to serve at an orphanage in Shaanxi.

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“Happy Sun, Beautiful Moon”

Buried in the (over)loaded suitcase in my dining room is something I’m pretty excited about.

Having seen how deep breathing and stretching helps our littlest learn how to relax and regulate, I wanted to take something to China this time to help the little ones there do a little bit of this…and maybe their caregivers too.

There’s a story behind the story…as their always is. There’s a boy at the orphanage only a little younger than my daughter. He can sing songs like a rockstar and thought a video on my phone of Lydia climbing up a pole was downright hilarious. If she were there with me last spring, they would have been buddies. His name means Happy Sun. Her Chinese name means Beautiful Moon. 

So, in honor of the sweet ones who wait and the sweet ones who have already come home, the book began.

We’ll try it out on this trip and see what needs to be tweaked in it to make it a more useful tool. I’m hoping it works for them…and I’m hoping the translations are correct.

It is time to eat page

Cool the soup page

It can almost reach the sun page

Beautiful moon page

Drink the soup page

At least my little Beautiful Moon seems to like it. Clearly, the stretching movement from side to side is a fave–hence the blurry picture.

Lydia with book
3 more days

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Their vision is valuable {make it happen}


It seems only fitting to share this on Independence Day.

Ya’ll know that I had the privilege in March to lead a team to serve at the orphanage in China where our daughter was. With 12 other people from all over the United States, we held babies, taught preschoolers how to play London Bridge and blow bubbles, and built relationships with the staff (a process that involved a whole lot of leafy water) who serve the 300 orphans in their care day in and day out. When it was being planned, we were hoping we’d get to go back but were holding that loosely. But, before we even flew home from China, it became very clear that that first trip was a foundational trip in an ongoing work and we’d have to go back.

It didn’t take long to get that next trip in the works. I hoped to be able to recruit 9 team members—we got 14. And, those 14 are going to rock it in Shaanxi this fall. Among them are teachers, a neonatal nurse, occupational therapists, orphan advocates…and a professional photographer.

Ben Leaman has been volunteering for The Sparrow Fund with his wife Abbey for a few years now. They both were a part of the team in March, and they are the only ones from that team to join me again in October. As we dreamed together about this next trip and future trips, something incredible was born—a photography workshop that Ben could teach for 10 older orphans there to teach them photography basics but also speak to their hearts to show them that they are beauty makers and creators and that their vision is valuable.

Yeah, pretty exciting stuff, right?

The curriculum is written, and everything ready to go…except for all the hardware to make it happen. As Ansel Adams pointed out, you don’t make a photograph with just a camera. But, we do need equipment or we cannot offer this program. We can’t teach photography without cameras. So, we dreamed up something else—Valuable Vision sponsors, people like you who understand the significance of what we’re doing and want to come alongside a specific child to allow him or her the privilege of joining us to be mentored in photography and heart.

It sorta rocks. Through a tax-deductible donation of $200 to The Sparrow Fund designated for this purpose, you will be sponsoring one orphan to join the class. Your $200 will pay for the camera, camera case, and memory card he or she will use for the class (note that we have been given a discounted price for the equipment…yahoo for that). Your donation will also cover the in-country printing of some of the child’s shots for him or her to keep as well as the printing of a portrait for the child to keep as well as to be placed in his or her orphanage file—a shot that could be potentially used for advocating for that child as well if he or she becomes available for adoption. Once we’re home, sponsors will receive professionally printed artwork of one of your child’s prints (an 8×12 freestanding Standout) as well as your child’s portrait and a small gift purchased specifically for you during the trip (mystery gifts are super fun, aren’t they?).

However many sponsors we get will determine how many children can join the program with a limit of 10 sponsors/kids. And, I really don’t want to have any less than 10.

Do me a favor—go to this link where there is a button for people to click to become a sponsor. Consider sponsoring a child as a family and SHARE the link until all 10 sponsorships are to. tal. ly. full.

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Just because it’s hard to watch doesn’t mean you shouldn’t

It’s a 2 minute 8 second video that every China adoptive family should watch.

Yes, it’s very hard to watch. Yes, you may want to turn your head. But, you must watch because you are now or are waiting to be a parent to a child who will one day—sooner than you think likely—face his story, try to piece together her own history, and the images and sounds of grief heard in this video should not be unfamiliar to you.

No, it doesn’t take away his anger or her desire to ask her unknown birth family why. The city shown here may be hundreds of miles away from his birthplace. And, we may never know if her birth mother or father walked away broken hearted or relieved or both. But, the more we as their parents can experience that may help us connect some dots even if the picture never will be complete, the more completely we can walk with our children and the better we can love them.

Watch the video. 

 

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