I haven’t been where you were yesterday, physically taking a child back into a life of uncertainty, a life that looks from our few as far from safe. You were her advocate for 47 days—some of which felt like they would never end as she made a permanent marker and baby powder instruments of art and some that went so fast that you’re liking pining for them now, wishing you had taken one more walk, sang one more song, read one more book.
While I’ve never fostered a child who did not belong to me, I’m not a stranger to the heartache in response to a child’s brokenness. I spent one week, only one short week, with children in China who do not have families. They called me Mama. They called every woman there Mama, a constant verbal reminder of their loss. In the first 5 minutes I spent in a room there, I was drawn to a little boy. He was maybe only a few months older than your foster daughter. In no time, he’d run to me when I entered the room. I’d hold him with his little bare hiney peeking out of his split pants, and he’d fuss when I’d try to put him down. He’d push other children away who approached me in a vain attempt to claim something that could never be his. I asked the staff about him, wondering if I could somehow share his preciousness with Mark and we could come back for him. But, that cannot happen. He had been brought to the orphanage as a victim of human trafficking. At less than a year old, someone was arrested for trying to sell him for the highest price—maybe about $5,000—like we would a possession we see no more value in beyond bringing in some extra cash. Because of his history, he can never be adopted internationally; he doesn’t qualify as an “orphan” according to the definition a committee in some board room far from Shaanxi, China secured. He will grow up in the orphanage, calling every woman there Mama, his name literally meaning “minority,” forever marked as a stranger not even qualified to be grafted into a new family. The injustice is infuriating. And, the dichotomy of his life and the lives of the children in my home at the start of a hopeful summer—one of whom may have slept in the very same bed he has slept in—makes me want to foolishly bury myself in a frivolous book or movie simply to try to put it—him and all the others he represents—out of my mind.
I got up early this morning and sipped my coffee and read before the spirit of summertime arose in four little bodies here. I read 2 Corinthians 12, a familiar passage from Paul about the thorns in his flech and boasting in his weakness. He wrote God’s words to him: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” I’ve read the words lots of times before but today I thought of the little one who has been in your care and the boy I grew attached to. They could be seen as tangible images of weakness, stuck because of a system designed to serve their best interests that appears to have failed them. In their young sweetness, they just smile and run and eat their goldfish crackers or oddly-flavored Chinese saltines, oblivious to all that we see. Where’s the perfect power in their weakness?
It’s a beautiful morning. My little Chinese friend is likely asleep by now, his life dictated by a tight schedule. And, I’m sure your house is very still after 47 chaotic mornings with a two-year-old. I’m sure you are wondering what she’s doing right now. The only path to peace for us is in trusting that His power isn’t always demonstrated the way we’d like it to be. In fact, I’d say it rarely is. But, his power is still there, still with them in a crowded orphanage in China and in a little house where a little girl may be watching morning cartoons. His grace is sufficient for us and somehow He is sufficient for them. And, unless we receive a specific calling from Him to fight to radically change the system—a call I’d be willing to accept if it came as you would as well—we must rest in that sufficiency, that power in what appears to us to be hopeless, trusting that He is whispering words into their hearts that man may not utter.
God called you to foster, to care, to stand in the gap in this little one’s life for 47 days. You willingly accepted that calling and now have completed it. It seems He is calling you now to something else. I trust that whatever that is, you will fulfill it more fully because of His sufficiency to you through this season.
