As a father on a day set aside to honor fathers, I am reflecting on what it truly means to be the right kind of father and how much I fall short of that goal every day. It has caused me to take inventory of my relationship with each of my children and how I can better connect with them individually as well as help us all stay better connected as a family. Whether it is night swimming and eating warm chocolate chip cookies together, or playing and watching sports together, or wrestling with each other, or just simply holding my newest son and helping meet his needs- I want to do better. I need to do better and I am slowly learning that I can only do this with the help of my Heavenly Father.
I live in a culture where it is too easy to make excuses about why I am not available when my family needs me- I have too much that I need to get done around the house, I have to be at this event at church, I am just too wiped out right now and want to relax. All of these things are real things that need to be done as a part of the life that God has called me to; but I hope that I and other fathers will wake up to the fact that only bad things come from putting your family behind a myriad of other things. God is teaching me in a very simple way that He has called me and that He is also currently enabling me to rise up to His standard of what a father should be. When you switch time zones like I have recently and when you are dealing with a son who needs to attach to you as his dad who will always be there you quickly realize that you sleep when you can and when you can’t you rest in God to make things work. When you enter an entirely different culture and realize that their food is not your favorite (and I’m far from a picky eater) you just make it work by eating when and what you can. I am learning that I am supposed to eat and sleep to live not the other way around.
What Shana and I have both loved the most about the idea and now the reality of adoption is rescue. When we began this adoption journey 15 months ago we saw it as an amazing opportunity to show an orphan with special needs the beautiful picture of God’s amazing love for His adopted children. When we started to pursue Aiden this past January we were reminded of how God pursues us to be an eternal part of His family with the same rights as His Son, Jesus! My greatest excitement in all of this has not been that we were able to rescue Aiden from the sad life that he was destined to live in order to give Him a better life in America, but that God is using the example of Aiden’s adoption into our family to help me truly understand all that His adoption of me includes!
God is constantly reminding me that His desire for my holiness greatly dwarves my desire to be comfortable and happy. The God that is redeeming me is so madly in love with me that He will exhaust every resource at His disposal in order to make me more like His Son. He has kept every one of His promises to me and He will continue to do all He said He will do- for me and for you, no matter what the cost.
Thanks for reading and thanks for praying for our family! God has many more lessons in store for us.