…today we leave Ethiopia.

…we say good bye to new friends with stories left untold.

…we begin our journey home to a place that will look so very different from when we left it.

…we bring back from this country images and experiences we will never forget and I believe may have changed us in ways we have yet to discover.

…we leave too soon.

…we have just a few more places to visit before our plane takes the three us of back home.  But, home may really only apply to two of us at this moment as home for one of us may have yet to be defined. 

There is a joy and a sadness that has come with bringing this little girl with us. 

Joy in that this a moment we have dreamed about for so long & would not trade for the world.  It is a moment when she becomes a part of our family and our joy.  Joy in the new family she will meet and hopefully come to love in ways words can not express.  Joy in the simple fact that a child without a name who was living across a distant sea is coming home.

Yet, I know that long before we decided to bring her home with us, something was taken  from her than can not be fully restored.  Regardless of the circumstances of her entrance into this world and the journey that brought us all together, there are still a thousand questions unanswered with faces left unseen. 

These questions and faces will be something that bring us to our knees as the years pass.  We will attempt to provide answers, reasons and possibilities, but I fear they may be insufficient.

However, we know that the years ahead of us will be another type of journey with a new path.  We are unsure where it will lead and for how long we will travel, but life has now been reframed into a picture that is just now beginning to take form.  It’s a new start, a blank canvas of sorts, and I’m excited to explore what it could become.

Tomorrow Africa will be on the other side of the world yet at the same time also held in the eyes of a little girl held tightly in our arms.

…today we leave Ethiopia, but it will never leave us.

…5:30 a.m. and a little more sleep than the night before.  My mind, heart and emotions are at capacity (to say the least)

Today we travel to see St. Mary’s Church to learn about some of the custom and celebrations here in Ethiopia and then to the US Embassy for our Visa interview.  Pray all goes well as we expect our Visa approval tomorrow morning so we can leave tomorrow night.  I can not believe this is almost over…

…10:00 p.m. and trying to record a few thoughts of the day.

Belay, our in country Gladney representative, served as our tour director as we spent the a few hours walking the grounds of the St. Mary’s Ethiopian Orthodox Church.  However, Belay was no stand in tour director as what he shared that day and his relationship to the church is truly something that is hard to comprehend.

With great passion Belay shared much about the richness of the Ethiopian Orthodox history, traditions, meanings behind every painting, window, and symbol.  It is a rich culture and the symbolism and meaning behind what he shared is truly beautiful.  It is obvious that his faith is true and the strength of how it is embraced by the history

Then Belay began to share the history of the Communist party take over of Ethiopia in 1974.  He shared of how the Emperor of Ethiopia was a descendant of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, and with the Emperor’s execution the blood line was cut off forever.  This was Ethiopia’s connected to the blood line of the tribe of Judah.  Belay also shared how when the Emperor was executed approx. 60 of the highest ranking government officials were also imprisoned and how they ultimately faced the firing squad of the Communist party. 

And they Belay shared that one of those men was his father…

As Belay shared this from within the memorial dedicated to these Ethiopian martyrs, we turned to see a picture of his father on the wall behind us.

I can only imagine what Belay had gone through as a child of 11 at the time of his father’s execution, but as he spoke of the events he did so with a quiet strength and pride assembled over many decades of retelling this story. 

Our time at this place was a gift…

…it’s 4:00 a.m. again and this time change is starting to wear on me. Yet, our time here is come quickly to a close.

Today we will travel to the Gladney care centers & then celebrate with a lunch with all of the families who are here in country as a part of their adoption journey.

Today we get to be the ones that take the photos and video of 4 children whose families are anxious to catch just a few glimpses and moments of their children.

I was there just weeks ago, so I know that what we do today is not just about photos and video. Today, what we are doing is capturing hope and joy in preparation of an arrival.

Today, we are the Advent messengers… What joy it is to be the one who carries the Good News of the adoption of sons and daughters to their loving parents.

Our time with Sosi these past two days has been life changing & I am only beginning to see the outline of what this all means.

Sosi has bonded with Corrie in a way that I can only explain as God’s design from the moment Sosi was born.

Literally within three hours of holding Sosi for the first time, Sosi cried and reached out with longing as Corrie went for just a bottle of water. Yesterday this pattern replayed itself every time Corrie left the room, and while it makes us sad it also brings joy that Sosi knows her mommy.

And for me…

As I put Sosi to bed last night, I held her until I thought she was asleep and then gently let her down into her bed. But, at the moment my hands let go, she awoke and began to cry. With my three children before, I have walked away and let then fall back to sleep. However, last night, there was no way that I was going to let this little girl shed one more tear because her mother and father were not there with her.

…10 p.m.

today was a full day as we visited the Gladney Care centers just on the outskirts of Addis or about 30 minutes away from our guest house. This gave us the opportunity to see more of the city and watch it slowly transition to (though not fully) into a more rural Africa. We literally saw a thousand things and that short trip along those streets will be with me forever.

We arrived at the care centers to the warm reception of the care center staff, the in country Gladney teams, Scott Brown (Ethiopian Program Director for Gladney) and the children’s “Special Mothers”. These “Special Mothers” are the ones who were the main care givers for each child during their stay at the Care Centers.

I struggle to fully comprehend their role, and not because of what their daily duties are. I struggle because for the last six months these women have literally been the closest thing to a mother that our children may have ever known.

From the moment we arrived the love and true affection from both the staff and the “Special Mothers” was overwhelming. This we know….Sosi has been loved beyond measure during her time there. She has known the affectionate smile and gentle embrace of someone who loved her.

I could write and will write more about this in the months to come as this relationship and this place were truly holy.

We then had the opportunity to take the care packages from the families back in the states to their waiting children, and I will forever struggle to express what this was like. How do you walk into a place where the orphan child is present, alive and able to literally reach out and touch you without shedding tears of both pain and tears of hope.

The especially difficult moment was when we went to the older children’s (ages 3 to 5) house where visitors are seldom taken. Genet (our guest house Director) quietly took Corrie and I a couple of streets over to this care center.

Guest are seldom taken to these older childrens homes because at this age, the children do understand what is happening to them and when two people like Corrie and I enter the room, the children begin to wonder if we are their parents who have come to take them home. You can only imagine the sudden stop of activity when Corrie and I entered to disrupt their lunchtime meal.

We carried a small package for one of the 30 children in room…I was we had been taken to a private room to deliver this package as we did not have one for each of them.

Someday I may be able to share the video of visiting these care centers, but not today. I can not share publicly both out of respect for the children and their families, but also out of my own inability to even begin to process these moments. I will watch it again and again over the coming months as space in my heart and emotions allow.

…come and sit with me at my home for a few hours and we can watch together. You will not leave the same.

After lunch we traveled back the guest house for some time with Sosi and then out into Addis to try and do a little shopping in order to return to the States with gifts and memories.

…but this is a moment that I will also never forget.

As we waited for the traffic light to turn green (it seemed to take an eternity), this boy who could not be any older than John Michael came to our van window begging for money. As I reached into my pocket, the driver asked me not to give the child anything because the traffic police could fine our driver (I assume the police do this so that the children will not run into the heavy traffic to beg).

And so with the equivalent of only one US dollar in my hand, I turned to the boy and looked into his eyes to motion that I could not give it to him. For what felt like the next hour, he looked back into my eyes and begged for this money…

…I was broken, and not because I could not give him the money. I was broken because the eyes of this child held no promise for a better tomorrow. One US dollar or even a hundred US dollars could not do anything for this child that would make a meaningful difference. What this child needed was a home with a mother and a father so that he could be a child. And there in that moment, I saw the face of the children who by some difference in circumstances never made it to the Care Centers I had visited just hours before.

…I was broken because even though I can’t help him in that moment, I can help him and the thousands of children just like him. It simply does not have to be this way.

…4:00 a.m. and sleep has escaped my grasp.

My mind & heart are alive because just a few feet away I hear the turning and breathing of my little girl who tonight sleeps in peace.

I want to put my arms around her right now and lift her from her bed because I have waited far too long for that privilege; however, I resist.

I am ready to be home back in the states to be united with our children, but these next few days that Corrie and I will spend with her are so necessary. 

God, I pray that I am present in every moment.

The phones and computers here connect to nothing, and while we are eager to share our joy maybe it is a blessing we have needed for far too long (at least I have).  In just the two hours I was gone last night to post pictures of our day, I felt like I had missed so much even as she slept.

But now…she sleeps and I am here. 

There is no greater joy than this…I have peace.

…10:00 p.m. and sleep is taking over my eyelids :-)

today will be the day that I felt like I was properly introduced to Africa.

After some quiet moments this morning with Corrie & Sosi, we ventured into Addis to play the role of observer as the celebration of Epiphany came back into the city.

We left the comfortable observing distance we have felt within the car as we drive through the city and walked the streets among the people as they streamed by the thousands to St. Mary’s Church.

From within the confines of the car, I had a nervous anxiety inside knowing that two white foreigners being driven around the city showed I was different; however, from the moment I stepped outside the car I was cured.

Walking the streets amongst the celebration filled my soul as the people danced and sang and moved together in one motion to celebrate the dwelling of God with mankind.

…“mankind” took on a newer and richer meaning today.

Of course we stuck out big time in the crowd (especially Corrie with her blond hair), but I was among people serving and worshipping their God…our God.  And even though on this day the streets were not made from gold, I feel like I will share this moment again with these people in a different place.

So rich are the lives of those who can sing and dance in the streets to celebrate what God has done for them…it makes me sad to think of the walls of our American churches that contain our joy so that it doesn’t spill into the streets around.

Yesterday, I was told that the faith of the people here is so strong because they are so poor. 

At first glance, that statement makes sense, but after today I will have to re-examine by first reaction.

…can I even count the times that Jesus spoke of the first becoming last and last become first?  Or, how the meek & poor shall inherit the earth?  Or, how Jesus told the rich young ruler to sell all he had and give it to the poor so that the man could then come and “follow me”?

Yes…these people are poor and the poverty is overwhelming.  However, their faith is so much greater than mine because maybe they are truly living out a call to “come and follow me”.  In this way, I envy these people…

…a quiet city of 3 million people wakes us after a jump forward in time that causes us disruption in our rest; however, today could not come soon enough.

Today is the day we have waited for, longed for and cried for. Today a few blurry pictures come to life as a little girl without a family will be wrapped in the arms of two people who will never let her go.

It is by no coincidence that today is Epiphany here in Ethiopia. Today is the beginning of a time of celebration to mark the moment that God making His dwelling place among men and the Word became flesh.

I can not help but draw from this rich moment that today is our beginning of a time of celebration to mark a moment when an orphaned girl makes her dwelling place among my family and the reality of her existence will be held in our eyes for the very first time.

It is only because of what God has done for us that we have come into the brokenness of this place with the simple hope that His story of rescue and redemption become real in the world around us. We give all with no expectation of personal gain; however, the coming reality of the moments ahead shows us that in giving all we are gaining a small piece of a coming kingdom.

Today, it is my fear and my hope that forever more this small piece of a kingdom will call us to gain more by giving all.

Just a few more eternal hours away and she will be with us…