As I held her tiny body in my arms outside that Romanian hospital staring into those huge brown eyes my tears ran down my face. Years of waiting for a child had almost crushed my heart and our marriage yet, God's perfect plan was unfolding right in front of us! We named her Hannah after Samuel's mother in 1 Samuel. I remember praying over her then and often afterward Hannah's prayer, "O Lord Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant's misery and remember me and not forget your servant but give me a child then I will give him to the Lord for all the days of his life...."
I often wondered how God would want us to "give her back" to him. And as the years have gone by I realize that parenting is process of giving our children back to God. We are working ourselves out of a job. That's parenting, in a nutshell as painful as that sounds to me today!
Early this morning we received an email from our Hannah. She is in Romania for 10 days serving her people, giving back, loving them and sharing the gospel with them. I feel like we've come full circle in a way. We are praying that God will plant in Hannah's heart a deep love and compassion for the hurting and lost in the land of her birth. We pray this for all our children. Every one of them has come to us by way of adoption and every one of them has a "people" to go back to.
Our letting go is difficult. We are in the beginning stages of "letting go" of an adult child. We are learning to keep our mouths closed when our advice is not necessary. We are learning to praise her when she takes huge steps into adulthood and looks back for our approval. And most of all we are treading lightly when asked for our opinion. Continual confirmation, affirmation, gentle course corrections are all a part of this stage of parenting.
Thank you Lord for the wisdom of others that you are providing us with so we may tread in the path of righteousness directly behind them, even when we long to just pull back on the reins and control our adult child.
"When words are many, sin is not absent. But he who holds his tongue is wise." (Proverbs 10:19)
