It is Poetry Friday, so it's time to get a good, healthy dose of poetry. The poets and poems are being hosted at Live Your Poem with Irene Latham.
Some good friends of ours, (well, they are good friends of my daughter, but I have come to know them as our own personal friends also) some time ago, decided to adopt. They have three children, and decided they would adopt their fourth child. They wanted a boy, which would mean they would have two girls and two boys then. It would be most likely an infant, and from the USA. They would name this baby boy, John.
Some good friends of ours, (well, they are good friends of my daughter, but I have come to know them as our own personal friends also) some time ago, decided to adopt. They have three children, and decided they would adopt their fourth child. They wanted a boy, which would mean they would have two girls and two boys then. It would be most likely an infant, and from the USA. They would name this baby boy, John.
But that is not exactly how it turned out. To read their story, Mom has started a blog. She has never blogged before, so it is a work in progress. Please, go here to learn more about the incredible journey to bring John home: His Name is John: Our Story.
I wrote them a poem for John, when they found him. We could all see him, read about him, pray for him, etc. but he could not know yet that there was a family - real people somewhere desperately trying to find a way to make his dream of a family come true, wanting to make him a part of their family. When I too saw his pictures and video, it struck me how much we already knew about him, how much was being put in place to have this happen...and yet, he knew nothing of it. His world had not changed, but for others it was changing already.
You Don't Know
We know your name
We’ve seen your face.
In a faraway place.
You don’t know,
but
We know you;
The time is coming;
to be a brother,
To have a mother.
You don’t know,
but
We know your laugh,
And wistful wishes;
We’ve seen the gleam,
We know your dream.
You don’t know,
but
We hold your picture,
As we speak your name
In our prayers, too,
Asking blessings for you,
You don’t know,
but
At your new home
Your family awaits
Holding your space
In the family embrace.
You don’t know,
but
You will know
soon.
We know your name
We’ve seen your face.
In a faraway place.
You don’t know,
but
We know you;
The time is coming;
to be a brother,
To have a mother.
You don’t know,
but
We know your laugh,
And wistful wishes;
We’ve seen the gleam,
We know your dream.
You don’t know,
but
We hold your picture,
As we speak your name
In our prayers, too,
Asking blessings for you,
You don’t know,
but
At your new home
Your family awaits
Holding your space
In the family embrace.
You don’t know,
but
You will know
soon.
©Donna JT Smith, all rights reserved
A portion of Abbey's Blog Post starts here:
Here is our story about God leading us to adopt John (Zhen Zhen). I hope you are blessed by seeing God's Hand as we have been!
These are just some of the things I wrote down about John's story and ours coming together. Many of you have read this in an email I sent at the beginning of all of this, but I thought it was the best way to get the story on the blog (finally!)
In the fall of 2013 Ethan and I had a light-hearted yet real conversation like this:
Ethan: “We need another boy. Sam needs a brother.”
Me: “Let’s adopt one.”
Ethan: “Okay.”
Me: “Really?”
Ethan: “Yeah.”
Me: “Let’s pray, then. If God wants us to adopt a boy, He will make it happen. It’s not hard for Him… Dear God, if you want us to adopt a boy, we will. Please make it happen if you want us to.”
That must have been November 21, 2013, because two weeks later I wrote in my prayer journal the date 40 weeks from that night. I didn’t know “why” but along the lines of, “Hey- maybe our baby is being created right now and we can pray for him from the start of his life until birth.” The date I wrote: August 28.
Two weeks later, Ethan and I watched a documentary about adoption called, “Stuck.” We had been praying and thinking about adoption, but that night we literally shook hands—agreeing that we would start taking steps toward adoption and only stop if God told us otherwise along the way. I also wrote down the date 40 weeks from that day. In my prayer journal it says:
“John” (Aug. 28, Sept. 11?)
Sometime in the fall (soon after we decided and felt led to start taking steps) I was reading my Bible and praying. I wrote down, “The work of this adoption will be done in prayer.”
I wrote each of our kids’ names and the theme of their name, story, birth, etc. It looks like this:
- Child #1's Name: Ask Your Heavenly Father for what you want.
- Child #2's Name: Let our children exist for God’s Glory.
- Child #3's Name: Please, ask specifics!
- (John) Child we don’t know yet: salvation, adoption, protection, funding, matching. PRAY IN FAITH! John 1:6-13; Luke 1:63-80
I recently reread those Scriptures and am reminded of the message I heard from the Lord that morning about our future son. Name him John. He will be like John the Baptist in that he will lead people out of darkness into the Light—sharing salvation and the forgiveness of sins. Just like the themes and beautiful messages God gave us with our biological children, those passages, I believe, mean something significant about John and God’s plans for his life.
Since that day I have been praying for our hopeful adopted son by the name of John.
JJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJ
Thank you for reading. But there is more to his story... for more of the story and to keep updated on the adoption process please go to her blog:
The adoption agency does not want images of him online yet. Sorry. When it is permissible, I will put his picture online.
