Trust and Obey

As I blog surfed many months back, someone mentioned reading the book titled The Boy From Baby House 10.   I purchased the book and it traveled to Georgia and Florida with us, but I never opened the book.  About a week ago I began reading the book.  This book is a true story of a little boy with Cerebral Palsy who lived in a Russian orphanage for many years before being adopted.  As I am reading, I can almost see the scenery, smell the scents, and feel the children in the book.  My heart breaks because I can almost put myself in that Baby House.  Although we have not been to Russia, the description of the baby house reminds me at times of those we have been in.  Other times while I am reading I am so grateful that the first homes our daughters lived in were much better conditions than what is described.

And then, last night, there was a passage that hit me--like a rock.  I sobbed.  I finished the chapter, and then sobbed some more--and began to pray for all those children who were "left behind".  The passage stated "....as the Americans were carrying Andrei out of the room, I heard a wail like a howl of pain.  I turned and looked down.  I saw it was Masha, confined as usual in a tethered baby walker.  Tears were streaming down her face.  There was no doubt that she understood that Andrei had found herself a family, and with all her being she was trying to say 'Take me too'.  She understood she would never be the center of anyone's attention...."

How many times have I walked in and out of a baby house and heard those same howls?  I've seen the tears.  And every time I think about it, there is this pit in my stomach and tears begin to flow.  I can think of multiple times I wanted to peek behind a door when I heard a baby cry--wanting to go and pick him/her up and give them comfort, but also knowing that was not allowed.  I was there to see our daughter, not to comfort others. 

I have felt this great calling in the last month, more so since I started back to school, that I could (and should) be doing more.  I talk to people in the education world and feel selfish that we as Americans are being so petty--arguing about such silly things--when children of the same abilities in another country are tucked away and don't know what sunshine is, aren't given the chance to experience the grass between their toes, aren't given the opportunity to go to school, leave their bed, or take a nightly bath.  The children don't know the love of a family.  It breaks my heart.

As I read the book, I can't help think about our two girls--where they would be today if they were still in their birth country. 

I could and should be doing more.  I have told many people I feel like I work in the right company, just the wrong department.  I'm in the special education field, but rather than being an educator to children with special needs, I have been called by God himself, to be a mother of children with special needs.  I don't know how we are going to make it work, but if it's what God called me to do, then by all means, that's what I'll do.  How many do we want?  I don't have the ultimate plan, so I'm relying on God to tell me when and where to go, and we'll go.  Maybe I'm meant to be in mission work.  I would love to go work with a wonderful physician in another country and start a special needs preschool--something the "locals" think is cray!  I would love to be the cray American with the idea that "will never work" and see God work miracles thought his most precious children.