i've been home from china for ~2 months. between returning to work, getting sick, opening months worth of mail, traveling out of state for a friend's wedding (and again for my grandma's funeral), attending a continuing education course, catching up with family & friends, visiting a different ill grandmother, doing taxes and other "life" stuff, etc., i think am finally starting to catch my breath. phew.
i had big plans to sit, process, and blog more stories, updates and reflections on the experience as a whole, but so far that has not happened. i'm still hopeful it will, and in some ways, getting something on this blog tonight is a first step.
many have asked if i'm "adjusted" to being home, and in the most basic sense of the word, i am. obviously there is no longer jet-lag and i'm going about my day-to-day activities per usual.
but there are, honestly, instances where i'm not adjusted, but adjusting and it's hard. hard because you return to a place where no one experienced what you did; no one fully "gets" it. hard because you have knowledge of what you left behind which can nearly haunt you; what are you suppose to do with all that now that you're back? hard because time away from and/or missing certain aspects of life (in the US) often leads to them being idolized and/or romanticized, and the gap between that and the reality is often disappointing. hard because you're wondering where (passionately, culturally, etc.) it is that you fit. hard because the various perspectives from which you've now observed foster care and adoption paint a much bigger, messier picture: one that can still be described as amazing(!), while simultaneously highlighting, at best, broken systems in a broken world.
at the end of the day, adjusted or still adjusting... it was 4+ months of wonderful, hard, deeply saddening, amazing, challenging, heart-wrenching, frustrating, stretching, life-changing... all wrapped up into one. i experienced god's favor in ways i never have before. i learned to depend on and trust him for things that really seemed (humanly) impossible. i've been blessed by unique relationships with people, some i've yet to meet in person, who have similar hearts and passions for caring for orphans. i tasted of the lord's goodness and was clearly reminded that jesus is the only hope for our broken humanity.
Taste and see that the Lord is good;
blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.
blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.
Psalm 34:8
May the God of hope
fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him,
so that you may overflow with hope
so that you may overflow with hope
by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Romans 15:13
