of frost and flame

For you, God, tested us. You refined us like silver...

we went through fire and water, 

but you brought us to a place of abundance.

Psalm 66: 10, 12

Gray and hazy. Horizons blend into clouds and sky. We are facing north again. Headed home. Away from her. And every mile my heart is breaking. I feel like I am just holding my breath each second. A sigh too deep and I might just fall to pieces. It's the quiet of the car that is most haunting. I look in the rearview mirror to see if the semi is passing and I catch a glimpse of the backseat. Empty backseat -- where for the last four amazing days she sat and chatted and giggled and slept and I would try to tickle her feet at the stoplights and trains and she would squeal. I grip the wheel tighter, only 12 hours and I can cry until I'm dry.

I ask Mom about her week with her sisters and brother, no doubt filled to the brim and bursting with laughter and silliness. So she recaps all the fun and one-liners. And we laugh too.

Far into the plains and with every hint of city behind us, we both spot a tall column of black smoke reaching high. And I say, "Only a white man would make a fire for everyone to see."(From Dances with Wolves) And we laugh hard some more.

Miles farther there are more plumes of smoke rising. It seems that the whole of the plain is ablaze. And we see the black trails stretching across fields. Farmers burning off brush and stubble from the last harvest to prepare for the new planting.

And I see it.

So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, 

even though you have to endure many trials for a little while. 

These trials will show that your faith is genuine. 

It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold -- 

though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. 

So when your faith remains strong through many trials, 

it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day 

when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. 

1 Peter 1:6, 7

Sometimes the new does require the flame. Burning away what is not needed, what is not necessary, what is in the way. Clearing the ground for the new life to be planted. And it seems so counter-intuitive. Fire to make new. Fire destroys and devastates, and it does. But sometimes, sometimes we need it.

Sometimes we need to get rid of the brush and stubble, what has been left, the excess we thought we needed but don’t, is burned away.  Sometimes we need to be refined.

It's the hard stuff, that suffocates and makes us sweat. It's the battle we fight within ourselves -- are we strong enough to survive? How will we make it out the other side? And in the end -- and there is an end, and yes, that does seem to loom forever -- we are ready for the new planting. The next adventure. The next chapter. The next step. The next obstacle.

For me it is  these long treks home without her. How is a mother to do this? Can I survive? How will this be worked out? Is there an end? It is the  disappointing meetings and phone calls, the moments the walls close in and I think it's over. It's the endless line of paper work. Finances needed and no idea how to pay.

And it has been the years of waiting. The mornings of hope followed too quickly by nights of despair.

I remember screaming loud and being physically exhausted "God, where are you? How could you let me burn?" And I see it now. Sometimes you need the flame to clear the ground to be readied for the new planting. It's never fun. Never exciting. I have never jumped for joy of it, but I do count the joy hunted and found because of it.

What was burned away?

Doubt and fear. A love and need for material things. Selfishness. Pride. Defiance.

What was planted?

Courage. Joy. Gratitude. Humility (most of the time). Appreciation for the simple and unseen. Trust. Patience.  Peace. Grace.

The flame. During the bulk of our infertility journey to be readied for the long road of adoption. And during the adoption journey to be readied for…whatever else we encounter.

We have seen and felt the flame. And we have seen and felt more miracles than we can count. 

.   .   .   .   . 

So we head north, into the dark of night. The good man is waiting for us at the door and helps us in. We all fall quickly onto fluffed up pillows  and I sleep restless. I wake up several times thinking she is sleeping next to me. I reach my hand out to the left to rub or scratch her back and there is nothing but darkness and the edge of the bed. And each time I lean into the good man, and his snores, as I try to remind myself that we are nearing the end and she will be home.

 She will.

It’s Monday morning and I'm getting used to the after the leaving part of this journey. I looked through the pictures several times, watched the videos, and cried…only a little. I have survived the second worst day of my life  and the sun is shining.

I look outside and see green grass in the yard. Green Grass. I run out, feet bare, and squeeze the sprouts with my toes. Look to the beaming sky and breath deep. The winter does end. Spring does come. And He is making all things new again. There is hope in this. In these toes pressed to dirt and green.

This most awful winter, frozen flood, is nearing an end. Many of us in the northern states thought it would never come -- trapped in bitter tundra forever. And I don’t know if this adoption process had made it seem longer and colder, or if the cold, long winter made the adoption process more grueling? Either way, this has been the longest winter, longest season, of my life. I am grateful for the sun, and the grass, and the birds that chirp outside my window.

It was you who set all the boundaries of the earth;

you make both summer and winter.

Psalm 74:17

And I know we need the winter, just as we need the flame. We need the snow and the frost. A season to calm and quiet, to be bundled and gather close. A season to reset nature and bring out the new life on trees and ground. And though it seems to last forever, we are promised spring will come. And it does. To everything there is a season. Only a season. For a time. And it will pass. And we might emerge  different, maybe a little frazzled and worn, maybe renewed and grateful. I'm a little bit of everything. Maybe it's because I am so worn and frazzled that I am grateful for dirt.

We need winter to grow. We need the moments of quiet, still, and silence, to understand what lie in our depths. And not only in our depths alone, but what we have become through the Holy Spirit. Do we trust, truly and deeply, that He is good? Do we find our peace and comfort in Him, even in the silence? Do we praise Him in the desert and the oasis? Do we love Him in the barren and the fertile? And in my waiting and wondering, my fear and doubt, I do confess, I know it is Him who calls out winter and the sun, who controls the silence. And there is always a plan even if I can't see it in the blizzard. 

There were seasons I cried out and He did not answer back. I called and was not immediately rescued. And what lesson do we learn if we are constantly in the sun, the green, the easy and blissful? What lesson to we learn if we are always rescued and never learn to take courage, to be strong, to trust? So my winters came. And they are never easy, never joyful. But just as for the flame, I am grateful for the joy I have gathered and counted because of the frost.

.     .     .     .     .

Are you in the flame? The frost?

You are not alone. For some, we have survived and can give hope. We can offer a listening ear. For others, we are there with you. Struggling. Waiting. Sweating. Wondering. We too can comfort.

What has been burned away, refined? What has been proved through frozen flood?

What joy have you hunted, found, counted because of the flame, the frost? 

For what are you now being prepared?