"Take Heart, I have overcome the world."

So much has happened in the last month since our last post I could write a book! Let me start by saying “GOD IS GOOD! HE IS FAITHFUL! HE IS WITH US!” Praise His GREAT NAME!

God by His grace has revealed so much to me lately, particularly that there is a lot of Biblical knowledge that I know to be true but have been living as if I really did not believe it is true. One area in particular that I want to share about is some recent revelations about the reality spiritual warfare. I know this goes on, I know this is real as it is all over the Bible, but the way I was living, and particularly praying, did not match what I know to be Biblical. Think about this, what would be the response if you went into your church or small group this weekend and said “I believe I am under demonic attack!” What kind of response would you get? I would venture to say most in groups it would raise a lot of eye brows, lots of questions, many will blow you off or say you are passing blame, and there are those who will “deliver you” on the spot. In this post, I am not going to give a lot of doctrine here, but simply say what was revealed to me and my heart particularly. I will say one thing I believe we all can agree on, real believers can experience demonic attack, and therefore, we must know how to fight.

I want to begin by explaining one simple thing, the adversary’s goal is “to steal, kill, and destroy”. He wants to steal our joy, satisfaction, kill our passion, kill our ability to love and be loved, and destroy our lives, families, and kingdom advancement. We must understand that he is a force to be reckoned with! He is powerful and he is cunning! Also, he has all the time in the world, and sometimes the best tactic he uses is not drastic changes or lies, but slow, subtle, disguised lies that causes us to slowly but surely drift away from the truth (Heb 2:1). The way he attacks is clear in Scripture, he as “the father of lies” distorts truth so we cannot see the truth. He cannot create anything, leaving him to only manipulate what already exists. Think about this, the best lie is one that is plagued with partial or half-truths and they take knowing the real truth to identify (Hence we MUST KNOW the PERSON to Word is pointing to!). His tactic is NOISE! Or “smoke and mirrors”! He blinds us with a lot of lies that seem true and there are a lot of them at once and they are noisy and we cannot sift thru them because we are SO BUSY and distracted! Lies like:

·         It is all up to you. If you don’t do all this, your family will fall apart.

·         You must make the right choice and you must figure it all out. (NOTE: there are consequences for sinful choices, but I will explain this later.)

·         God can’t use you for that; you are not adequate.

·         Your kids NEED all this stuff and to be involved in all these things and if not, they will miss out and their lives will be forever changed and ruined.

·         You will never have real community and fellowship. See how many people have left and how no one is around, you are on your own! Besides, you don’t have time anyway and it is not really necessary!

·         No one can relate to your struggles as you are the only one dealing with this! If you confess your sins to others, they will laugh at you, think so much less of you, and this will further drive the ones left in your life away!

 

I am willing to bet I am not the only one who has heard these LIES! The truth is I had bought into some of them and did not even realize it! That is the deception! We can be fooled and NOT KNOW we are fooled!

God is good though! Last Friday I met a person that was able to articulate some biblical truths in a way I had not thought of before. The amazing thing, it was simple and he did not show any “new truths” so to speak, but he said it in a way that was very eye opening for me. He said the adversary’s tactic is to distract with all the noise so we cannot see THE ROOT of our sin! If we never get to the root, we can never address the real sin. As long as the root of the sin is in our hearts and never confessed to God, to ourselves, and to others as necessary, then we will always struggle. Let me give an example, we may have a deeply rooted sin of doubt in God’s ability to guide us. When we see we are misguided or make mistakes, that root sin plays out in tireless working and figuring things out, endless planning, anger, frustration, and fear, which are all symptoms of the deeper issue. We typically repent of the symptoms and not of the root because we never get to the root. Our flesh does not want to go to the root! Therefore, the temporary anger or frustration will go away when we confess and repent, but the root is still there and will simply show up somewhere else or return later. The real deception here is that “voice of doubt” at the root of the sin in our hearts is indistinguishable from our own voice and from God’s voice. Since we cannot distinguish this voice, we buy in to the distortions and lies, partly because there is some truth to them, and they are rooted in principles of this world APART from the truths of the Gospel! It is an internal battle. We are at war with our passions within our own hearts (Romans 7:21-23). This is HUGE! If we cannot distinguish the voice of lies from the Voice of Truth, how do we choose which one to believe? We will choose BOTH!

So last week, a handful of us talked and shared our hearts and prayed together. We confessed our sins to one another and begin to peel back the lies to get past the noise. I want to list some of the deep rooted lies that were behind the noise that I had bought in to and these are DEEP ROOTED sins that, under the “kingdom of darkness” are true, but in the “kingdom of heaven”, they are lies:

·         Your family’s provision is up to you to figure out and manage well. You mess up, your family will suffer and never forget! There is some truth to this, but see the distortion. I am responsible to manage and lead my family. However, it is not up to me to have a detailed plan, see our road ahead, lay out plans to get there, and make it happen. My role is to “see Christ”, “hear His voice” and “Follow Him”. Now our direction is dependent on my hearing and seeing and not my DOING! Also, my family does not need a PERFECT father, but a HUMBLE one! Subtle but ETERNAL difference!

·         Your good job and ability to provide is a result of God’s favor BECAUSE of your good choices and hard work. Some truth here again but don’t miss the distortion. God does give favor and gives us good things to enjoy and we are accountable for how we use them. However, how we use them is not what drives us to receive more. We receive more because of God’s unmerited love and mercy. He does not give because I have done anything. He gives because He loves, PERIOD! Also, He withholds because HE LOVES! God’s favor is not dependent on my ability to choose.

·         At the bottom of these distortions of truth was a deep rooted and well-disguised sin of self-reliance. Everything was all up to me. God’s favor and blessings were a result of my choices and works. LIES! I had not seen this in myself before.

When all of this was revealed, all I have to say was a prayer to God saying, “God I confess my sin, my self-reliance, my belief in these lies over your clear truth. All I have to give you is SIN and I want to give it to you. I am begging you to take it and to replace it with faith, zeal for your Name, fellowship with others, and a deep sense of your presence. Open my eyes to see the future attacks of the adversary and please do not allow me to be fooled or blinded! I need You and I want You! Please do not let my sins play out in the life of my wife or my children. Guard and protect them from MY SIN! Lastly, I ask that you empower me to fight! Empower my prayers! Empower my study time! Equip me fully to be victorious!”

After our time of confession and repentance, I truly believe I walked away changed (so did a close friend/brother of mine!). I will also say this, MY SIN as the husband and spiritual head of my family, had also been working in the life of my wife. I had to confess my sin to her and repent and we prayed together about it!

“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.” James 5:16.

True freedom begins with humble confession! Confession of sins leads us to the cross! Give Him your sin. He has already paid for it. He gives us Himself and we can overcome the world! These prayers of confession to God and confession to one another are prayers He DIED to answer! I hope my revelation of sin is encouraging to you! I am changed! HE DID IT, NOT ME!

 “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”  John 16:33

Andrew

LIfe with 3....

This blog is just a follow up to the last...and honestly just some relax time for me that I shouldn't be taking anyway:)  But I didn't just want to leave our readers or the blog just hanging!  Anyway,  without going into every little detail that I would just love to share with you -I will just say that Kailyn is doing absolutely outstanding!  I will venture to say (knock on wood) that we just don't see the indiscriminate issues that were present in the first weeks.  We still want to stay on that path-we won't be passing her around, leaving her in a nursery or with a babysitter for several more months, but this Sunday Kailyn and I did make it into the doors of the church for the first time since China and it was so refreshing!  She just sat with me in my husband's class until she'd had enough and then we walked around.

As far as adjustment on our part-it is as if Kailyn has always been in our family.  She is so vibrant and full of life and personality, it is just hard to fathom that anyone could have abandoned her.  And she is a continual reminder to me of all of the other children out there who just need a chance...and of course, the memory of China... that all of us who live in the US are truly blessed...with freedom, with hope of life, with abundant opportunity to know and to share the Gospel.

My daily life is busier than it ever has been, coffee is a very good friend of mine, and I am sure this is true of anyone who has three children and any young ones at home.  I once again am back to scheduling all of my time around a two hour nap, in which I race to get as much done as possible, and  this time must be fit in before time to get the boys, and early is good so she'll go to sleep when the boys have to be in bed:)  Kailyn is still having appointments, catch up work to do with her weight,  and motor skills, language, speech and a pending surgery.  But it is a good busy-and there is no greater joy than being a mom who gets to spend her life pouring into three precious children, and we would do it all again!




Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him.  Psalm 34:8

Attachment-where we are with Kailyn...

Hi friends,

I wanted to write this because we have had Kailyn for five full weeks now-three weeks at home, and they have felt like nothing short of a whirlwind (but a good one:)  August 10-land at Birmingham airport after being awake for @ 42 hours, recover from jet lag until August 15, then on August 19 start the boys at two new schools for both of them!  Saturday August 24, mom, dad and Kailyn finally sleep through the night!! whew!  And now we pretty much have a nice daily routine that works for everyone.    We want to continually thank everyone who have prayed and supported us through this process-we could not have made it so far without you!!  But there is still work to do and I wanted to answer many various questions that we are getting about when we will be getting out more...when family will be able to stay at our house overnight, gracious offers to babysit...when I will try and get back to church...etc.  And really, the answer is...whenever we feel like Kailyn is ready, we will step out slowly, a little at a time.  

Kailyn is doing fantastic in her adjustment to our family in home.  We could not be more thankful for her progress and we thank all of you for your prayers for her and also for respecting the requests that we've made for limited interaction with you all right now.   It is a strange request I know-and until Andrew and I began this adoption process, the needs of internationally adopted children were a foreign and completely unheard of subject.   So this is the scenario that even I find that I have to remind myself of:

March 4, 2012   Kailyn was born.  She was carried safely and securely in the womb by a mother where Kailyn was able to hear her mother's voice, just like our biologicals heard our voice.  She likely stayed with that mom for 2 days after birth.  

March 6, 2012  Kailyn was abandoned at the gate of her orphanage.  Mother vanished.  Never to be seen or heard by Kailyn's little ears again.

March 6, 2012  Kailyn was taken into orphanage care for one month.  All new caregivers.  New surroundings, new voiced, new bed, new food new routine.

One month later-Kailyn was put into foster care.  Orphanage caregivers vanished.  New surroundings, new voices, new bed, new food, new routine, new caregiver.  

16 months pass...

 5 WEEKS AGO -  July 28, 2013 Orphanage administration comes to the door where Kailyn is staying in the rural town.  They take her from her caregiver, put her in a strange vehicle (she has likely never ridden in a van before)  ride for 2 hours.  They take her to a hotel in another city where they take her up to a hotel room, and hand her over to a strange new family.  Foster caregiver vanished forever.  New surroundings, new voices, new bed, new food, new routine, new caregiver.  

August 10, 2012  Family flies into Birmingham Airport where Kailyn now becomes a US citizen.  China and its familiar culture and language-vanished forever. 

So although Kailyn is doing well -she has been through a lot!!!  What I just described would be stressful for an adulte-much less a 17 month old.  
We also still have  lot of work to do in developing secure attachment with us, and there are obvious signs that show up in different situations.  We have work to do at home in helping her to adjust to some specific family life routines.  We are thankful to have an outstanding social worker and family therapist, staff at International Adoption clinic who are helping to guide our steps as we walk through this period of transition with Kailyn.  

The most specific thing I would ask of you all (weird I know) -when we see you is that if Kailyn does try to interact with you-by giving you a big smile, peek a boo, handing you an object, trying to share a cheerio or cookie with you, the best possible thing you can do for her is to not reciprocate.  And obviously, she doesn't need to be held by anyone else but mom and dad right now.  It is totally fine to say hello to her, and most of the time Kailyn's initial reaction to friends and strangers is clinginess to me -which is great by the way!  But if I show warmness to you, then Kailyn tends to want to ensure her acceptance by you as well.  And that shows insecurity in her relationship with mom and dad.   We have to remember-WE know that her new situation is permanent.  But it may be a while before she is able to understand that.  As far as she knows, we could put her in our van at any day, and deliver her to a new family.  Why not?  It happened before?  Also, the ONLY adult relationships she has ever had before now is caregiver.  So each one of you are all a potential new caregiver in her eyes.  We are working to help her distinguish mommy and daddy relationship from friends.  We thank those of you who we've explained this too and have already shown respect to our wishes.  

Oh- then throw an upcoming surgery in for October-so she's got even more stress coming.  Bless our sweet baby.

Amy

Home at Last! Week two August 18-24

Week two August 18-24

Kailyn continues to adjust very well-I would say, she is pretty much adjusted to us and our home, with the exception of sleeping alone in her room.  This is a pretty normal adjustment to go through from all we’ve read and heard.  She doesn’t want to be alone in the room, and if she wakes up, we have to go up to the room and sit with her or lie in the twin bed that is in there until she goes to sleep.  She has given us a couple of rough nights this week, but Andrew and I are thinking that we may use some melatonin for a while to help her sleep more soundly, and maybe even shorten her daytime nap to see if that helps.  Aside from that, Kailyn is just precious and such a joy!  We truly cannot imagine our family without her now. 

She has the most delightful smile and laugh, and she squeals when we are outside and she is allowed to run freely!  And that is what she does-she just runs with those little arms waving and cackling the whole time!  Love it!  We are trying to get some good video of this.  Other favorite activities are playing upstairs in the playroom when we are all up there together.  That is where we have the geotrax train and even though we have to keep her from taking it a part (this is the boys special toy that they work hard to build and design), she loves carrying around the trains and just watching it go.  She also still loves playing in the bathtub, and also when Joseph gives her a very slow ride in his razor go-cart around the cul de sac.  She would stay on this all day with him I think.  As far as luvees go- we have caught her sleeping a few times now snuggling the blanket that is in her bed- the one we sent in her care package and Andrew said he saw her sleeping holding the pink bear we had sent!  She is also starting to carry around the musical wind up giraffe we gave to her in China.  In China she didn’t want anything to do with blankets or stuffed animals.  I think it is a healthy development that she is warming up to them.  We have also made a couple of trips to the grocery store this week-one short one to Publix with me, and one to Wal-Mart with both daddy and I.  She really does well riding in the buggy and seems to enjoy it but I would never take her, at least not yet, on one of my stock up trips. 

She also does very well with teeth brushing now.  Pretty much after I wrote the last journal she decided that it wasn’t worth the fussing anymore when we brush her teeth and she opens her mouth readily.  Yeah!  Also, I can’t say enough how smart Kailyn is.  We were told that we would be amazed at how quickly she picks up on the English language, and they were right!  She understands several words that are obvious to us (maybe more that we just can’t tell).  She definitely knows –no no, come here Kailyn, bring that to mommy please (this came about to teach her not to throw objects), puppy dog, apple juice, milk, outside, all done (and the sign we made up:), want down (and she points down from her booster seat).  We also think she has a great memory.  Not only does she mimic things that we do-once we have done something together, she remembers what to do the next time.  For example, I let her “help” me do laundry by letting her push the wet clothes into the dryer.  We did it one time, and the next time I didn’t even need to show her.  She has also mimicked washing her face in the tub with water after she watched me wash mine in the sink a few times-but then she also does this with foodJ  I saw her also one day take the napkin I had given her (she likes to wipe her own hands and mouth-another things she has picked up) and she reached the kitchen table and started trying to wipe it up.  I guess she has seen me do that a few times.  It is so fun and I am excited to teach her so many things that she’ll need in life!

One thing that Andrew and I have realized this week though-this baby cannot crawl.  She walks great and loves to climb –though she cannot climb up or over anything on her hands and knees.  I don’t think this will be a big deal for her, and we will see and occupational therapist on Monday, but it does give us further insight into her past environment (which we were not able to see).  She must have not had much opportunity to explore.  The likelihood is that she spent much of her time in a bed where she learned to pull up and stand, but never crawl at the younger age.  This just makes me more convinced that the “foster” home she was in was just that she was put in a room with one of the residents at the SWI.  I am definitely happier she had the attention of one caregiver for 16 months, and I think it has helped her with emotional development and attachment to us for sure!  But, I would have thought in a true foster home she would have been able to explore a little bit more. 

Lastly, maybe the thing we are most thankful for at this point, is that we see her attachment to us (at least as far as Andrew and I can tell) developing beautifully.  We have had several visitors this week in and out, bringing us food and helping in other ways, and with the exception of children, she hasn’t reached for anyone, and really is clingy to me when other adults are around!  Yeah!! We are so happy!

 

Amy