What Does it Mean?

“Mommy and Daddy are coming very soon to take you home!”

These are the words that have been repeated often at the foster home lately. As we prepare for adoptions this month, one of my roles is preparing the children to be adopted. To joint their forever family and meet their “baba” and “mama.” The families that God has prepared for them.

Tonight I was praying over one particular little girl who will be leaving us and joining her parents in just a few short days. However, as I was praying, I stopped suddenly as a frightening thought entered my mind. We keep telling her that “baba and mama are coming soon!” and she gets this huge grin on her face. But as I think about it, does she even know what “mommy” and “daddy” mean? What is her image of parents? She doesn’t have any. She was abandoned at a few months of age, spent a few months in an orphanage and was then brought to us…. where she has about 12 “mama’s” and 1 “baba.” They rotate in and out of her life with the shift change. That is not normal. She is not attached to one particular “mama.”

How long will it take for her to realize that this new mama is different? That this one is never going to leave her but is her forever mama? How long will it take for her to trust her with her fragile heart? One that has become attached so many times and had those people taken away from her?

As I pray for all our kids, I pray that God will settle a peace around their hearts. And not only a peace but a trusting spirit. I pray that she will KNOW there is something different about this mama. That this is a mama who is never going to leave her. And more importantly that she knows that the Lord will never leave her.

“I will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be discouraged, do not be afraid.”
(Deuteronomy 31:8)

Lord, give her a spirit of peace. A peace that comes from you. That she will know that it’s ok to trust and to love. I pray that she will feel your strength especially in those first few days. That she will know that these are parents who will always be with her and even more importantly that she has a Heavenly Father who has and will always be with her.