I woke up with these words playing through my head, “I wish you could come with me.” Ben knew he was going to heaven and he talked about it more and more as we got closer to his death. None of us had any clue that Ben was so close to death. He was happier and healthier than we had seen him in his whole life. But I guess God was whispering to him and preparing him. I remember in the latter days when he would talk about going to heaven to see Jesus he would look so excited. Then his face would drop and he would look at me and say, ” I wish you could come with me.” “I know baby! I wish I could come too. Wait for me, I will be there soon!” I know it will seem soon for him, but for me, it seems like an eternity.

I am excited to share with you that God has brought a blessing to us, a new daughter. This whole process has been amazing, to see God work out every detail, to bring her to us. She is a 12 year old girl originally from China. She came to us from her first adoptive family here in the States. She is beautiful and wonderful.

Her first family were Buddhists but they requested that she be placed in a Christian family. Before they transfered her to us this weekend they gave her a children’s Bible and told her that we would pray before meals and go to church on Sundays. The first night she was with us she excitedly showed us her little Bible. She turned to the page of Jesus’ birth and pointed to him saying, “This is Jesus!” We talked about who Jesus was and it was all new to her. Flying home we talked about who created the clouds in the sky. She struggled to remember the name, “Go….d”.

Today I was teaching the kids a song that they will sing in church this weekend. It is “Nothing But the Blood of Jesus”. We talked about our sin and how we needed someone to pay the price we could not pay. We talked about how Jesus died to pay that price and that because of Him we have hope and peace. Then we got to the end of the song and she was so excited  about Jesus returning, she said, “Jesus is coming back?!!!!”

Our grief is fresher than ever now. I don’t know if it is because we relieved the adoption experience this weekend or if it is just because we hit the two month mark. Or maybe a combination of both. How divinely appointed that we would bring home our new child on June 11th, just two months to the day since we sent our son ahead to heaven? She is also developmentally delayed and in many ways reminds me of Ben. It is only by the power of Jesus that I am able to experience the love and excitement of adding another child into our home while also very much experiencing the grief of another child leaving our home. It is all to big for me to comprehend let alone communicate here.

Emmeline and May still talk about Ben going to heaven like it happened yesterday. They both talk often about how they miss him and want him to come back. When we were planning the trip, to go bring our new girl home, Emme was excited about having a new sister but she wanted to know why I can’t go on a plane and bring Ben too. This morning at breakfast she was talking again about how much she missed Ben. She said, ” I miss Jesus and Ben! I want to go to heaven with them!” Our new girl, who is new to the idea of Jesus and heaven, asked, “Is it far to get to heaven?” It is hard to explain this to them but reading the words to “Nothing But the Blood” reminds us that we have this hope to see Ben again because of the sacrifice Jesus made for us. I want to live in light of that. Jesus gave everything so that I might have life. I want to live the life He has prepared for me here on earth and I long everyday for Him to return, and to begin living eternal life with Him, when I will once again hold my baby boy.

 

 Only The Blood  

Adapted from the Hymn “Nothing but the Blood” by Robert Lowry (1876).

 Additional Words and Music by Jeff Capps, Michael Bleecker, Taylor Johnson,

               Lauren Chandler, Josh Drew, John Warren and Isaac Wimberley

What can wash away my sin,        Only the blood of Jesus

What can make me whole again,     Only the blood of Jesus 

 

Nothing can for sin atone,   Only the blood of Jesus

Nothing good that I have done, Only the blood of Jesus

O Great God, blessed Redeemer,  Merciful Savior You are

O Great God, King of creation,      Hope of the nations You are

This is all my hope and peace,        Only the blood of Jesus

This is all my righteousness,    Only the blood of Jesus 

 

You are… Gracious in saving

You are… Perfect in loving

You are… One day returning You are       

One day returning You are

One day returning You are

What can wash away my sin, Only the blood of Jesus

 © 2010 Blepo Publishing (ASCAP), Bleecker at The Village (ASCAP),

Taylor Scott Johnson (ASCAP), Lauren Chandler, Joshua Drew (BMI),

John Warren, Isaac Wimberley. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

CCLI #5876334

THE VILLAGE CHURCH

WWW.THEVILLAGECHURCH.NET

 

Just wanted to post a quick update to say we are still here! The move is completed and Mat has begun studies at the seminary. This move was by far the hardest ever! It had this creepy feeling like we were moving on and starting a new life without Ben. My parents still live next door to our old apartment so we still visit the area a couple times a week. I wonder if the park across the street where we watched Ben play for the last time will always feel like home?

This Monday, five weeks since we said goodbye to Ben, we are burdened with the  stress of moving and revisiting the overwhelming grief that I thought we had worked through. We are moving to a new house, one that six weeks ago we all would have been excited about. But with Ben gone and so many reminders of him left in our apartment, this is a very difficult move. I appreciate your prayers as we try to make this transition and find some hope in the future before us. We have plenty of good things to look ahead for, but I also feel a since of obligation to myself and Ben to allow for this time of grieving over the past.

So today marks one month, four mondays, since Ben died. I was dreading this day, thinking that tons of emotions would be attached. God’s grace was good this morning. When I woke up I couldn’t remember what day it was. Then I remembered it was Monday. The next thought came quickly, ” Hmm…it doesn’t feel like Monday.” The other three Monday’s have been so hard, I wondered if Mondays would ever be the same again. Today was ok. I didn’t even realize as God was working some amazing healing in my heart this weekend that He was helping prepare me for this Monday.

This weekend I enjoyed taking the kids camping alone while Mat was working on his final exams. We had a nice time together. We sat around the fire Sat. night and talked about Ben. It was hard for the older boys to talk about him. They both said they didn’t want to think about him because it makes them cry. I encouraged them that we are sad because we love him and it is good to let ourselves be sad and even cry. Our littlest one is so excited to talk about Ben at any chance. Every time I read the Bible to the kids she gets excited and points to the words and says, “Jesus and Ben!” My four year old has some delays and she seems to have the hardest time understanding. Today, she came to me randomly while I was packing. She says, “I don’t want to see Ben’s body.” It seemed so random and her speech is delayed so I wasn’t sure if I understood her. I asked her to repeat what she said. She said it again and I realized she was talking about when she came to say goodbye to Ben after he had died. How did she even know to call it “his body”? I thought the two little ones just thought he was asleep. But she seemed clear that it was just his body. I asked her if that was what she meant and she said yes. I asked her if it scared her when she saw Ben’s body and she said “YES!!!! That is why my face was like this________”, she makes a shocked scared face.  It was really kinda funny which seems out of place but I have to admit that it that the face she made was kinda funny. I talked to her about why his body was here and he wasn’t. Not sure how much she understands but then she just talked about her body and showed me her skin etc. saying this is my body?

So that’s where we are on this fourth Monday.

Things have been pretty tough since my last post. I just miss my little boy so much! It is still hard for my brain to comprehend that he is really gone. It seems strange to me because I am an adult who knew what was coming, knows where he is, and still my heart and mind have such a hard time believing that I will not see him again in this lifetime.

I have developed through my life a way to manage pain. I have been through a fair share of pain from being sick in childhood, struggling through very difficult pregnancies, going through 6 heart surgeries and multiple hospitalizations with my children. I learned in childhood to  to focus on the end point, the point when the pain would stop. I fine tuned and strengthened this coping technique into adulthood. No matter how hard the hospitalization was, I knew there would be a day when we would go home and life would be normal again. Now, there is no end point and this is the worst pain I have ever known. I know that there will be no way to restore what has been lost until I die or Jesus returns. So, I find myself in church pleading with Jesus to return soon. “We need you Jesus! Please come back!” Then, I hear His gentle voice speak to my heart, “I’m already here.” I cry out to Him, “I need you to hold me!” No sooner have I finished this prayer than I hear the band begin to play this song:

You Hold Me Now

On that day when I see
All that You have for me
When I see You face to face
There surrounded by Your grace

All my fears swept away
In the light of your embrace
When Your love is all I need
And forever I am free

Where the streets are made of gold
In Your presence here to hold
Let these songs of heaven rise to you alone

No weeping, no hurt or pain
No suff’ring You hold me now
You hold me now
No darkness no sickening
No hiding You hold me now, 
You hold me now

In this life fin’lly stand
Through my joy and my pain
Knowing there’s a greater day
There’s a hope that never fails

When You’re name is lifted high
And forever praises last
For the glory of Your Name
I’ll be livin’ for the day

When the world has finally cease
All creation rest in peace
Let these songs of heaven rise to you alone

No weeping, no hurt or pain
No suff’ring You hold me now
You hold me now
No darkness no sickening
No hiding You hold me now, 
You hold me now

I think I need a new focal point. I can’t focus on when this pain will end and when life will return to normal, so I have no choice but to focus on Jesus and know that God is holding me and carrying me through this life until I am granted to privilege of joining Ben in heaven and all suffering will finally end.

I am sorry you can watch the video! But I thought I would post some pictures from our trip to bring Ben home.

I found this video tonight. I made this video shortly after Ben arrived home with us and sent it out to all of the people who financially supported our adoption. I haven’t talked much about Ben’s life and it seems appropriate to start at the beginning. How did we come to bring this amazing little boy home to our family? In short, God prepared the path we would follow well before Benjamin was even born. I (Elizabeth) grew up in a family blessed through adoption. I am the oldest of six kids and the only child who did not join the family through adoption (I am a bio kid). If it were not for adoption, I would have been an only child. Benefitting personally from the blessing of adoption, and witnessing first hand the needs of the orphans, God prepared my heart for special needs adoption from a young age. I also believe that God prepared me for special needs adoption through my own childhood illness. I grew up with a very severe, almost debilitating skin condition accompanied by a systemic autoimmune disease. I know how hard it is to suffer physical pain as a child but I was blessed to be born to parents who loved me and were equipped to care for me. After visiting a special needs orphanage as a teenager, I could not stop thinking about the special needs kids who would grow up suffering alone and was haunted by the fear that these kids would always wonder if it was because of their special need that no one could love them.

For my husband, God began to prepare his heart for adoption by first demonstrating His own love by adopting Mathew as his son during his teen years. After being amazed by the love of His new savior, Mat began to develop a heart of compassion towards the lonely, hurting, and downtrodden.

Mat and I met and married in a matter of 6 months. During this short time we discussed options for growing our family. We both hoped that adoption would be a part of God’s plan for our family. We were soon surprised to find out we were expecting a honeymoon baby. This baby, our first son, would be born with a congenital heart defect and would require surgery at birth. Only six months after bringing our first baby home from the hospital we started talking about adoption. As it would turn out, God did put another baby on our hearts but it would not be through adoption yet. We were again surprised to find out that we were expecting another boy. This pregnancy would run through a frightening, life-threatening course. After giving birth to a second premature baby it really seemed to us that we were done having biological children and started making plans to adopt. We started the adoption process looking to adopt a child with a limb difference, birth deformity, or orthopedic condition. We already had one heart baby and we were hoping to adopt a child with a condition that would not require frequent hospitalizations. We found a young girl in Russia who met this description. We began her adoption process. A few months into the adoption process we found out we were pregnant again. In my heart, I knew this pregnancy would not go to term and so we waited until making it past the first trimester before we finally made the difficult decision to pass this adoption on to another family. The day after we officially handed over the adoption I found out that I was miscarrying. It was very hard to understand at the time but I am able to look back now and know that God was saving my arms for another child.

We took a couple of months to grieve the loss of both of these children before we considered going back to the adoption process. Again, God was preparing our hearts for a baby but we started out by pursuing an adoption from the wrong country. God made it clear to us in our hearts that the baby we had been assigned was not the right child for us and we made a painful decision to deny the referral. You might think that we were off the path when we decided to go through the adoption process for this other country. But what I can see now is that we were on the right path but we had the wrong destination in mind. God used all of the steps we had taken in that process to prepare us for the child that He had chosen.

So, how did we end up in Korea? Three of my siblings are Korean and we would have loved to adopt from Korea but unfortunately, at the time, I was not old enough to meet the Korea requirements. So we had not considered Korea at that time. One day I tried to google something and somehow found myself at the WACAP waiting children’s page. I casually flipped through the pictures of the waiting babies. And there was a picture of our Ben! He was listed as having a congenital heart defect. The agency didn’t really understand all that his heart defect entailed so they just posted one of the defects in his description. The defect they listed was they same one our biological son had. When I saw his picture and read his profile my heart sank. I wish I could say that my heart jumped and I knew that he was my son, but I have to be honest. Something in my heart knew from that profile that he was my son but the thought of going through more heart surgeries seemed so heavy.

I called the agency to get more information. I told them that our biological son had the same heart defect and asked if they would consider us even though I was too young. I don’t remember  how the rest of the process played out but I do remember the conversation I had on the phone with the cardiologist while we were making the decision to adopt him. Here is a quote from what I shared at the funeral,

“ I remember when we were making the decision to adopt Ben. I remember the call from the cardiologist who had reviewed his file. She told me that best-case scenario he would live to be 20, worst case he might only live to be 2 years old. My heart sank and I immediately thought this was obviously not the child God had chosen for us. I couldn’t have imagined anything harder than loosing a child and I knew God wouldn’t be asking us to do that. But just as quickly as that thought came, it was replaced by another. ”We can walk away from this and for us it will all go away, but for him it will not. He will go through this alone and will die alone in an orphanage.” I cannot imagine how much we would have missed if we had decided to walk away. Sure, we would have missed a lot of pain and suffering, but we also would have missed the joy. I wouldn’t have missed these 5 years for anything. I don’t know why, but God chose us to be Ben’s family and I am so grateful that He did. I didn’t get to hold him when he was born, but I am so honored to be the mother who held him while he died.  ”

Everyone tells us, “You were so brave!” “You were so kind!” We really were not. I was so scared when we went to get him. Looking back at this video reminds me of how overwhelmed I felt when they brought him in to meet us and his coloring was so blue from lack of oxygen. When we walked away from that first meeting I felt like I was drowning in fear. I cried out to God and He reminded me of Peter walking on the water to Jesus. When Peter was focused on Jesus he stayed on top of the water. But when he started looking around and focusing on his circumstances, he started to sink. Jesus comforted me and reminded me to keep my focus on Him and He would keep us afloat. I held on to those words all through the scary path of ups and downs that Ben’s life would lead us through.

People keep talking about how Ben was our “adopted son”. That phrase has always been difficult for me but it is harder than ever to hear him described in that way. Yes, he came to us through adoption and I am happy to share with you his adoption story, but he was never my “adopted son”. When I look back at this video I hear the same words that have pierced my heart since that morning on April 11, 2011, when my son lay dead in my arms, “MY BABY IS GONE!” He was my baby! He is my son! I only wish I could have loved him more while he was here with us. The time goes by so fast! Even just looking at the pictures of our older boys reminds me of how short childhood is, how quickly they grow, and how quickly our lives are gone.

I am new to the blogging world but from what I understand this is a place for free speech, were I am able to share my own personal views. So I am going to say something that may offend some of you but it is said out of love and a desire for good for each of you. Mothers, your time with your children is SO short! Don’t waste it worrying about what others think, don’t miss today because you are too concerned about tomorrow or held back by regret, and don’t trade the precious time that you have with them for any career or cause.

And for those who don’t know Jesus as savior, don’t put it off until tomorrow because there is no gaurantee that tomorrow will come. And even if it does, life is hard and there is no need to bear that weight alone. We are all like the orphans who suffer through life alone. But you have a heavenly father who is waiting to adopt you and hold you through the pain.

Click here to watch the video…..I have no idea why I left so much empty space at the end of the video. Oh how I wish that I could add pictures from Ben’s heavenly welcome home! I am believing that Ben will be the one waiting to welcome me home when my time comes.

The sadness is heavy today. I think it must show on my face because my baby keeps looking up at me and saying, “Mommy, you crying? You want Ben?” She still isn’t eating real meals. She just snacks on fruit and takes little bites at meals. I think she is having the hardest time with Ben gone.

My brother Noah made this video with pictures of Ben. I wish you all could have known him but this video will let you see a little bit of his life.

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