When God Says No

I was trying to decide on a title for this post. Originally I was going to call it the Black Friday Hustle and you’ll see why in a moment. But this title seemed appropriate when on Saturday morning I read Our Daily Bread, which talked about dealing with disappointment of wanting something and God says no, at least for a moment.

On this past Friday, Black Friday, Ted and I were sitting at our kitchen table, finishing our dinner (leftovers of course). I got a text on my phone. Initially it was hard for me to decipher. I thought it was one of those messages telling me that my entry had one, when I hadn’t entered for anything. But it wasn’t. It was a cold-call. A healthy, biracial baby boy had been born on Thanksgiving and the mother decided to make an adoption plan. She wanted to choose the family that night and wanted to meet the family on Saturday, the planned day of discharge for the baby. Once I focused and was able to decipher the message, I think I screamed, jumped up and down. I’m not really sure, but I was excited. I didn’t recognize the number so that added to the confusion. In the midst of my excitement I tried to tell Ted, rather incoherently what the message said. I texted and responded that we were interested because they needed a response by 6 pm, we got the message at 4:44 pm. It was like being in an emergency situation and you forget all of your training. I told Ted to call the number back and he says but you should go to the portal. I’m thinking I don’t think so, but I did and he called the number back. It was the head of the agency so that assured us that it was a real message. She told us she got our message and that correspondences were by phone for cold-calls. She would send us updates on the progress of the situation.

We were instantly in a whirlwind of thoughts and activity. I paced the floor, with a million thoughts. Ted sat and tried to appear calm. I looked around the house and distressed over the disorganization and the dust. Oh and the the baby’s room. While we have furniture, it is nowhere near ready at least to our satisfaction. We haven’t painted or decorated and we don’t have a glider yet. I would need a glider to rock the baby. All these things were flooding my brain. We didn’t know whether to wait to hear anything or whether to take action and be prepared just in case. We chose the latter.

We rushed to the bank before it closed to withdraw the placement costs. When we returned home, we did the most important preparation of all. We prayed. We prayed and anointed the baby’s room with consecrated oil and the furniture in it. And we anointed each other. We prayed for God’s will above all else. We wanted this to work, but we knew we had to yield to His will. After we prayed and wiped our tears, we settled back down. But only for a moment. I pulled up our registries to see what we needed. Just about everything. We didn’t even have diapers. We only had samples of diapers and formula from classes and registry enrollment gifts. At 6:07, we were notified that the profiles of the interested families were delivered to the hospital and that the mother may make a decision as late as tomorrow morning.

Ted went downstairs to watch football and to pretend like it was just another evening. I told him I needed to call someone. He cautioned that we should wait. I agreed although it was hard. We decided that we would wait to go to the store until we heard something. But I couldn’t sit still so I decided to go to Babies R Us to purchase essentials. My thinking was what if we were chosen and we had to pick up the baby the next day, we would need diapers and formula at least. It seemed logical. Ted made sure I had my phone in case the agency called. He wanted me to act like it was going to happen and that our prayers were finally answered.

I was driving down 270 and I pulled my phone out of my purse. I usually have it out but I was in such a rush, I forgot to take it out. I removed it from my purse I could hear any call. My music was up a little loud which is typical. I didn’t hear my phone but I saw a message pop up. It was 7:50 pm. It was a text from the agency again providing another update. The update we didn’t want. I didn’t have time to cry, I was on the highway and it was dark. I was going to turn around but I decided we would need stuff at some point so I proceeded. I texted a sad face to Ted. No words were needed.

This was one of the most difficult store trips in my life. I was in a bit of a daze. I tried to focus and get the essential items. I succeeded but it was painful. Not only dealing with the disappointment of what had just happened and buying things for some date that is unknown. But there were very happy pregnant women in the store with their husbands/boyfriends and it was a like a double reminder of what has yet to happen in my life and our lives. It was almost unbearable.

I have yet to shed tear. I’m sure it will hit me when I least expect it as most grief does for me. But when Ted and I prayed we were very clear in our petition. That whatever baby is ours let it be clear to us that this is the one. Let the birthmother pass us by if that is not our baby. I don’t claim to have a direct line to God or always know when He’s speaking to me. All year we have been claiming to have a baby by the end of the year. I felt that the baby we would have would be via a cold call and that it would be a boy. Perhaps I’m mistaken or maybe we’ll get a call on Dec. 31 at 11:59 pm. Who knows. One thing we cannot do is lose heart and faith. We are confident that this is indeed what God has called us to do. We are to press in and not turn away from His guidance and wisdom. Because right now, we need it more than ever.

Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see. – Hebrews 11:1 NLT