Well, well, well. Today is the day. The one year mark. A major hurdle. Ask me if it seems like a year, and if I'm honest I'll say I don't know. Sometimes it seems like just yesterday. Sometimes it feels like it has always been this way. The last year has seen its share of scars, bumps and bruises. We have crawled, walked, run, stumbled, staggered, fallen and gotten back up again. From learning to communicate to learning our love languages, it has been quite an adventure. But there is something about the one year mark that seems binding. Permanent. Not that we ever thought of this as anything other. But there is security in having a year behind you and not only surviving it but enjoying it. Enjoying the building of the relationship. Enjoying the journey. Enjoying the process, the learning, the growing, the ever-deepening sense of family. We are secure in the knowledge that God has given us, through sad circumstance, a beautiful child; and that having him as part of our family has somehow made our family more whole. I can't say that this whole thing was intended or planned. I don't think God WANTED Noah's father to die, or for him to be separated from his mother due to circumstances beyond her control. What I do think is that in the midst of a broken world, God placed it within our hearts to be there for him and for his mother, and placed people in our lives who were willing to help us help them. I think that God has allowed us the privilege of taking this precious child of His into our family, allowing us to love one another as one of our own. And not only that, but to love Him as Christ commanded us to love. This has been an amazing year, a blessed year. And we pray that as we celebrate Thanksgiving with our family and our church family and all those who have borne us up and supported us and loved us, that we will have the appreciation due them. God, thank You so much for allowing us to be part of Your plan to pursue love in a broken world!
