A Rollercoaster of Emotions...

So here's the thing... thousands of years ago, God created this amazing world... But sadly, we blew it... We chose our own way over His and frankly, He owed us NOTHING... Anything He did from that point on, that moment of choice in the Garden of Eden, was just an act of sheer mercy! We don't deserve anything good, but thankfully, He chooses to bless us with good anyway... Jesus... and answered prayer...

Today, I have been overwhelmed with His goodness... First, I got news that my new cousin, born on June 30, was scheduled to go home from the hospital... I haven't heard the final word yet, but she is out of NICU and doing better... prayers have been answered...

A bloggy friend is making her 18 hour drive home, with her sweet husband... It's been a scary few days with him in the hospital...

And Scott will think I'm making too big of a deal out of this, but he knows that I tend to under-react to situations...

On the day that Nick broke his collarbone (he's doing great by the way), Scott was playing softball. He slid into base and really tore up the side of his leg... It looked like your typical strawberry kind of injury, but it got infected... It was really nasty... It had boils on it, YUK! Thursday night he spiked a really high fever and woke up with knee and ankle pain... The doctor started him on antibiotics (for him to go to the doctor, it's bad...) and he was instructed to watch it really closely and head straight for the ER if anything changed... We probably should have gone yesterday...

Yesterday morning it looked better, but by the afternoon, it didn't look so good again... Last night in the middle of the night, he woke up with a terrible headache... I was really worried. But this morning, you could see a NOTICEABLE improvement!! Needless to say, I didn't sleep much... But again, God in His mercy, saw fit to provide His healing power and we sent to see
'Up' instead (What a GREAT movie)...

So where's the rollercoaster? It's Abby... My head knows she's making tremendous progress...

She seeks me out...she asks me everything...she draws and colors the most BEAUTIFUL pictures for me and they almost always say, "I love you..." But my mommy's heart is really struggling...

In case you haven't figured it out by now, I'm a hugger... Nothing can make the world right faster, than a good hug... A few weeks ago, I was scheduled to speak at our women's summer event at church...I hugged Scott good-bye as I was leaving, and it so calmed my heart, so I asked him, "Do you think they would think it was odd if you went with me and I spoke to them over your shoulder as I hugged you?" That's the power of a hug for me! (By the way, I didn't take him with me and I was fine... God was more than sufficient and I had a blast!)

But you get the idea, hugs are crucial for me...I'm just an affectionate person. So Abby's refusal to be affectionate is really hard and as I grow to love her more and more, it's becoming harder and harder. For the last few weeks, my arms have physically ached to just scoop her up in my arms and hold her...

I respect her space and settle for my bedtime hugs, but today was so hard... She didn't really like our traditional 4th of July dinner... Scott's homemade ribs (AWESOME) and fresh corn... from there...she just kept telling me how fireworks in China were so much better... Later, as we were watching tv, I asked her if I could sit with her, the response I got, "I don't care." I decided to just stay put...

But a little while later, she invited me to sit with her and my heart soared...the emotions...up and down and up again...

I know, you may be thinking, "Why do you give her so much control?" Fair question... But I've learned from observing my Heavenly Father, He doesn't force Himself onto us...and I'm not going to force myself onto Abby.

I have so much to give her... She is missing so much, but until she sees that for herself, it won't mean a thing to her. I try to give her a taste of it from time to time, but I will not force it on her...

And it really makes me think about me and my Abba Father...

It pierces my heart to offer Abby myself, and have it rejected over and over... To know that she is missing out on so much, because she refuses to let down the walls of her heart... And I am just like her...

I've written about this before, but it is fresh in my mind as I'm reading a book called "No Other gods..." by Kelly Minter... China for Abby is Egypt for the Israelites... is idols... shopping, food, whatever...for me... In so many ways, I keep looking at God and telling Him, "China was better..." Maybe not with my words, but definitely with my actions...

I am so thankful for His incredible mercy, demonstrated in so many wonderful answers to prayer, but my heart is broken as I continue to see, so clearly, through Abby, how I choose everything else over Him...