Learning From The Adoption Process

Those of you who know Shay and I know that we are "somewhere" in the adoption process. I wanted to do something different with this posting by sharing some of what I am learning through this process so far. As you will see, I think there is a great leadership lesson what we are experiencing as we wait.

The background of this tale is that Shay and I started the paperwork for adoption from China 3+ years ago. When we started the paperwork, families were taking nine months to go from approval to travel to get their child. By the time our paperwork was approved, families at that moment were waiting twelve months. We have been waiting almost 30 months since our paperwork was approved.

Here is what I have learned: adoption takes a long time! Just kidding.

I think I have learned a couple of important lessons as we have navigated this process so far. The first lesson is on patience. I have never been a patient person. I get bored easily on many things, so waiting around is not one of my strong points. I'm not known as a patient person.

As the months have accumulated, I realized God may be trying to teach me something. So, I decided to do a little word study on patience. I realized that patience is an attribute of God. It is most often associated with His desire to forgive, but it is used in how He deals with His children when they are disobedient as well.

Since God desires that I be conformed into the image of His Son, God has used this experience to develop this attribute in my life. As I have had the discussion with people over the last few months about the adoption process, many have commented at how patient Shay and I have been throughout the process. In other words, people are seeing in me (Shay was already a patient person) an attribute of God that was not present before this experience. (Kind of cool if you think about it.)

Which leads to the other thing I've learned and the leadership lesson for all of us. I did not set out to develop patience. Heck, I never pray and ask God for patience. I figure the only way He can answer that prayer is to make me wait on something, which I don't like to do. Yet, God has developed this attribute in me.

How? Shay and I had already settled a couple of important issues at the beginning of the adoption process. We knew God had clearly called us to adopt, and He called us to adopt from China. Once those items were settled, the process and timing was out of our hands. We were responsible to say "Yes" to adopting and to discern where He wanted us to adopt from. Everything else, like timing and processes, are tools in accomplishing the mission. Waiting does not seem like an "optional" part of the process since it is part of adopting from China (not that we knew the wait time in advance.) I did not even recognize it as patience until recently because my focus has been on the mission of getting our child from China, not the circumstances surrounding the process.

This is the crux of the lesson. If you know what God has called you to do (mission/vision), then everything else that occurs is part of the process of helping you toward fulfilling the mission. Some of that stuff will be positive and some of it negative, but none of it catches God by surprise.

Victor Frankl wrote one of the greatest books I have ever read, Man's Search For Meaning, that touches on this issue. Though not a Christian, he identifies that every person needs a future hope to help him live in the present. Frankl was a prisoner in a concentration camp during World War II. He talks about how a person with a why can endure almost any how.

Shay and I can endure the wait time because our focus is on what lies at the end of the wait, Elizabeth. We are focused on the mission assigned to us. For us, the wait time is part of accomplishing the mission. If we didn't have the "payoff" at the end of the wait time, we would have quit a long time ago.

I would suggest you determine what your "whys" are in your life. What is your mission? Let God show you that and decide to pursue that mission(s) whole-heartedly. You will be able to endure any of the obstacles is you know what the target is at the end of the journey.

The same is true for your work. Be clear as to what the mission/vision for your work is and pursue it. Decisions should be filtered through the question, "Does this help me accomplish the mission or hurt me in accomplishing the mission?" A "yes" answer means you should pursue that option, and a "no" answer means you reject that option.

Mission/vision are critical in accomplishing the purposes God has for your life. Once you settle these issues, the obstacles and roadblocks seem much less daunting and discouraging.