"He's a hurting child..."

This has been a phrase I've had to repeat over and over in my head a lot this month. It's something that I knew, but never completely understood the ramifications of until the beginning of this month.

You see... my husband and I are helping out some friends who have been in an awful adoption process for about five years now. It should be over soon, but the kids are a lot older now and have been really hurt from this process. They may not even truly believe that it's going to happen. It's this thing that keeps getting talked about, but it's not real. That's why we are here. In Mexico. We are helping to start the transition, helping to show them that it is real and they will get to be with their parents soon.

But people who have only felt hurt or abandoned their whole lives are hard to connect with, hard to get close to, difficult to change and accept change. They fight those feelings the only way they know how: trying to control whatever makes them feel safe.

While I am not a perfect person, I didn't realize exactly how unprepared and inexperienced I was for this task until we started to have problems. I trusted God to provide the tools and skills I needed, but He needed to show me my inexperience and unpreparedness before He could equip me better. I thought too highly of myself. I was trusting myself more than I was trusting God.

That's why I was hurt and embarrassed by his cutting, insulting words. A child's words. A child who has been through more serious and damaging things than I have experienced in my 24 years of life. He's hurting in more ways than I will ever know or understand.

Only the hand of God can reach that, touch that, begin to change that.

How dare I to even think I could do it on my own?

I am an arrogant, selfish person sometimes. Only the grace of God can make me anything else.