Cookie Cutter Calling

"Hi.  I am a homeschooling mom and we are adopting."

Double whamee.

It's not unusual during a lengthy conversation with someone who doesn't know me well, that these 2 things end up coming out...not usually in the same sentence...but quite predictably, when one or the other does (or both do), I instantly get a reaction.  The minority tell me they think it's great and then we get to have a conversation about how God is working in each of our lives.  The majority give me one of a few different responses: 

      - Some grimace or groan and inwardly (the bold aren't so inward) start questioning my sanity or my abilities or both.

     - Some say they admire me...I wish they wouldn't.  I'm simply doing what I know God has called me to do.  My days are like their days, a mixed bag of success and failure, just with more regular chaos.

     - And then some start giving me reasons why they don't homeschool or why it just doesn't make sense for them to adopt...etc, etc. 

For this last group, I grieve.  Where Satan can sow seeds of doubt, he sows.  Where Satan can tear Christians down, he tears.  He loves to plant all kinds of confusion and guilt.

I recently had a conversation with a wonderful Godly woman who is devoted to loving her husband and raising her children to the glory of God.  When she asked what I had been doing recently, I replied that I had been filling out paperwork for our upcoming adoption.  Her eyes darted to the floor and then she started telling me (in rapid style) how wonderful adoption is, how much she admires those who adopt (ugh), and how she just doesn't see how it could possibly work for their family.  She quickly produced evidence upon evidence for how her family supports ministries that care for impoverished children, but adoption just wouldn't work....

When she stopped to take a breath I smiled and said, "Andrew and I prayed for a long time for God's clear guidance before we said yes to adopt because frankly, peer-pressure and guilt are fine motivators for short term missions trips...not so much for life decisions."

I think I saw her breathe.  A deep, relieved, "Oh good, your not judging me" type of breath.

 See, I'm convinced that God doesn't issue cookie cutter callings.

No, I don't think I'm some special, unique snowflake.  But my relationship with my Heavenly Father is intimate.  He called me, individually, to follow Him.  And while God calls all of His children to obediently follow Him (through Christ alone), He has not given each of us the same path to follow.  It's not shocking we have a hard time understanding this concept - the Disciple Peter did too (check it out at the end of the book of John), but I do think it's sad.

Should more Christians be caring for widows and orphans?  Yes.  Should more be deeply invested in their children's schooling and education?  Yes.  But, outside of praying for God to move more hearts, my hands are full enough figuring out how God has called me and my family to behave in these spaces and live out that calling to figure out how God is calling others.  Period.