Living in the bubble free zone

I remember as if it were yesterday. My 6th grade teacher gave us the daunting assignment of writing our own epitaph. Say what?!?!? How is an 11 year old girl supposed to know what she wants written on her gravestone? Yet, I remember it so vividly.
Here lies the body of K. Moore. Like a hot air balloon, now deflated, lies her body, limp and shriveled, returning to the ground from whence it came. But her passing will not go unnoticed. For like ripples on a pond, affected by a stone, she touched the lives of others.
Pretty dang poignant for a 6th grader, don’t you think? I remember even as a little girl feeling as though I had a direct line to God. These words reflect the calling He had for my life, the calling that still stands true today. I tell my students I want to live my life so that there’s standing room only at my funeral. I want my life to matter, to make an impact, to be meaningful.
In a society that is so far gone from focusing on the meaningful, this is tough to do. We prefer to live in our protective little bubbles, shielded from the harsh realities of the fallen world we live in. Inside the bubble of suburbia, we feel safe, protected, a false sense of security that isn’t real or of value. And yet this is where we choose to reside. I chose living in the bubble for many years, but now the bubble is gone and for the first time in my life, I feel like I am really alive.
When I look back on the last 40 years of my life, I can recall times when God would give me glimpses of life outside the bubble. Like the first time I went on a mission trip to Juarez, Mexico and I saw the true meaning of living in poverty for the very first time. The people we ministered to contained a joy and sense of gratitude I had not witnessed before. The struggle to survive was so real and it opened my eyes to see how blessed I truly was.
One of the most real times in my life is when I gave birth to my first and only biological child who was born 10 weeks premature. At that time, nothing else mattered to me except him living and surviving the trauma of entering the world before his tiny and precious body was ready to function on its own. I remember feeling so isolated on that journey because I didn’t feel like my friends and family could understand how deep was my worry and concern for my precious son. Even though I had the love and support of many, it was my faith in God that saw me through this most difficult time.
There have been many bumps along the way: losing my job, secondary infertility, chronic migraines causing daily physical pain and suffering for the last 10 years. Each of these trials has driven me and pushed me closer to fulfilling my calling in life; to be utterly, totally, and completely dependent on Him.
No one said it would be easy. And no one said it’d be this hard. The final bubble popping moment came on May 29, 2015, the day we took in our first foster placement. Today marks the 4 month anniversary of that date, the day our lives changed forever. The day the bubble burst and we were shoved head first into a world we had never known. A world of sadness, a world of darkness, a world of sin so deep and all consuming that all rational thought is thrown on the back burner and lives are driven totally by their sinful nature.
Even though I have walked through the valley of the shadow of death and have faced many trials and tribulations along the way, I had not ever fully understood the evil that existed in our world until we became foster parents. Now the knowledge and awareness of how desperately our world is in need of a savior is in our faces, full out, day in and day out. I want so badly for my faith to be deep enough for me to believe these people can change and be saved. I pray for the parents of our foster children that they will find the love of Christ and be healed as only He can heal. I pray their hearts will be mended from the pain and suffering and abuse they endured as children. I pray that they will choose life, choose their children, and choose to be made well again.
I feel like I’m failing daily to fully trust in Him, to remember that greater is He who is in me, than he who is in the world. This journey has pushed the limits of my faith to places I never knew existed before and I want to let go and let God and scream at the top of my lungs, “Jesus, take the wheel!” And yet, I find myself still holding tight to this false sense of control we think we have. It’s as if I think that by fully letting go, I will surrender to something that will control me. I know in my heart God is calling me to release my fears, anxieties, and doubts and to trust Him fully to work it all out for good, but I’m not always able.
It is a moment to moment striving. It is a constant reminding of my inner spirit that He called me to it and therefore He has equipped me for it. It is a choice to pick up my cross and follow Him, even though my flesh wants to go back in the bubble and pretend like all is well in the world.
Trust me when I say there is no pride in me for what we are doing. If anything, I feel more humble than ever before. If it were truly up to me, we would have quit on day 2, but His power is made perfect in my weakness for when I am weak, then He is strong. The constant battle within my mind is, “We can do this,” and then moments later, “No we can’t.” It is exhausting and invigorating all at the same time. It is a constant back and forth of trusting Him, and then forgetting to do so and suffering the pain and misery because of that choice. It is one moment of being stretched so thin you feel like you will snap, to the next moment of feeling the depth of His love and His power at work in our lives and in the lives of those He has brought to us.
I pray for strength and wisdom every day. I pray for protection over my family. I pray for healing for my weaknesses and sins. Will you please pray for me too, and for our family, and for our foster child and her brother, and for the parents of these foster children?
I pray you will ask God to bring you a bubble popping experience too. I pray for strength for you to carry out whatever His will is for your life. I pray that you will know of His great love for you and that in the end, nothing else matters.
For God has not given me a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of sound mind. – 2 Timothy 1:7
Kristin