One of these days—when our kids aren’t pulling us in so many directions—I will have an amazing vegetable garden. When the month of May isn’t so “May-I-please-sit-down-for-a-minute?!” I will find the time to really get in there and get my hands dirty. My garden will have enviably rich soil in the most perfect location to receive optimal sunlight. I will water and care for my plants, nurturing them into adulthood as I examine their leaves for signs of sickness or insect invasion. They will grow beautifully and reward us with an abundance of tomatoes and beans and melons and cucumbers. Until then, I will reminisce about the summers of my childhood. I will remember the distinct smell of freshly watered plants and the taste of a sun-warmed cherry tomato plucked and wiped on my shorts before popping it in my mouth. I will remember the days of late summer when my grandmother and my mother canned green beans in the kitchen, their faces red from the steam. The hard work of having a vegetable garden continued throughout the summer. Preserving the abundance from the garden was unquestionable, every piece should be eaten—either by us or our neighbors, either now or later. The shelves in the laundry room were lined with Mason jars filled to the top with summer’s bounty. The deep freezer held jars of strawberry jam and sliced peaches. Everything not eaten right away was preserved for later. By February, when the last jar of strawberry jam was scraped clean, we began to dream of visiting the U-Pick strawberry field so that we could replenish our supply. Preserving the sweetness of summer doesn’t have to involve giant pots of boiling water and steamy glass jars. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a bit of sunshine-y June and July in the dreary winter months of January and February? Try this: Keep a summer journal or write down what summer was like when you were a kid. Take pictures and make a photo album (not just the Facebook kind, a real one that you can hold in your hands) so that you can relive the best moments of this season. When it’s below freezing outside and the sky is filled with gray clouds, you’ll be glad you did.

Once upon a time, there was a mom with a dirty van. She took that dirty van to a car wash, a narrow room unmanned by human employees but armed with brushes and sprayers attached to robotic limbs. Flashing lights notified the driver when to stop and when to go. It all seemed so simple but evil intent lurked in the shadowy corners. According to the design of the facility, if the vehicle was not positioned exactly right within the crowded confines of the car wash, a sign would flash with instructions. On this particular occasion when the mom pulled in a bit on a diagonal angle, the sensors did not flash, nor did the mechanisms give her time to correct her parking, instead, all hell broke loose. Brushes began swiveling and spinning in a mad dance. The front and back windshields were pummeled with water and soap. The woman pounded on the window, crying out to be released, but the cleansing rained on until the beating finally stopped. The woman left the car wash drenched in sweat with a side mirror dangling in defeat. As it is so often seen with car damage incidents, there were calls to be made and claims to be filed. But no one wanted to pay for the repairs. No one wanted to take the blame for the dangling mirror. Still, the woman would not give up. She followed the trail of calls to an executive of the company who owned the car wash. He showed little care or remorse but he did ultimately reveal that he had seen “the video of the incident” and this video was fairly irrefutable in the car wash’s liability. He also acknowledged woman’s persistence so he begrudging agreed to pay to fix the mirror. (Though she was relieved to receive payment for the repairs, she would always be haunted with the thought of a video of the most frightening three minutes of her life floating around and possibly available for viewing. She would often scan episodes of America’s Funniest Videos looking for it.) In spite of the frustrations, the woman persevered. But persistence isn’t always considered an admirable trait. Sometimes it’s right up there with stubbornness. Anyone with a toddler can tell you that the persistent call of “Momma, momma, momma…” can get a little old. When Jacob, the grandson of Abraham and one of the patriarchs of the Old Testament, got the chance to meet up with God he did the unexpected in one of the more confusing episodes of the Bible—he took part in a wrestling match. Jacob wrestled God (in human form) and refused to let go. Even when the God/Man asked for release and Jacob’s hip was pulled out of place, Jacob held fast. His reason for persisting in the struggle was to receive a blessing. The thing Jacob wanted most was the thing he had tricked from his brother with the help of some goat hair and a pot of stew. He wanted something he probably didn’t consider himself worthy of but that didn’t stop him. Years of guilt had weighed down on him. He was about to see his brother for the first time in twenty years and he was afraid of the future. Like Jacob, sometimes we are in a place where we will wrestle with God. It may not look like Jacob’s experience—a nighttime kickboxing match. But we are called to be persistent as we wrestle for God’s blessing and understanding of His teachings. And “we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”

A few years ago, my family and my sister’s family went to one of our favorite places to eat: Blue Coast Burrito. All eleven of us stood in line, waiting to tell the people on the other side of the glass sneeze guard what we wanted on our burritos so they could pile them unimaginably high with meat, cheese, and veggies but still be able to wrap them up into a snug little bundle. (Those wizards!) In front of us in line was a couple we didn’t recognize. They appeared to have just attended Woodstock, or more logically Bonnaroo, both with long unkempt hair, bare feet, and a certain degree of intentional grubbiness. She was wearing a broomstick skirt and he was wearing a long suede vest. Using my non-verbal, mom glares/facial expressions, I instructed my children not to point or stare. After the couple ordered their food, they set their trays on a table and the man stood on the bench of the nearby kid-sized picnic table, clearing his throat to make an announcement. My brother-in-law, an elementary school teacher who excels at quieting down groups of chatty people, shouted for everybody to listen. The man said something to the effect of, “__________ (insert the girl’s name), will you marry me?” The girl said yes and the couple went to their table to eat their supper. No big deal. I went to congratulate the happy-ish couple. “Congratulations!” I said, “So does this restaurant have a special significance for you? Like maybe it’s where you met or where you had your first date?” The girl looked at me matter-of-factly and said, “It’s just good, wholesome food,” and she resumed eating without even looking at her beloved betrothed. If the ten other people from my family hadn’t witnessed that proposal with me, I would’ve sworn I imagined it. Where was the fanfare? The pomp and circumstance? The fireworks? The bevy of doves released in the sky to symbolize their undying love? If you search “marriage proposal” on YouTube you will get 1.5 million videos. I didn’t check all of them, but I’m pretty sure this particular proposal isn’t amongst them. I guess it just wasn’t exciting enough, and they forgot to get someone to film it. Life, like marriage proposals and television series finales and new recipes, can often be disappointing. It’s easy to build up expectations beyond anything even remotely possible. The key to avoiding the nose-dive into disappointment seems to be three-pronged: Be active in ensuring happiness for yourself and others, be hopeful but flexible, and live a life of gratitude. As I think back on the Blue Coast Burrito Couple I have to wonder how everything turned out. Although the proposal was a bit anti-climactic, maybe they’re on to something. Perhaps a low key marriage proposal and “good, wholesome food” is just the right formula for decades of wedded bliss. And I bet those burrito-wrapping wizards already knew that!

Nearly 20 years ago, my husband and I participated in a weekend-long premarital retreat. There were sessions with a variety of titles—none of which I remember—but the main focus of the weekend was one simple word: communicate. We were taught to sit knee-to-knee, gazing deeply into each other’s eyes as we take turns using “I- statements” and exhibiting “active listening.” As someone who likes to talk out everything, posing various scenarios and hypotheses (just ask my husband…bless him), I am a big fan of communication. I love words. I love to express my thoughts. I love to find just the right words to express my thoughts. Now imagine me spending all day with a child who has no idea what the words—those carefully constructed ideas and statements—actually mean. This is my current reality with Ezra, our Congolese-born son. For example, on the long plane ride home to the U.S. we had several misunderstandings. When the air pressure in the plane made Ezra’s ears feel like they were about to burst, I pulled out a Dum-Dum sucker. I tried to explain that swallowing might pop his ears and give him some relief from the pain. He took the offered sucker, looked at it for a second, and poked the stick end in his ear like a Q-tip. Riding in the car offers more opportunities for me to practice my higher-level communication skills. Ezra is mad that he can’t sit in the front seat, must stay buckled while I’m driving, and has to sit in a booster seat. My attempt to enlighten him on the Tennessee seatbelt laws is inadequate as far as he’s concern. To him, it just looks like I’m being mean. After almost three weeks of his full immersion in the English language, we have all learned a lot. When he’s especially frustrated or joyful or grouchy, I can often (but not always) use deductive reasoning—along with reading his facial cues and applying what I know from the preceding events—to figure out what in the world is wrong. Ezra has learned out how to communicate the most basic information in a way that we can (sometimes) understand. After not owning much of anything for most of his life, he wants to know what belongs to him. He often takes me to the closet that he shares with his older brother to ask which section of hanging clothes are his and which aren’t. He does the same with the books on the bookshelf and the shoes on the shoe rack and the toys in the toy bins. But this doesn’t end with material possessions. I tell him that he belongs to me and I belong to him. We are his libota (family) and this is his ndako (home). I clumsily butcher his beautiful language in an attempt to find the words to explain these vital details. In the end, I know that the best way for me to communicate this is not actually with words, but instead with actions—hugs and smiles and meeting his daily needs. And if I get really desperate, I may sit knee-to-knee with Ezra, gaze deeply into his eyes, and see if that helps at all.

Since we’ve been home from Africa with our adopted son, I’ve been thinking a lot about how it felt to bring home our twin daughters from the hospital almost fourteen years ago. Sure, there are a lot of differences: he’s five and can only speak the African language Lingala, and they were zero and only babbled. He’s one boy and they were two girls. I was younger with a lot more energy and now I’m well…fourteen years older. Either way you look at it, both experiences carry certain complications and challenges. One of the challenges is to be able to remember these early days, in spite of a memory that is damaged by sleep deprivation and the occasional feeling that I have no idea what I’m doing. I didn’t fill out a “First Year” calendar for my daughters and the only journal I kept was to record their poops and pees and how much they nursed. Now I’m the mom who doesn’t know when her babies got their first tooth or rolled over. This information is lost to the ages. With that in mind, I’m going write down some of our son’s likes and dislikes and a few of the events from our first couple of weeks together. I know I’ll be glad I did. Ezra loves to play soccer…like a lot. It’s obvious he’s watched as much soccer as he has played it. He flops on the ground and feigns injury just as well as any professional player or Oscar-winning actor. Then he calls “P.K.” (penalty kick), walks off ten paces, and places the ball on the ground. He holds one hand in the air, makes a kissing sound (the closest he can get to whistling) and kicks the ball. If he makes a goal, he runs around celebrating and saying, “Na tye biiii!!” If he misses, he falls to the ground in utter desolation as if he just cost the Congolese national team the World Cup. The language barrier is tricky but we’re finding ways around it. In fact, I may sign up the two of us for a mother/son Mime Camp, assuming that exists. Ezra lets me know what he wants by miming things like peeling/eating a banana, kicking a soccer ball, or sipping from a straw (this means he wants to go to Sonic). It’s an all-day game of Charades. A little girl asked me the other day how to say “cold” in Sign Language. I told her I didn’t know and I asked her why she thought I would. She said, “Well, I thought he (Ezra) only knew sign language. No? Well, how about Braille? Can you say it in Braille?” Ezra doesn’t like milk but he loves bananas. He doesn’t care for sweets but he’s crazy about chicken. His favorite breakfast is a cup of hot tea and 2-4 slices of lipa (sandwich bread) covered with strawberry jam or mashed avocado. He loves to dance and mess around on the piano. He found an old, overturned, metal trashcan and played it like a drum while we took turns making up songs. He enjoys taking a bath and he will play with bath toys until the water gets cold. When we take him out of the water and towel him off, he likes to press his forehead against mine (or Brent’s if he’s the one on bath time duty) and make his hands into a tent over our faces. In the darkness between us, he whispers something in Lingala and gives me a kiss. My heart understands, so no miming required. I could tell you about the hard parts of the past few weeks because there have been plenty—the frustrations and the eerily quiet tantrums and the wondering if I’m doing any of this right. But I want to mostly remember the good stuff—the stuff that makes us beam proudly at each other when he’s not watching and the stuff that makes Ezra Ezra.

Ezra, our Congolese son, is home. It’s the thing we’ve been praying for and waiting on for nearly four years. Now that he’s home, it’s time for the real work to begin. Often when you look at pictures of families, you see their best selves—smiles and hugs and clean shirts. What isn’t always evident is the hurt behind the eyes, and this is the reality for our son. On the day after he came to America, we walked to the elementary school playground near our house. We were having a great time on a perfect Sunday afternoon. There was running and chasing and happy hollering. As he stood on a piece of the playground structure, I went to give him a hug but I accidentally gave him a static electricity shock instead. He recoiled from me like I had done it on purpose. Our other son went to comfort him and shocked him, too. Ezra’s eyes showed hurt and fear. No amount of “I’m so sorry!” could pacify him. He ran from us and cowered in the corner of the playground, like a frightened rabbit. When his dad and siblings leave for work and school each morning, Ezra mourns for them. His response is to throw himself on the living room floor and weep like there’s no tomorrow. He cries, “Papa!” and “Ya-ya” (his collective word for his brother and sisters). I try to tell him that they are at work (mosala) and school (kelasi). I hold his wet cheeks in my hands and say, “I promise they will come back. I promise.” But even if I tell him this in Lingala (his native language), fully expressing the truth of their return is difficult. Him grasping this truth is even harder. He hasn’t learned the heart language of fulfilled promises and the only way to teach him this language is with the consistency of time. How else can an orphan really know “family”? How can a child who’s known no parents since he was an infant understand how to rely on a father? How can a boy who has longed for a mother trust the embrace of a woman he barely knows? Our plan is to wake up every morning and show him. We’ll show him that we’re trustworthy and we’re in this for keeps, no matter if he’s naughty or happy or grouchy or sick or stinky or sweet. We won’t always be as patient as we should be and we’ll misunderstand him frequently but we’ll keep trying. Missteps won’t prevent us from taking steps toward him feeling secure. Most people who have already been where we are now say that it takes a full year to accomplish a sense of normalcy again. We waited four years to bring him home. What’s another year to make sure his heart has also completed the journey home?

We are thrilled to come home with Ezra today! (I say “today” although we won’t technically be home until tomorrow.) But before we arrive in the Nashville airport, we feel like we should say a couple of things about our expectations for the next several months. Ezra has been amazing. Apart from a few totally normal tantrums, he has been super easy and fun. He hugs us and smiles frequently (unless he’s getting his picture taken with another Congolese). We couldn’t ask for a better week! But we know this is just the beginning of a big transition for him and we want to be intentional about integrating him into our home. We are about to take the snow globe that is Ezra’s world, turn it upside-down and shake it like crazy. I feel confident that the pieces will eventually float down into a beautiful design, but in the meantime we need a little space. So, here’s what we’re asking: Please don’t drop by unannounced. Text one of us first to get the all-clear. If he’s having a rough day, we want to protect him and allow him to work through whatever may be going on in his mind. It will probably be a while until we go to church. Ezra has no idea what kind of fan club awaits him there! We will have to ease him into that much love. When you do see him, please refrain from lifting him or touching him. Talk to him and talk to Brent and me (you can even lift Brent if you’re up to it), just give Ezra a bit of distance. For a few months, Brent and I need to be the ones to bathe him, give him his food, put him to bed, and soothe him when he’s sad. We need to establish that we are his parents even though he hasn’t lived with us for five years. That is a pretty tall order and would be even more difficult if he has a bunch of adults providing the same assistance. This isn’t forever. We will gradually let in our amazing village, without whom we wouldn’t have made it this far. If you feel like we are over-doing this “cocooning” time or if you feel like we’re not sequestering him enough, please don’t let me know. Parenting is hard no matter how your kids come to you. We will do as we have done with our other three kids and we’ll tailor our parenting to this specific, God-given, miracle of a kid. We can’t possibly thank you all enough for all your prayers and encouraging words throughout this long journey (and it’s not over yet!). I am constantly amazed by the sheer volume of prayers that have been lifted on our behalf. I think God must’ve had to hire some extra angels to work the prayer call center for us during the last few years. “Grateful” doesn’t begin to cover how we feel about ya’ll! Nalingi yo! –Brent and Abby

It’s Thursday morning and the rain is coming down in sheets. Our friend told us there are two seasons in the Congo—the rainy season and the dry season. This is definitely the rainy season. We are sitting on our little porch, watching the rain and watching Ezra take pictures with the iPad. When he’s not taking (unflattering) pictures of me, he’s looking at old pictures—ones from our trip in 2014 and ones Knox and the girls took back at home. He’s watching the videos Knox made of exciting NBA and NFL Play Station games. It’s funny what entertains a five-year old. Besides the aforementioned ball-kicking and papa-wrestling, Ezra has been busy. He has drawn a colorful squiggle on several sheets of copy paper. We’ve hid Easter eggs with the twelve plastic eggs I brought from home. We’ve found one of his favorite things to do is to imitate us. For example, I almost fell off the bed on the first day here. Ezra replayed the scene over and over, cackling like a crazy person at the end of each mini-play. Brent and I both had a hard time sleeping last night. My brain was spinning with what needs to be done before we leave and what will happen once we’re home. I finally dozed off around 3:00 am, just about the time the rain started to fall on the metal roof above our little room. Maybe the gentle tapping of the raindrops gave me something else to think about. We still wait for news about Ezra’s exit letter. We met with our lawyer last night. He all but promised it would be done today. I can’t think of any piece of paper I’ve ever wanted to see more than this letter. Ever since September of 2013 when the DRC government said they would stop issuing them, it’s been on my mind everyday. We appreciate all the prayers for this to finally come true!

By Tuesday Ezra started to come out of his shell. He laughs a loud, wide open-mouthed laugh when he scores a goal (aka – kicks the soccer ball between the wall and the trashcan). Muttering lingala to himself, he sets out the little suction cup toys our friend Tucker gave us and the toy cars we brought from home like a parking lot of parked cars and blue, red, and yellow people looking for their cars. We were told he likes to watch soccer and professional wrestling on TV and we believe it since he mainly wants to play soccer and wrestle with Brent. He has been a lot of fun but he is also beginning to test us. After being reprimanded for picking up the phone in our room several times, Ezra retreated to a corner to sulk. He moaned softly until tears rolled down his cheeks. Although we are touched by his sadness this isn’t our first rodeo. It will take more than a tantrum with forced tears to let him call long distance on the Congolese hotel phone. We skipped his nap yesterday in lieu of a meeting with our friend who is working to secure Ezra’s exit letter. (Note: Please pray for things to continue to move in that direction. We have permission to apply for his exit letter but it’s not complete as of Wednesday morning. We need this document in order to leave with our son on Friday evening.) The skipped nap may have something to do with his crocodile tears. We had an early supper of Ramen noodles, bread, and applesauce, and then we gave him a shower and put him in his p.j.’s. We settled in the bed with popcorn and Bugs Bunny cartoons on the iPad. Ezra was asleep by 7:30. This trip is different in many ways from the one we took in 2014. That week was filled with making memories and taking pictures to shore us up for the months we’d spend away from Ezra. This time, we’re happy to be with him but we’re ready to go home and less patient on those endless, hot afternoons. We’re so excited to introduce Ezra to his sisters and brother. We’re ready to merge him into a busy, happy life.

After more than 24 hours in four different airports, we arrived in Kinshasa, DRC. It was Sunday night. Our good friend picked us up from the airport and dropped us at the hotel where we will spend the next several days. There is a row of four rooms in our little hotel, each with its own porch. The rooms are connected with a gravel walkway divided by small flowerbeds with brick borders. Though it is small, the area is thick with trees and bushes. In the middle of the garden/jungle, there is a covered meeting area, kind of like a gazebo but larger with sets of mismatched tables and chairs and a ceiling made of thatched straw. The morning after we flew into Kinshasa—Monday morning—our friend brought our son and his foster parents to our hotel. We knew they would be here sometime after breakfast so Brent and I sat on the tiled porch area, waiting for them to arrive. Without warning, we saw him. Ezra came around a corner, his shoes crunching the gravel as he walked to where we sat. I jumped up out of my chair and ran to him, holding him and crying, mascara running down my cheeks. When our friend saw that he was safely with us, he retired to the gazebo with the foster parents so that we could be alone with Ezra to get reacquainted. We played with the toy cars we brought, counting “1, 2, 3…” before rolling the cars toward each other making them crash and fly in opposite directions. After about half an hour of counting and crashing, we walked to the gazebo. Ezra was told that our friend would take us to the grocery store and the foster parents would watch him for us. After the grocery store excursion, we returned with milk and bananas and bread for later and fried chicken and French fries and Fanta for lunch. We all ate together, and then it was time for our friend and the foster parents to leave. Ezra shook their hands and said, “Bye-o” and they were gone. He hasn’t seemed to look for them so far. In spite of everything—we are practically strangers who speak different languages—he’s been loving and playful with us. We all took a nap together on Monday and he slept great that night on the mattress on the floor by our bed. After he woke up about 6:30 a.m. to use the bathroom, he climbed into bed between us, eventually flinging his arm across Brent’s back. His long arms and legs and his six missing teeth tell the story of the time we’ve missed with him. I tell myself not to think about the missed time, but instead I’m trying to be grateful for the time we have. As he rested between us early this morning, I asked God to speak to Ezra. The limitations of language prevent me from adequately explaining our absence in his life and his history prevents him from understanding what a forever family really means. This is why I need God to speak to Ezra’s heart and tell him that we’re in this for the long haul. We’ve desperately wanted to have him home with us for years. Some day I hope he understands.

Recently, I decided to shake things up a bit and change Siri’s voice (you know that know-it-all on our cell phones) to something other than an American woman. The choice I finally landed on was an Australian male. His voice was warm and comforting and, if I told him his answer wasn’t helpful, he would say, “I’m so sorry, Abby.” Nice. Eventually, I did find a snag in the design. One day, I asked Siri (or Crocodile Dundee or Hugh Jackman or whatever name you might give him) to call my daughter. “Call Ella,” I said plainly into my phone. The phone answered back with an Aussie accent, “Hello.” (Actually it sounded more like ’Ello.) “Huh?” I thought. “That’s strange. No. Siri, call Ella.” Again: “Hello.” “CALL ELLA!” “Hello, Abby.” With a sigh I removed “Hugh” from my voice preferences and went back to Siri—boring but efficient. It’s frustrating to be misunderstood. We think we’re being completely clear and yet we discover our motives or our actions are challenged. Joseph was misunderstood. He was the favorite son of twelve boys. His brothers were jealous of him and misunderstood his dreams. After those brothers sold him off as a slave, he was made a top-level servant in a rich man’s home. The rich man’s wife took notice of handsome, young Joseph. When her advances went unreturned, she lied and had him thrown in prison. Again, he was misunderstood in spite of his good intentions. Even with his years of setbacks, Joseph continued to do what was right. His work ethic was commendable. His interpersonal skills made him an easy friend. His middle name should have been “perseverance.” But the thing that was most notable about him was his general good attitude. When he finally reached the penthouse version of Egyptian politics and lifestyle, and he had his brothers groveling before him—hungry and desperate—Joseph chose mercy. Joseph could’ve gloated and kicked his begging brothers while they were down but instead he said this: “I am your brother Joseph. I am the one you sold as a slave to Egypt. Now don’t be worried. Don’t be angry with yourselves for what you did. It was God’s plan for me to come here. I am here to save people’s lives. This terrible famine has continued for two years now, and there will be five more years without planting or harvest. So God sent me here ahead of you so that I can save your people in this country. It was not your fault that I was sent here. It was God’s plan.” Joseph saw God’s Providence in the twists and turns of his very frustrating past. He had been maligned, mistreated, misjudged, and sometimes forgotten, but he continued to rely on God’s power and the fact that his Lord understood him even when no one else did.

Last week I had the privilege of speaking at a women’s conference. Months ago, when I was first asked to participate in the event, I was told that the subject for my talk was “Searching for Hope When Things Seem Hopeless.” My personal experience with this particular topic comes from the years we’ve been waiting to bring home our fully adopted son from Africa. In my talk at the conference, I went into detail about the nearly four years this boy has been a part of our lives. It’s been years of paperwork and frustration, and a lot of questioning. During that time, we have learned a lot about hope and why we need it and how we can sustain it and how to survive the waiting. After a lot of prayerful introspection, I realized I had learned (but not really mastered) ten things: Find your ideal “wait” – The time you’re waiting may seem interminable but it’s still valuable. Fill it with good things. Feel your feelings – God made us to experience emotions. Don’t stuff those feelings in an unused hall closet. If you feel grief, then feel it. Anger? Feel it. But don’t stay there. Then use those feelings to connect with others. Look for timeline revelations – Spend time taking stock in how God has participated in your story by looking back at journals and Facebook posts. Allow God to write the story – God is not a fiction writer. He deals with truth. It may seem helpful to guess why you are waiting but don’t let your guessing consume you. It’s not about the “why” and God doesn’t owe us an explanation. Don’t let the thing you’re waiting for become an idol – It’s easy to become fixated, or even obsessed. Anything that distracts us from God can become an idol. Watch out for envy – If you’ve ever been the last one in your friend group to join the next phase—getting a real career, marriage, kids—then you understand envy. (Or if you’re a human being that doesn’t always get what you want, you also get it.) Here’s my 3-part advice: when you’re feeling a strong pull toward jealousy, stay off social media, look for ways to serve the people you envy, and–when all else fails– fake it ‘til you make it. Lean on friends – You are not alone. Let people in. Pray expectantly – This one is hard for me. Author Rick Warren says HOPE stands for “Holding on, Praying expectantly”. Some say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, yet that’s the insane part of hope. Psalm 5:3 says, “In the morning Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly.” Keep doing the crazy, hopeful thing. Where do you place your hope? Hebrews 6:18-19 says, “These two things cannot change: God cannot lie when he says something, and he cannot lie when he makes an oath. So these two things are a great help to us who have come to God for safety. They encourage us to hold on to the hope that is ours. This hope is like an anchor for us. It is strong and sure and keeps us safe. It goes behind the curtain.” We have access to the One who is all-powerful. He has been in the “Holy of Holies” and he leads the way for us. He can handle the burden of our frustrations and unfulfilled expectations. But consider yourself warned: He may change your desires to something else when you give up the reins to Him. Seek out joy – Choose joy and dismiss bitterness. These past four years waiting for our son to come home have been so difficult and continuing to remain hopeful may make me a fool, but I will choose hope. Without hope we are broken. Without hope we are lost. Without it, what’s the point?