And then I found this picture.
I just stared at it for what seemed like the longest time and the emotion evoked from deep within matched perfectly the emotion I feel when I think of leaving this life and moving to Costa Rica. It is an emotion I can only describe as my heart being on fire.
The look on Harper's face as she emerged from the baptismal waters, eyes fixed on Kyle, smile beaming is one of security, acceptance, and adoration...all together combined into one word: love.
I wish I was better at explaining myself...my words fail me...but what I can say is that God has created each and every person to know the type of love that Harper so evidently knows.
When I think about children going to sleep without knowing that they are loved, I think of Oliver Jack and how every night he asks me "to do that 'courageous' thing" and I proceed to tell him that he is a smart boy, a handsome boy, a kind boy, a loving boy, a brave boy, a strong boy, and a courageous boy.
When I think about children feeling alienated and alone, I think of Calvary and how overwhelmingly often I am working to bridge the gap between what I understand and what I know so that he does not have to feel that way.
When I think about girls being sold into slavery, I think of my Harper...and those are thoughts no mother can bear.
When I think about children not knowing how deeply they are loved, I think of Finley and how I feel like she tells me 100 times a day that she loves me just to hear me say it back.
My children are no different from them. Simply because they do not have names or faces yet does not make them any less intimately significant. My heart is on fire because it aches to be in a place that I have never been loving people I have never met...it aches as if I have been there...it aches as if I already know them...in the same way that I look at this picture and my heart aches remembering the moment and the love...
Every day we are closer to being there as the ties we have here are loosened. With the pain of each sacrifice, I rejoice in the truth of purpose...the purpose of loving people now, here and later, there and hopefully everywhere in between.
