You Are Beautiful

“How amazing that he brings life this way. Through pain and hurt and the ugly things inside us we try to keep hidden away. The things we don’t talk about. In that moment, as I looked at my little girl lying in my arms, I realized this whole process was such a striking picture of how Christ works in us. He takes our disappointments, rejections, and hard times, and he makes something beautiful. He creates life and shows us what beauty looks like in places where we look and see nothing. He blesses us beyond our imaginations, in spite of all the broken roads we’ve walked. In fact, maybe he blesses us so lavishly because of all the broken roads we’ve traveled. As if to remind us that he sees us — really sees us — not just for who we are at any given moment, but for what we could be one day.” 

{Melanie Shankle in “Sparkly Green Earrings“}

Becoming a momma was the hardest season of my life. It involved waiting and wondering. I let go over and over again because my plan wasn’t working. I cried so many times and had my blood drawn just as often.

But then God turned us to adoption. The peace came just as I gave up trying.

Trying to become a momma.

Trying to have a family.

Trying to get pregnant.

Trying …

I gave it up. And God gave me a daughter. 

I’ve blogged about adoption often here. And it’s not even what I sat down to write in response to Holley Gerth’s prompt “You’re beautiful … just the way you are.”

But then I remembered that quote from Melanie Shankle’s book I loved reading last spring. And these words came on this cold winter morning.

I see my girl who made me a momma six years, eight months, and 16 days ago. She’s not that baby girl anymore. She’s taller and wiser. She’s a reader, a writer, an artist, and Lego builder. She likes to swim and ride her bike.

Yes, those big, brown eyes are beautiful.

Yes, the way she smiles melts my heart. And I love the way her hair never parts the same way twice.

Yes, she likes pretty things, sparkles on her shoes and designs on her shirts.

But her life is beautiful. Her story is beautiful. Her life was the choice of a teenage girl who was brave and selfless. Her life redeemed the hard season of waiting and trying that broke my heart over and over again. Her life strengthened my faith and is part of our family’s story that I love to tell.

This is beauty, friends.

When the light shines, you realize that hard road was worth it. Yes, there are disappointments in life, but they don’t make up life. The blessings are coming. Like when winter turns to spring, the beauty will come.

You are beautiful, my daughter. You are beautiful, my momma friend who is in a hard season. You are beautiful, the one who is waiting and trying. You are beautiful, the one having to make a hard decision. You are beautiful.