When “bad things” happen to “innocent” people, many wonder, “Where is or was God?” “If God is good and loving, why does God cause or allow such suffering?”
After my 35-year-old sister died of cancer, I was very angry at God and had those same burning questions. With a lot of prayer, reading and conversation with some wise people, I’ve come to the following conclusions:
Adoption has always been something that my husband, Tim, and I knew would be part of how we would build our family. It just didn’t happen exactly as we planned.
Tim and I knew we wanted to have biological children first; later in life, we would adopt. I am a planner—and this was my plan.
What we didn’t expect was that having biological children would be so difficult. After my having had three miscarriages by the age of 22, we decided to see a fertility specialist, who suggested genetic testing. We learned that I had an autoimmune disorder that was likely the cause of the pregnancy losses.
While all of this was occurring, we had begun the process of becoming foster parents with Diakon. We knew we wanted to start our family and we didn’t want to wait.
We received our first placement in February of 2010, a gorgeous little boy who needed a mommy and daddy as badly as we needed him. He was born prematurely, at just 26 weeks’ gestation, and had spent his entire life to that point in a hospital—yet that didn’t affect his amazing and joyful spirit.
I’m too out of shape to run. I’ll start after I lose some weight…
Sound familiar?
Mike Leavitt (bib #113 in photo) felt this way for quite some time. He was an athlete in his younger days but work, family and life in general had taken its toll.
At 38 years of age, he felt scared and disgusted at how out of shape he was. And when a friend suggested joining a running program, he thought it was out of the question.
“I’ve never been a runner per se. With flat feet, bad knees and a larger frame, I’m not really built for speed. In addition, my energy level was really low. I wasn’t motivated at all. Never thought I could do it!” he says.
