Who Needs Plans Anyway

When you dream about something and talk about it for quite some time, you often find yourself planning out the details in your mind, envisioning what it will look like, and creating this perfect scenario. It’s kind of like when you start dreaming about your wedding day and find yourself creating the perfect Pinterest board, combing through magazines and stuffing a binder full of your ideas. You know what you want. You have a plan. The expectations have been set. You would think that the same would be true about the trip to Ethiopia we promised to our son when he turned 10, after all, we had been talking about it for years. 

When it became a reality that we were actually going, which happened in May when we paid $4000 in airfare, it sunk in that we really didn’t have a plan. All we knew was that in less than 4 months we were going to board a plane to a third world country with an 8 and 10 year old. That in itself was a little overwhelming. However, what we’ve come to stake our lives on, is that God always has the plan, even when we can’t see it. 

Earlier that year, a woman named Kristin, had listened to a sermon that I had preached on racism, and had then reached out to me to see if I would want to meet up for coffee. We had never met before, and after checking out her profile on Facebook (don’t judge me…you probably would do that too), I realized she too was an adoptive mom. That day we met up for coffee, I knew we were going to be kindred spirits and that the Lord had not only brought me a friend right when I needed it, but we had so much in common. We both had kids adopted from Ethiopia, we both had a heart for marginalized people, we loved coffee and traveling, and we were all about family and adventuring. That day she shared with me that she had traveled to Ethiopia a bunch of times and could help me plan out my trip if I wanted too. Of course I jumped on that, seeing that our plan involved no more than flying to Ethiopia! The next time we got together, she handed me a handwritten paper lined with places to stay, ministries to visit and “must sees” in the city. It was a total gift. 

We quickly made reservations to stay at “The Holy Savior Guest House,” in the city of Addis Ababa, hired a translator and driver for the week (all recommendations from Kristin), and began attempting to make the one thing happen that we wanted to happen…finding and meeting Biruk’s birth mom. Truth be told, we hadn’t totally thought that one through. While we had met her 10 years prior, we had had no contact since then and international adoptions had stopped in Ethiopia. We knew that we could hire a person to try to find her, but also knew that would cost us and we were pretty strapped for money. So Nate decided to call our adoption agency, and within days, yes I said that, days, they had made contact with his birth mom and we now had plans to travel back to his birth town and orphanage and meet with her. In that moment it didn’t feel like any other plans mattered. 

About a week before we were ready to leave, things kind of hit the fan. We knew from the start of our planning, that there had been and continued to be, civil unrest in parts of the country. What we were discovering was that it was moving closer to the city, and the travel warning was at a level 3, meaning people should reconsider travel. As we began to talk to some of our Ethiopian friends both in the states and in country, many said we would need to be careful and stay inside the city limits and that we should absolutely not travel to Biruk’s home town. Meanwhile, our adoption agency hadn’t cancelled our meetings with his birth mom, and we felt conflicted. 

Fear has always been something I’ve found myself fighting. While I’ve come a long way, that week, I felt overwhelmed by fear and so many thoughts ran through my mind. “Do I take two little kids to a country with civil unrest? This is something we’ve talked about all of Biruk’s life. What if we’ve heard God wrong and we’re not supposed to do this? What if we miss out on an adventure of a lifetime? I don’t want to do something stupid.” Fear had such a grip on me. 

If there is one thing I’ve learned over the course of my life is that the best way to fight fear is to face it with God. I began to pray. I said, “God…if this is not what you want us to do, you are going to have to shut the doors literally. We can’t make this decision alone. Close the doors and make it clear.” 

The very next day our adoption agency called to say that we would not be able to travel to Biruk’s hometown. The doors were shut tight. However, they were going to do everything they could to bring his birth mom to us, in the city. 24 hours later, everything was arranged. 

I know there are a lot of moments when we question whether or not God hears our prayers, but in that moment, it was as though he knew exactly what we needed and what Biruk’s birth mom needed. Two days later, we would hop on a plane, still with very few plans, but with confidence in the God that does. 

Less than 48 hours later, completely jet lagged but excited, Nate and I sat across from Nardi, the young woman who owned the guest house, and Zelalem, our amazing translator, and they asked us, “What are your plans for the week?” We handed them the crumpled up piece of paper with all the hand written notes from Kristin, and said, “Something on this?” Within minutes, they had planned out our whole week and we began an adventure that God had planned for us far before we could have even envisioned it. God is pretty incredible.