40

It's 1:20am on November 12, 2017.  Today is my 40th birthday. 

I distinctly remember my own mom turning 40 and I recall how, at the time, I felt like I was light years from EVER turning forty.  I mean, good grief, I'd never be THAT old.  Would I?  Tickled.  My mind has been reeling for the last few days nonstop.  So many things I am processing, praying over, desperately seeking His guidance for.  In all of the praying and thinking and pondering, I have grown more and more convinced that aging is such a blessing.  When Mark and I were engaged and newly married, we dreamed about being able to grow old and gray together.  We had lengthy conversations about the trajectory we hoped our life would take together.  Let me be the first to say (tearfully), "Jesus has exceeded our every expectation."  I want to say it louder for the people in the back. In all our youthful dreams, which at the time seemed too big and grand to ever possibly come true we couldn't have dreamed for this life.  It isn't a perfect life saying it louder again for the people in the back.  But, my goodness, it sure is beautiful.  Beautiful isn't always easy and most assuredly not always pretty.  As most anyone knows who has trod on the sod of planet earth very long, beautiful rarely  doesn't always equal pretty.  It gets messy, this life.  It gets heavy.  It also gets wearisome.  But, it never stops being beautiful and it never stops being a life I want to live.  I want to live it well and full with Mark Daniel McKeehan by my side every step of the way.  I want to spend it sharpening these arrows in our quiver so the 5 of them can be shot out farther, faster for the gospel than we could even hope, ask, or imagine.  I'm FULL ON trusting Jesus to do it.   He has been too faithful to me in forty years to stop asking Him for big things now. 
As my 40th has been approaching, it has caused me to think back over the years. If I live to be 120, not one birthday will ever top my 39th.  Ever.  It was the day we arrived home from Ethiopia with Tyson.  now I am literally sobbing.  Jesus, I can't get over You. Even more than having him home was the fact that the night of my 39th birthday all 7 of us were sleeping under the same roof at HOME. It was on my 39th birthday that Hudson and Corbin got to meet and hug and kiss and smother Tyson for the first time.  WHAT A GIFT.  I got emotional talking to someone this afternoon about it right there at the Holiday Hoedown.  In all the wandering wondering, deep valleys, long years, tearful nights... through all of that, Jesus knew.  He knew the mourning would burst forth with great dancing and that doubts would give way to sight.  He knew all along that on my 39th birthday we would land in America, ride down that escalator, and be greeted home by our friends and family who are all basically family. ONLY JESUS DOES STUFF LIKE THAT.  Human minds can't manufacture this sort of thing, try as they might. 
There are a few important (to me) things I wanted to share on this monumental post.  They are in no particular order well maybe they are, but it's too early/late to try to figure out which is which...
First of all, I want to tell y'all something.  At 40, I can whole heartedly confess to you that I am more comfortable in my skin, more acquainted with Jesus, more confident in His faithfulness and goodness, and more grateful for the little things in life than I have ever been before.  So, would I trade going back to insecure, more anxiety-filled days just to be younger? HECK NO.  I am ready to see what Jesus has for us as the next decade unfolds. He can't be unfaithful.  And, that truth alone, as I have chosen to reckon it to be true, has offered me more freedom than a million years living could bring apart from Him.
Secondly, my visits to see Brooke she is my friend who also happens to do my hair might be more frequent as my age as increased though I am most certain there is no correlation between the two, but, there is something really powerful about watching Jesus just flat out come through for you.  In the past three to five years, I can say without hesitation, I have lived my best days and my worst days. Without fail, even when what my eyes could see wasn't the answer I was praying for, Jesus sustained me.  And, when He chose to move mountains and answer, He confirmed in a trillion ways that He had never missed a single prayer, tear, or heartache.  His mercies over me have been so personal, so intentional, and so unmistakeable.  Hear me out on this:  it wasn't all "just" adoption answers.  There were friendship answers, marriages of dear friends that were doomed without a miracle, friends who needed supernatural healing, friends battling infertility for years who were tired and bitter.  I will take a few more visits to Brooke to cover up the glitter any day of the week to be able to live a life that sees Jesus come through in all His glory, parting the sea and making a way where we couldn't see a way.  I am about to have church in here.  Except everyone is asleep and that might wake them up.
Next, fighting off tears, there is something that happened in Ethiopia one year ago this past Friday that I have never written about on the blog.  Last year, it was too raw and personal.  But, as the year has gone by and as our lives have continued to be an open book, I am at peace with sharing it with you now.  It really isn't something most of you will think is a big deal.  No big juicy secret is lurking in here somewhere.  But, it is deeply personal to us and to Tyson's journey.  As most of you know, Jesus parted what felt like the Red Sea for us performed a HUGE miracle for us last
November 10.  You can read about it here.  Everything about the day had gone all wrong from what we could see.  Nothing was working in our favor to get us on  a plane for home before the long weekend.  What seemed to be dead end streets everywhere we turned with mistakes on key documents, wrong birthdays, misspelled names, were actually setting us up to watch THE WAY-MAKER MAKE A WAY.  hindsight is so powerful. Had we had it all together and everything had gone perfectly smooth, we wouldn't have been positioned to let Jesus do what only He could do.  And, what He did was allow us to the be the very first case to EVER that is such a big word have to have corrections made (and translated) to those key documents, have them (after they were corrected and translated) stamped by the MOWA office the office that took a literal year to sign our final document that allowed us to travel, and get said documents back to the US Embassy in time for them to be approved and then have them print Tyson's visa all in one day! I am exhausted just recounting that day.  After we left the US Embassy that morning with great disappointment because of all the mistakes on paperwork (we hadn't seen those documents in advance to notice the mistakes previously) and realizing what kind of delay it would cause, we headed back to the Bethany offices.  We had eaten lunch out and Menge (we love you, Menge!) had asked us if we would mind waiting there while he worked and while we prayerfully waited to hear back from Tesfahun (our attorney who was working powerfully to get all of THAT accomplished in one day).  Menge's thought was, if for some reason they needed us somewhere to facilitate faster processing, we would already be with him and a driver, so we could get there quickly at least as quickly as Addis traffic will allow.  While we were waiting there in the offices, I saw Meselu walking towards us Meselu was Tyson's amazing social worker in Ethiopia.  I noticed she was carrying something in her hand. When she came in she greeted us with hugs and her big, contagious smile.  She knelt down and greeted Tyson in Amharic.  Then, she sat down and her words stopped.  After a lengthy pause she finally said, "I have something for you all."  silence.  eyes down seeming to fight off tears.  Finally, "Maso (Tyson's birthmom) loved meeting you and seeing Tyson.  After she met you yesterday, she asked if I would give you these."  Then, she carefully unfolded two pieces of copy paper.  When she opened them, my eyes filled with instant tears until they couldn't hang onto my eyelids anymore.  Each paper had one of her hands traced on it.  A right one.  A left one.  I looked at the papers and then up at Meselu.  "Oh Meselu.  She wanted him to have her hands."  She quietly nodded, "yes."  I ran my hands across each page, hoping to grab hold of any scent or DNA that might still be embedded in the ink.  Meselu finally said, "She thought of this on her own and wondered if you would be ok with her giving it to him.  She loves him so much."  Yes, she does.  We know this well.  I can't tell you the number of times I have pulled out those folded pieces of paper and ran my hands across them.  Those are the hands that rubbed a growing, pregnant belly, likely sweated in labor giving birth to the son we have in common.  Those hands were the first to hold him, first to stroke his face, first to wipe his tears, first to comfort him.  They are also the hands that likely caught tears as she agonized over what to do with growing financial demands and a son she couldn't feed.  Those are the hands that dressed him, scooped him up, and carried him to an orphanage, knowing it was his only hope to survive.  Those hands are full of bravery.  Courage. Hard work. Pain.  Love.  As we have recounted each day what we were doing a year ago, November 10th was that beautiful day that wasn't pretty.  My heart and mind have been missing her so much the past few days.  I watch Tyson reading or laughing, or riding his bike. Or I hear him singing praise music in the car or I watch him learn something new and I think of her.  She wouldn't believe her eyes if she could see him.  When I think back over what she wanted most for Tyson, I can't help but think she would be so proud of him.  If she could, I know she would wrap her arms around him and then, like I watched her do, she would touch his face.  With her hands.
Lastly, I want you to know that when the gray hairs come go see Brooke,  don't wish them away.  For heaven's sake get them covered up, unless of course you have beautiful gray, but don't wish them away.  If you, too, dreamed of living long enough to watch your children grow up or to be able to travel to new places or to see a special niece or nephew graduate... whatever it is that you fixed your gaze on long ago, if the Lord has allowed you to see that thing through- then Praise Him! We set our gaze on growing old and gray together, didn't we, Babe?  And, here at the ripe old age of 40, with gray  hairs coming faster than me or Brooke can keep up with, the Lord is blessing us with seeing that dream come true.  What a blessing:  to be healthy enough to be an active mom to many and to watch them grow up into amazing people while being married to their smokin' hot dad!  Yep, 40, you ain't got nothin' on me!

grateful.
carrie