Scripture Saturday: A Gift from Romans

A few days ago, I was really struggling with my impatience over my foster care license. Spending day after day thinking "today, surely, it must be finished today" is a very wearying way to live. I was checking email every five minutes, finding it difficult to concentrate on any task, and generally just being fretful.

Into this stepped my beloved Jesus Calling. The devotional for that day spoke about hope. More importantly, it pointed me to Romans 8:23-25:

And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.

Reading that, I thought, "whoa, just change 'adoption as sons' to 'adoption of sons' and that fits my feelings exactly!" And then I had a moment of conviction. I am focusing so much on what I want to do that I am forgetting what God has already done.

Yes, it is important for me to obey the call to adopt that God has given me. And yes, any adoptive parent will tell you that it is excruciating to know that a piece of paper is preventing their child from knowing he or she is loved, valued, and wanted. (It's not that simple, but it often feels like it is). But my primary calling is not to do God's work in this world--it is to appreciate His work in me. I can so easily get fixated on serving God that I forget all He sacrificed for me. It's the old Mary/Martha dilemma. I am so busy with preparations for obeying Him that I neglect to sit at His feet.

If I think about the gift God gave the world through Christ, His death, resurrection, and promise to return, then all my impatience should be for His second coming, not for the coming of my boys. If I focus on the wonderment and worship that the outpouring of His grace should invoke in me, then how can I be frustrated by earthly timetables? If I consider deeply what it means to be an adopted daughter of the Lord of all creation, how can I fret over the slowness of becoming an adoptive mother?

That passage in Romans reminded me of the great hope we have in Christ. And it reminded me where I ought to center my gaze--on the Creator rather than on the calendar, on my Savior rather than on my schedule.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His beauty and grace.