For the Son, that one is easy. I get the roles of savior, brother and intercessor. Jesus is easy to relate to. For the Holy Spirit, the roles of counselor, coach and comforter again are very easy to understand and relate to.
But the Father, this one was not so easy. My relationship with my own father was complicated, and I projected that relationship onto the Father - and so God in the Father role was more challenging for me to trust.
My natural daughters arrived on the scene with a built in trust for Carolyn and I. As we get to know them at their deeper levels their trust for us was and is built in. I could kill it by betraying them, but trust in them for us started in place.
MeiLi is fully a human being and as such she has many layers. In getting to know MeiLi at her deeper levels, her trust for me has not been so built in. I can feel it when she pushes me away because she is not sure she can trust me. Her trust for me at the deeper levels is growing slowly. I have to wait and go slowly and sense when she is ready to take a risk and trust me more.
Because our older daughters can speak Mandarin, Ying has initially preferred the girls. In the past 9 days, Ying has not been so quick to trust Carolyn and I, especially me. That's OK. We don't know her personality or care experience. There's the language barrier. There are lots of potential reasons for her to hold back, and for me not to push through this quickly. So I wait.
Last night was the second time she played with me. She, MeiLi and I had a pillow fight. We were probably the ugly Americans, running in and out of the hallway and between the rooms yelling loudly - I am surprised we didn't get a call. It was a blast. It was also breakthrough in her willingness to trust me a little.
Romans 8:15 says we are adopted into God's family.
Projecting myself as an adopting father onto the Father helps me know that no matter how many times and at how many levels I have pushed God the Father away, He has all the more patience and grace for me, and is ready for me to take another step to trust Him and to deepen our relationship. He waits for me, then pours out His grace and love for me on me when I am willing. I didn't understand this through natural fatherhood, only through adoption.
Sunday, a rest day.
Early Sunday morning Allie and Nate left for KC. We missed them immediately.
We took Sunday as a day of rest, alternately eating, napping and going to the pool. The pool is the place to meet other adopting families from the US. Every US family comes to Guangzhou to get their visa, and most stay either here in the China Hotel Marriott or the Garden. It is a fun thing to run the standard set of questions: Is this your first child? How many natural? How many adopted? How old are your kids? Where are you from? What agency did you use? What are your kids special needs?
Yesterday I asked a couple where are you from? Iron Mountain, Michigan. Meeting other Yoopers in Guangzhou!!!! How cool is that?
(For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term Yooper - Michigan consists of 2 parts - the Upper Peninsula and the Lower Peninsula. The Upper Peninsula is known as the U.P., and people from the U.P. are Yoopers. The U.P. contains 30% of the land but only 3% of the people. So meeting a fellow Yooper anywhere is rare. I had no expectation of meeting fellow Yoopers in Guangzhou China. Of course we have common friends in Iron Mountain.
So one of the most fun things of being here is meeting other couples. And one of the most impressive things about other couples is the special needs that they are willing to take on. Some of these kids have significant, life-impacting medical issues. I have met my limits - and I haven't been able to tackle this type of issue. These people, who are able to take on these types of special needs, are my heroes. (Note, you can have a natural child with a special need and be my hero too, but these folks went in eyes-wide-open.)
Monday, a safari day.
Monday we went on a safari, which is really a big zoo with a tram ride. As zoos go, the Chime-Long Safari here in Guangzhou is a really nice one. Of the roughly 500 white tigers remaining in the world, roughly 40% are in this facility. And they have the only panda triplets in the world.
There are lots of animals. Where the KC zoo might have 4 or 5 of something, Guanzhou will have 30 or 50 on display. They all appear to be very well cared for.
They also had an animatronics Jurassic walk. We are sub-tropical here, so the forest is really lush and the dino-robots looked really natural.
One of the most surprising things was how close you could get some of the animals - some of the animals were out among us. I mean, not just kangaroos like in KC, but orangutans and monkeys. Also, we all got to hand feed the giraffes.
We returned to the hotel for a swim. Ying is getting more comfortable with swimming. She really made great progress this evening.
Wednesday, a Consulate Appointment day.
The appointment at the US consulate is the date that this entire trip pivoted around. The US has built a new consulate in the central business district of Guangzhou. Like the medical visit, this facility is far nicer and newer than our experience with MeiLi. We got up early (departing the hotel at 7:30 AM) and were done by 10:30. The potential hitch here was the TB test results - which Ying passed, so if there are no system delays (as there were a few weeks ago) the we should be getting a US visa on Wednesday.
Wednesday evening we took the dragon boat tour that Holt arranges. This is the same tour we took with MeiLi 4 years ago. It was fun to go back and remember.
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