Guard Your Heart
In our first week fostering we heard, “Guard your heart!” more than “Congratulations!” I could feel the tangible tension in the response of our friends and family. Foster care comes with so much loss and uncertainty that it almost feels wrong to celebrate our long awaited foster son joining our family. Truth be told, I don’t think there is a right thing to say in these situations.
Our family made the decision to go all in with each foster placement, whether they were with us for two days, two weeks, two months, or two years.
The unknown is what we signed up for, but there's one thing we know: the biblical instruction to “Guard your heart,” does not mean withhold love.
We guard our hearts by taking captive thoughts of judgment and anger towards the birth parents, choosing instead to love and forgive.
We guard our hearts by not allowing our minds to jump ahead and begin planning a future with children that are not forever ours and instead thank God for each present moment we’ve been given with them.
We guard our hearts by confronting bitterness we feel towards a broken system and practice quick forgiveness and freedom from offense.
We guard our hearts by putting on love and compassion even when we don’t feel like it.
As foster parents, we must guard our hearts in many ways, but withholding our love and attachment will never be one of them.
Life, even when it’s messy and uncertain, is worth celebrating. Our foster son came to us at 13 months and we wanted to throw him a one year birthday party to celebrate his life. While there is loss that must be acknowledged, God spoke to us that celebration must also be enjoyed for the precious child in our care and for our Great Redeemer who lives!
