I have always been a person with a plan. 

After five years of marriage, when my husband and I decided we were ready to have a baby (but really, is anyone ever ready for a baby?) I stopped taking birth control and we waited with anticipation. We bought a tiny newborn onesie on a whim and looked at each other with wonder. Surely we’d be holding our son or daughter in no time at all. 

Fast forward a year and that empty onesie still sat in a drawer. At my annual physical I told my doctor that I was starting to feel concerned. Shouldn’t I be pregnant by now? She assured me that it wasn’t yet time to worry. My mom had died in the intervening year, an unexpected death that had upended our lives. Emotional trauma affects the body and I had to give myself time to heal. 

This Had Never Been the Plan

So for six more months I waited, and hoped, and imagined pregnancy symptoms only to cry over a single line on a stick. And then we headed to a specialist for tests. I remember holding my husband’s hand with tears streaming down my face as the doctor explained that we were unlikely to get pregnant without a whole lot of medical intervention. But then he said something that has always stayed with me: “I’m just a doctor. I’m not The Great Physician. And ultimately He is the one who will place a baby in your womb, or in your life through some other means.”

We left that day without scheduling a next appointment. We knew the fertility treatments available to us, and neither one of us wanted to head down that path. Instead, we waited. And we grieved the loss of the child we would never have. As I continued to mourn my mom’s death, I also mourned the death of a dream I had carried since my own childhood. I felt drenched in sadness. This had never been the plan. 

God’s Better Plan

Slowly, little by little, I allowed God to pull me out of my grief. Friends got pregnant and we cried tears of joy mixed with sadness. I held these other babies in my arms. The dream of being a mom was still as strong as ever, but the shape of that dream began to change. We signed up to become foster parents, and I had a new plan.

Over the next fourteen months, God placed four children into our home. And not a single one of them were small enough for that onesie. Instead, we welcomed a feisty two year old little girl and her chunkster of a baby brother. Then God clearly directed us to say yes when another brother/sister duo, this time ages 8 and 9, needed a family.

We worked with their birth families—a different story for a different time—until the judge determined they needed to be adopted. And absolutely none of it went according to plan. It was messy and chaotic and hard and fraught with challenges. And frankly, it continues to be all of those things to this day! But it is also so, so good.

Our verse as a family has become Psalm 126:8. “The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.” On our adoption day, we sat in a courtroom and vowed yes when the judge asked if we would love these children as if they were born from our own bodies. I never carried a child in my womb, but I hold these four in my arms and in my heart just the same.

To the Person With a Plan

What is it that you are planning? Maybe your plan is on track, and you can celebrate that with joy! Or maybe there is a dream that you are grieving, a sadness that you can’t shake. Can I encourage you to believe that God might have a different plan? Whether we see it or not, He is at work. 

That empty onesie is still in the back of my sock drawer. I no longer dream of having a baby who will wear it; our family is complete. But I can’t bring myself to get rid of it. It is a physical reminder of the dream we released. I had a plan that was, quite literally, tiny. And I am so grateful that God’s plan for my life was bigger than I could ever have dreamed. 

Meet Mindy Groff

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Begin Within is a series to inspire a year-round lifestyle of gratitude that will impact not only your own life, but the lives of your neighbors as well. Gratitude is a theme we talk about often around here because it ties so closely into other missional living rhythms. Practicing gratitude reminds to keep our hearts soft and expectant and our eyes open. Therefore, the more we embrace gratitude, the easier it becomes to truly see our neighbors and where we can join what God is already doing in our neighborhoods.

If you would like to contribute to Begin Within, you can find the submission guidelines here.