Jesus Saves

Free at last, every debt has been repaid

Broken hearts can be remade, Jesus saves

Sing above the storms of life
Sing through the darkness night, Jesus saves
lyrics by Tim Hughes

Happy Thanksgiving! We give thanks and glory to God because Jesus saves! We now hold Ian in our arms and I know heaven is rejoicing with us along with all of you! "I will praise you, O Lord, with all my heart. I will tell of all your wonders" (Psalm 91:1).Ian is doing so great! He was scared at first which is to be expected. I gave him some Cheerios and he seemed to warm up to us a bit but would not make eye contact. The guide told us that we only had five minutes before we had to leave to go to the government office to do paperwork. When we started walking out of the orphanage, Ian started crying and was really upset. You could tell that he was confused and did not know what was going on. The caretaker came over to him, dried his tears and talked to him. I wish I knew what she said because he stopped crying instantly. When we got on the bus, Chris tried to make him laugh. Chris was hysterical but Ian stayed stone faced. It reminded me of the game the kids like to play, "See if you can make me laugh", and you try to see how long you can go without laughing. One of the kids who came with their parents to China was even laughing out loud but Ian looked at Chris as if to say, "Is that all you got?"When we got back to the hotel, Ian was very quiet. He had five layers of clothes on so we tried to take some of them off to make him feel more comfortable. He is very tiny and looked a lot bigger in his photos. Now we know why. He was wearing ten pounds of clothing. By the afternoon, he was smiling and laughing with Chris. By evening, he was puckering his lips to give us kisses at dinner. God is so amazing!At bedtime, we put Ian in his crib and gave him a lamb, a gift from Chris' mom, that has buttons that make different sounds like the ocean, rain and even the sound of a heartbeat. Ian was pushing all the buttons at first then went to sleep in about five minutes. Two hours later, he woke up and started crying. I comforted him but he was really upset. I prayed and asked God to show me what to do. He reminded me that Ian likes music because he has been humming tunes all afternoon. I put him back in his crib, placed my hand on his chest and started singing, "Jesus Loves Me". Within minutes, he stopped crying and was sound asleep. Again, God is so amazing. I wonder if the tunes Ian has been humming were the songs that God sang over him in the orphanage when he was afraid so many nights. "The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you. He will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing" (Zephaniah 3:17).