Maybe I'm Amazed

Maybe I'm amazed at the way you pulled me out of time,

You hung me on the line.

Maybe I'm amazed at the way I really need you.

Baby, I'm a man, maybe I'm a lonely man

Who's in the middle of something

That he doesn't really understand.

-Paul McCartney

I really am a grounded person. I understand that things will not always be beautiful... but I would be untruthful to myself if I did not shout from the rooftops that I am in awe of these days. I know the difficult times will come... Jesus himself told us that it would be so when we said that we will have trouble. But we hold tightly to that promise... "take heart, for I have overcome the world."

These days are so much bigger than we are. 13 years ago tonight Kellie and I made a trip to Kettering hospital in Ohio. We had rehearsed and prepared for the moment. Kellie had said all along that this night would be the perfect night to give birth to our son. She even had it in her planner.

And wouldn't you know it... she was right. She said it was time and so we drove to the hospital to give birth. And on that next day, September the 9th, she gave birth to our first child, our son Caleb Thomas Shepherd.

I remember how terrified I was that day when I picked him up in my arms for the first time. This tiny life that had been entrusted to us. We were so overly prepared... and we felt so utterly unprepared. He was ours. 

We have had so many days since then where we felt so incredibly unqualified and tiny in the world. Maybe I'm amazed. Maybe I'm amazed at the way I really need...

I'll just let that trail off... because my needs are more than I can explain, and yet these days are bigger than I can imagine. Each time we think we have our life figured out, God shows us that our vision is not big enough.

We sleep here tonight in Guatemala with our teenage son who the doctors said could not be conceived, our (nearly) 10 year old daughter from Russia who was placed in an orphanage for terminally ill children, our daughter from China who was abandoned premature and gasping for air at a street corner. We sleep here with the realization that this week we sign a contract for a property that is too big, too expensive, too aggressive, and out of our reach...

...but it wasn't out of the reach of God. This was His plan. He simply made it happen. How can I express to you how I am so much just a passenger on this incredible journey.

God has covered our faults, my missteps, my impatience, my arrogance, my foolishness... He has covered it all with His grace and provision as we have learned through the beatings of life how to simply be obedient. We still learn daily.

Can I just tell you... can I simply challenge you... to step out on obedience to God? The thrill that comes with obedience is unbelievable. Our life has been hit with miracle after miracle. 

I don't know where it stops. I don't know when the storms come... but I know this beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Maybe I'm amazed.