Timing

I am quickly learning that my "time frame" is not always God's timing!  I knew to expect this with adopting, but for whatever crazy reason, I thought I could be so organized that I would be able to keep my perfect little time line in order!  Ha!!  Well, my goal was to have all of our paperwork ready to submit to China before Christmas!  Oh, how much I have to learn! We just received our completed home study in the mail on Friday.  Which means, we can just now fill out and mail our I-800a form (if we had our hague approval letter mailed to the correct address, which we did not! - another one is on the way!).  Then, little did I know, that we will have to wait 1.5 - 2.5 months to get our USCIS approval to be included in our dossier, which will have to go through all the certification process. 

Having a little bit of a let down that things didn't move quicker like I had hoped but fully trusting in God's timing.  All through these past 6-7 months, I have been content with our 2 year plan to bring a our baby home.  Now, all of the sudden, I have this crazy sense of urgency to bring her home now!  I feel like a crazy woman, praying about it all the time and making my requests to God to somehow bring us a baby now.  And, in the midst, God is growing our hearts more and more in the direction of adoption. 

Just this weekend, Robbie and I celebrated our 12 year wedding anniversary.  And do you know what my man of 12 years asked me?  What if God is calling us to adopt more than one?  How would you feel about that?  What if He wants us to adopt a lot or wants us to somehow partner with an orphanage to care for more than our household?  I don't know what God is working our lives or in our hearts, but we are one, me and Rob, and God is giving us a united heart that only He could create!  Oh how that makes me love him all the more, that he is open and is listening to God speak to him; and that he is ready and willing to obey God no matter how crazy His calling may be.

Home Study Completed!

Whew!  I feel like we are in the final stages of all of our paperwork!  We had our last home study visit last Tuesday and just received our home study draft today.  I am glad to say that we passed, but not without a few good laughs during the kids' visit with the social worker! Oh, the stories kids tell!!

During this visit, we also talked with our social worker about what special needs we are considering.  It was hard, like everyone said it is; but, we had completed a lot of research and felt good about what we knew we would consider, what was a maybe and what medical needs were off our radar.  I feel like we have to explain our reasons why we are open to some needs and not others, but in the end, I believe it is the Lord who is directing our hearts and we trust him completely to prepare us for whatever He has planned for our growing family! 

 So now, we have to get our finalized draft and we can start getting all of our paperwork certified! 

Whoa!!!  For almost being finished!!!

First Social Worker Visit

Monday was our first time to meet with our social worker.  We will have total of 4 visits with her and are much less nervous about the home study process after meet with her!  We still have lots to get ready for the 4th and final visit at home, especially since we are still in re-model mode.  But, with most of the major work behind us, we feel like we can begin to make this house a home.  We are still undecided as to whether we should move now or wait awhile.  With all the paper work to do, I haven't taken the time to sit and pray about this matter specifically like I want to.  I want God to move us in His time and trust in Him to provide for our every need!

In the mean time, we will be finishing up the few things left on our home study and begin to work on the papers for our dossier! We're getting excited!!

Begining our "Paper Pregnancy"!

Early last week we heard from both our social worker and our family coordinator.  Both have sent us a bundle load of paperwork to read and work through.  So much so that my head is spinning a little to know what to do first!  Thankfully, we have a checklist to work from and we spent the weekend filling out forms and signing what we could.  Yesterday, I began to gather information such as financial documents, marriage and birth certificates, apply for background checks, make appointments for fingerprinting, and so forth. 

We are eager to get through the home study because we can not begin to apply for grants until our home study is approved.  In the meantime, that means writing big checks to pay our fees as we go.  Some have asked us if we are going to fund raise for our adoption and I don't really know the answer to that right now.  What I do know is that we are trusting in the Lord to provide financially for us as we obey Him in this adoption.  Whether that means God providing extra work (Robbie is already in the process of renewing his real estate license), providing grants, providing ways for us to sell more wholesale inventory or what, we don't know.  BUT, we do know that God has placed us on this journey for His purpose we believe in Him to provide for us along the way.  It has become a little scary with so much money due up front and hospital bills from CR's visit rolling in, but I have to continue to remind myself that God, who began this good work, will be faithful to complete it.  He always has!

Let The Fun Begin!!

Here is what I found in my Inbox on Friday afternoon!!

"I hope you are doing well today!  I wanted to email you to confirm receipt of your initial agreement paperwork and payment.  Now that I’ve received your paperwork, your family will be assigned both a Social Worker to work with you on the Home Study and a Family Coordinator to work with you on the Dossier paperwork.  You should hear from both of these individuals within the next week or so regarding the next steps. . . "

We are officially on our way! I guess each step feels a little more official than the step before, but this one feels a little like it is signed and sealed!  Let the fun begin!!

Decisions, Decisions . . .

Over the past several weeks, we have had a hard time deciding for sure which country to pursue for adoption.  We arrived at China Special Needs basically as a process of elimination.  We thought we would end up in the Honduras program and still keep feeling a pull that way, but it seems as though God has placed China on our radar for a reason!

We were officially accepted into the China Special Needs program on August 23,  but have yet to send in our first round of signed papers and initial $2000 payment.  We wanted to make sure this is God's path for us before jumping right into a program and have taken the last month to pray and ask God to specifially show us the country He has for us.  During the last month, we have probed further into the Honduras program, investigated the Philipines program, and talked more extensively about special needs. 

2 weeks ago, after praying myself to sleep asking God for direction, I awoke with a verse heavy on my heart. 

"I have come that they may have life and that they may have it more abundantly." John 10:10

I shared this verse with Robbie that day, but it didn't really give me clear direction on a country to pursue.  In our humble application of this verse (I know Jesus is speaking of giving eternal life) it seemed to point towards China.  I kept thinking of all the precious children who are overlooked because they aren't perfect and my heart was saying, "Yes! I will choose you and give you an abundant life full of unconditional love!".  But, I wasn't for certain.  And Robbie's concerns about special needs only grew more and more. 

Then, just last Monday, a dear friend encouraged me to "wait on the Lord"  instead of us trying to decide where we should adopt.  This seemed like good advice, but I felt like God was telling us to go now.  How long would it take for us to wait and hear His voice?  For Him to speak to us and tell us where He has our baby?  I spent all of last week praying and asking God to show us, to speak so that we could hear.  I wasn't looking for signs in the sky but I was waiting - and listening. 

Friday night we decided to get a babysitter so that we could go to Lowe's and grocery shop together!  Fun date night!  We ended up connecting with the dear friend mentioned above and her husband and going out to eat instead.  After dinner, her husband wanted to take us to a local coffee joint and there is where we believe God wanted to speak to us.  We were sitting outside drinking our hot chocolates when the owner's kids walked outside and Brian decided to introduce us.  Their names were Max and China.  I didn't hear it at first.  The ah-ha moment happened as we were walking back to the car and I realized that God just told us to go to China to get our baby!

This is still a little wacky seeming to me.  I don't normally hear God like I am hearing Him right now.  It had me all giddy like a teenage girl on her first date to think that God cared enough about me to speak to me.  To us.  To direct us when we didn't know where to go.  To give us peace to make that decision to finally say "Yes!" to China Special Needs.  This excites me!   Papers will be signed tonight and be mailed tomorrow!!!!

The first "shazam" moment!

I know it sounds a little crazy, but one March night in 2011, I awoke to the single word "Uganda" spoken very clearly to me in my sleep.  I have never heard God speak to me like this before, but I knew without a doubt that God wanted me to find out about Uganda.  At the time, I didn't even know where Uganda was.  I remember sitting up in bed saying to myself, "I think Uganda is in Africa, but what could be in Africa?" 

The next day, I spent all of my spare time researching Uganda and what I found out was staggering.  Just looking for basic information on the country, I began reading about all the orphans in this country.  According to countless websites and studies, Uganda has the largest orphan popluation per capita of any country in the world.  I quickly began to see that God wanted me to find out about His children in this country.  It didn't take long for me to stumble onto Kisses from Katie, a young girl from Brentwood, TN who obediently answered the Lord's calling for her to live amoung the Uganda people and minister to the poor and needy, namely the orphans. 

I cried and cried all that day as I read her story.  It was on that day that I first told Robbie that I felt now was the time to start researching adoption with serious intent.  We both had all kind of excuses of why now was not a good time.  Our kids are still so young, they still need intense training in righteousness, the cost is staggering, we need more space in our house, do we have the time to invest in more children or even time to research adotion? 

Even with all these questions in our minds, Robbie gave me the green light to begin research so that in a few years, we would be ready! I took the green light as permission to engage and went right to work finding out all I could about internation adoption first, and then domestic adoption.  As I researched internation adoption, I began to see that we would not qualify for many of the country programs because of the size of our family or because of the extended travel required for many of the prograns.  We went back and forth on domestic adoption, but for now, have decided that we should pursue internation adoption. 

Robbie started to get a little nervous when he saw information packets arriving in the mail and as I probed him for family information to help me fill out online applications! It was time for a heart to heart so that we could move forward together and walk on the same page of this new story. I laid out my concerns about finance and travel times and concerns over domestic adoption while Robbie gave me just 2 concerns he had. The first was our children. He really wants their training in godliness and righteousness to take root in their hearts before adding more children to train who will need lots of attention. That one seemed easy for me - I'll just focus more energy on training time. The second and biggest concern he had was our house. He felt that we are busting at the seems, not because of our bedrooms, but because of our small bathroom for the kids and our lack or attic or storage space. He thought we really needed to sell our house before should seriously move forward in the adoption process.

I was a little bummed because I was already filling our paperwork and starting to get excited about adoption and this put a little damper on my excitement. But, my response to him was, "well, I'm just going to pray that God sells our house, then." And that is exactly what I did. When I would start looking at agencies and countries, I would just have to stop and pray, "Lord, if you want us to adopt, please sell our house for us."

This takes me to Monday, June 13. On Monday, I decided to list our house as a "Make Me Move" option on zillow.com. I didn't really know what this was, but thought it might let people know that we would be willing to sell our house even though it wasn't listed. We eventually wanted to list it, but still needed to get it "show ready" before we could that. On Tuesday the 14th, we received an email from a couple in CA asking if they could get some pictures of the house. It turns out that they were planning to make a trip that weekend to come look at house in TN. My first thought was no way! We are no where near ready and it would take me longer than 4-5 days to get this house in order. But, Robbie and I both agreed that we needed to make this work and agreed to show the house on Friday.

Fast forward through the long week of yard work, cleaning, organizing, throwing out and so forth. An agent showed the couple our home and called us after 2 1/2 hours of viewing to say that they had written up a formal offer and wanted to close in 2 weeks! It's funny how we weren't really shocked. I mean, we were, but we knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was God speaking to us. He was making us move! He was answering our prayer (or at least mine!) and saying very loudly, "It's time!"

The neat part is to see how through this sale, God was speaking directly to Robbie.  I had already heard God tell me "now", but for the first time, Robbie was hearing God speak to him telling him to move "now". We had much work to do and the adoption process would be put on hold while found a house to move into, completed the moving process, began renovating the new house and began a new school year.  But, we never lost sight of the goal of the whole move.  We knew that we had to get settled so that we could begin again, with earnest intensity, seeking after the child God has waiting for us!

My Heart for Adoption: Robbie

My journey to adoption is quite different than my wife's.  Growing up as the baby of my family, I never had the opportunity to be exposed to younger children.. Even thinking back to the majority of my high school friends, we were all the youngest of our families and I don't remember any younger siblings around.  I have always enjoyed high school aged kids, but even the thought of starting my own family with young children was a bit scary.

I began my career in education right out of college and started teaching and coaching middle and high school students.  I developed lasting relationships with students who came from both stable and unstable homes.  For the first time, I began to see how adults can be role models and have a lasting impact on children and how much children need those adult role models in their life.

When I was 26 years old I had my first opportunity to visit an orphanage.  I went with a fellow educator on a trip to Honduras where we drove a truck from there to Guatemala.  He had lived in Honduras for 2 years and wanted to donate his truck to the same orphanage where my wife had spent her years going on mission trips.  For the first time I was exposed to a different kind of need that I had never seen before. 

Fast forward a few years to when I was 29 and courting Dabney.  She boldly confronted me on the topic of a future adoption.  From the tone of her question, I knew that this was a passion that she had, but God had not yet laid on my heart.  I did say that I would be open to, but it was not a driving issue for me. 

Over the past 11 years of our marriage, we have talked about this subject from time to time.  Though we have been busy with the raising of our 5 children, we have never stopped and taken the time to pursue adoption until  2 months ago.  I was still a bit reluctant since we have much training to do with our current children, but God revealed himself to me through the sell of our home in such a way that now I am the eager one to begin this journey.  I am excited beyond anything I can explain or understand to open our hearts and our home to a child through adoption.

My heart for adoption: Dabney

God began to steer my heart in the way of adoption way back in the 9th grade.  Every year in high school, my school would take a mission trip to other parts of the country and world.  Wherever we went, we were always serving children whose parents could no longer take care of them.  We went to French Camp, MS where we worked and played with troubled teens who were living at a Christian home away from home to get the help they needed.  We went to St. Croix where we helped repair an orphanage that was hit hard by a hurricane. 

We traveled to Poland to help lead a Children's camp.  This was my first heart-breaking experience with true orphans.  Most of the children at this camp came from families, but there were 2 children there who were orphans.  The camp hosted a family day where the parents of the kids got to come and experience a day at camp, but these 2 children had no family to come and visit them.  They had a nice man from the children's home who came.  But, I can remember one little girl who ran into my tent crying that day because she had no mom or dad to visit her.  I held her in my arms and wished with all my heart that I could take that little girl home with me.

The next year, and several more years into my college years, we began traveling to an orphanage in Guatemala called Agua Viva.  Here, we actually stayed at the orphanage and taught the kids about Jesus and played with them every day!  We helped with maintenance on the building and grounds, took trips into the city to preach the Word on the streets; but, my favorite times were sitting with the children and hearing them laugh!  I was always amazed at how much joy they had, especially with such meager circumstances.

Through these years of mission trips, I knew that I would one day pursue adoption for my future family.  So much so, that it became a pre-requisite for marriage!  Yes, this is one issue that Robbie and I talked about before marriage and were in agreement upon.  I just couldn't see myself marrying anyone who would not consider the adoption of a child into their family. 

So, from the get go, we have always wanted to adopt.  I always said that I wanted to have 2 children by birth and adopt two children.  My perfect little plan was turned upside-down when God graciously blessed with 5 children by birth! I began to think that our plans for adoption might never become a reality, but God has rejuvenated my God-given vision for adoption again. 

And, I whole-heartedly believe that He will give us everything we need for this journey.  From the energy, the patience, right down to the money and the perfect house!  "If God is for us, who can be against us?" Romans 8:31

So, here we go!  We covet your prayers for us during this time and would love all the advice and wisdom you can give us!

Religion?

No matter what we think when we hear the word "religion", God tells us what He thinks about it.  It seems many people are running from the word religion or religious, but a clear distinction should be  made between "man-made" religion and God's idea of a "pure religion".  No matter what denomination of church you have been in, you have probably been subjected to some form of man-made religion.  Where a set of standards, absent from God's Word, were created to measure one's rank in the Christian walk.  Jesus called out the Pharisees and religious rulers of His time for trying to "act religious" on the outside, when their hearts were desperately wicked on the inside (Matthew 23:27).

When Jesus comes to live inside of us, He will give us a new heart!  One that is cleansed from all unrighteousness!  He will take the burdens of man-made religion away and give us rest from the tiresome act of trying to save ourselves by good works.  He tells us in Matthew 11:30 that "My yoke is easy and my burden is light."  Through the sanctification process, we begin to desire holiness of the heart, the part of us that only God can see and judge.  He knows the motives of our hearts, the whispers of our thoughts.  And He tells what He requires of us as Christians.

 "He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?" Micah 6:8  So simple, yet seemingly so hard to stop and just be humble and show love and justice to our neighbors.  I believe James 1:26, 27 tells us what it looks like to show humility, love and mercy. 

"If anyone among you thinks he is religious, and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this one's religion is useless.  Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world."  Ouch! How often do I let my tongue loose and show a heart of pride instead of humility?  Do I have a heart of mercy for the least in this world, those people who can't take care of themselves?  Do I show the love of Jesus to people who look different than myself or I am I too consumed with trying to look how world looks?

We are embarking on a journey towards the adoption of a child, but adoption is not the only way to care for orphans.  Even now, we can sponsor a child who needs to see Jesus.  We can pray for the millions of orphans around the world that need the love of a mom and dad.  We can help sponsor families that have chosen to open their home to orphans.  We should look for the widows in our churches and neighborhoods that need help with yard work or home repairs or just plain ole fellowship.  We should teach our children to "look not only to your own interests but also to the interests of others" (Phil. 2:4). 

I'm preaching to myself here.  And sharing what the Lord is teaching my stubborn heart.  Whatever way we choose to respond, our hearts should be heavy for the those who can't care for themselves.  This is the heart of our heavenly Father and ours, as Christians, should beat much the same way!