Taking a Leap

We have news to share!

James 1:27 “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. “

We are excited to share that God is leading our family to pursue international adoption. Surprise! Surprise is the appropriate word for how we feel as well. The idea of adoption for our family is not a new one for Chad and me. We have literally been talking about it since before we married. We both individually have felt for a long time that adoption may be included in our story and have, until recently, been on slightly different pages about the way God might choose to play that out in our family. To me, adoption was something we would pursue “one day” maybe when our kids were older or when we had the money. I did not give the “when” much thought or prayer, just assumed it was later for us. God has been stirring my heart now for weeks to seriously seek His will for our family and adoption. As I submitted in prayer, He was faithful to communicate to me His desire for our family in a number of ways. Knowing full well that I would need confirmation in many different forms, God used His Word, sermons, personal Bible study, books, music and wise counsel from godly individuals to reveal His will for our family and adoption at this time. We still have more questions than answers at this point, but God was gracious to provide clarity in some of the specifics for us. Again, He knew I would need some of the details to more easily acknowledge this as a reality rather than a “some day” dream.

Here is what we know God is telling us:

· God is calling us to begin the adoption process now. The Gospel in our hearts compels us to live it out in our lives through orphan care. Adoption is the way our family feels led to care for orphans at this time.

· We are adopting internationally from China through Lifeline Children’s Services in Birmingham.

· We are adopting a little girl (probably under two years old) with a mild medical or other special need. This has been one of the scariest things for me to accept. Upon further research and conversations with Lifeline staff we learned that many of the children’s medical needs are easily repaired in the U.S. and simply have not been addressed in the orphanage due to a lack of resources. If a child with such a need remained unadopted, they would spend their whole life in an institution likely without ever having their need addressed.

o Psalm 82:4 “Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”

· We will be able to specify with the agency what type of “special need” our family is willing to commit to before they offer us a referral. Some of the more common needs include: cleft lip or palate, club foot, minor heart defects, malformed or missing limbs, and sometimes even a large birth mark can be considered a “special need.” With many of these needs, medical procedures, medication, or therapies can correct them.

· She will be named Charlotte, and we will call her Lottie. Charlotte means free or strong. We pray that Lottie will experience freedom from bondage as an orphan and grow strong and healthy as a result of being adopted in the same way that we have experienced those things through our adoption as God’s children.

o John 14:18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.”

In feeling the nudge to go ahead with the adoption process, I quickly questioned God’s timing. I thought we weren’t ready, that we didn’t have the money we needed, and that He couldn’t possibly want us to start the process while Chad was still in school. The very same week I was feeling these doubts, God spoke to me through my Explorer’s Bible study material. Here are some quotes directly from my book that I read just a day after feeling such doubt:

· “The key to hearing from God more frequently or certainly is to take action on what you think God is saying.”

· “What God calls you to do will meet with His provision in accordance with His timing.”

· “Expect the Holy Spirit to give you His peace when the leading, timing, and conditions are right for obedience.”

I was also reminded of the passage in Isaiah 55:9 that says God’s ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts higher than our thoughts. All of these things served to reassure me that God was not asking us to have the entire adoption process figured out, He was asking us to take that first step of obedience on a path He has clearly directed us to. I do not feel rushed to bring Lottie home, but I feel an urgency to be obedient in beginning the process in obedience to Him. I know God will sovereignly direct everything else.

This will not be easy. There may be many unexpected obstacles along the way, but we feel confident of God’s calling and know He will carry us through each obstacle. This will be a LONG process. China requires both adopting parents to be 30 years old before considering them for adoption. As a result, Lifeline will allow us to begin the “paper chase” at 29 ½ years old. So, we will not officially be able to begin requesting documents and completing the home study until late February of 2012. That is so all of the documents we collect will still be current when they are sent to China. Our hope is that by the time we turn 30 next year, our dossier will be complete or almost complete in order to be sent off to China and officially be put on a waiting list. It will most likely be another year after being put on the waiting list before we are able to bring Lottie home.

Adoption will be expensive too. I have heard someone say before that when God calls you to do something extraordinary it is usually costly and requires great sacrifice. That is the case with adoption too. We need close to $30,000 from start to finish over the next couple of years. That number alone is enough to make some of those considering adoption run for the hills. Here is the good news, we need only portions of that at a time (the largest coming at the end of the process when we travel to China to get Lottie) and we will get around 1/3 of that back in tax credits once the adoption is finalized. We have a lot of work to do, but are confident God will help us to do the necessary work in order to bring Lottie home. We are brainstorming some creative ways to raise money and are actually excited about getting our hands dirty for Lottie’s sake.

So what do we need from our family and friends? Prayers first and foremost. Pray for Lottie, her health and safety. Pray for her birth mother, especially if Lottie has not been born yet, for her health and safety as well. Only God knows the circumstances that will lead Lottie’s birth parents to abandon her and only His grace will be able to heal them of the hurt that will follow such a decision. Pray that God will comfort them with the assurance that their little girl will be well cared for and loved deeply. We also need your support in this decision and throughout the entire adoption journey. We need you to encourage us when we feel defeated, strengthen us when we become weary of the wait, and celebrate with us as each step along the journey brings us closer to bringing Lottie home.

· "Always remember that God is never separate from your wait. He is the Lord of waiting. He is the liberal giver of grace for the wait. Because your wait is not outside of his plan, but a vital and necessary part of it, he is with you in your wait. And remember God is not so much after the success of your ministry, he’s after you. So as you wait, tell yourself again and again: Waiting is not just about what I get at the end of the wait, but about who I become as I wait." -Paul Tripp

We are taking a huge leap of faith with the confidence that God has shown us where to jump and will not abandon us, just as he has remembered Lottie and will not abandon the fatherless.

·Isaiah 49:15b “Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.”

· Psalm 10:17-18 “You, LORD, hear the desire of the afflicted; you encourage them, and you listen to their cry, defending the fatherless and the oppressed, so that mere earthly mortals will never again strike terror.”

· Psalm 68:5 “A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling.”

Joyfully waiting,

Gloria & Chad