I'm so sorry that part 2 of our adoption story has been such a long time coming. When I wrote part 1 I really intended to finish the story in the next day or two, but I didn't get the chance so it kind of got pushed to the side. If you missed part 1 or need a refresher you can read it here. As Paul Harvey would say, And now, the rest of the story....
July 1, 2010
The majority of this day was probably like any other. Typical Texas summer day. Hot and humid. We probably went swimming. I don't recall what we had for dinner or what particular activities we did that day. It was just a normal day.
That evening, after the kids were in bed, I got on the computer and was surfing around. I ended up on blogger, which was a rare thing for me those days. I had been so sick and tired during my pregnancy with Kellen, that I pretty much quit blogging and reading blogs all together. It was during my pregnancy though, that God started doing some amazing things in mine and Josh's life spiritually. Looking back I see that God was just paving the road to where he was leading us. I love how he does that. Rarely does he just drop a radical life altering plan on his children, without first preparing their hearts.
So there I was, surfin' the net, and I started to do the blog hop. To this day, I'll never know how I ended up on the blog that changed everything. I've gone back in my mind several times and tried to figure out how I ended up there, but I can't figure it out. I guess I followed the blog chain somehow and God guided my clicks.
I found myself on the blog of an adoptive mother who had recently returned from Eastern Europe with her two new daughters in tow. If you will remember, I hadn't read any adoption blogs for over a year. I casually began reading the post I had been linked to. It was a heavy hearted post. She talked about the conditions that her daughters had lived in when they were orphans.
She talked about laying rooms.
And medicated children.
And urine soaked cribs.
And institutions.
And neglect.
And dehydration.
And then she showed pictures of the ones she had to leave behind.
It was too much for my heart to bear. I sat at the computer sobbing. While I had always had a special place in my heart for orphans, I had never felt anything like this. The grief I felt for "the least of these" felt unbearable. The scales had been removed from my eyes, and I felt so utterly overwhelmed by the desparate nature of their situation. I didn't even have that, "I have got to DO something" feeling yet. I just felt grief.
I was still sitting there crying when Josh walked in. Crying is not a regular thing for me, and he looked shocked to see me that way. He tried to comfort me and asked what was wrong. I just mumbled that I had read something sad and that I was going to take a shower.
I stood in the shower crying and praying. At first I didn't even know what to pray because I just felt so sad. Something in my heart had been changed and I was pretty sure that I could not just go on being the same person I was before. I had no idea what I could do, but I knew that I had to do something.
I prayed,
Lord, my heart is so full. I can't sit and do nothing. You have got to put mine and Josh's hearts on the same page. Give us the same desire, whatever that desire may be.
After praying, the best I could through the emotions of my broken heart, I got out of the shower feeling the Lord's peace. He would work his will in our lives in his timing. I got dressed and walked back in to our bedroom to find Josh's sitting in front of the computer crying. Hard. Apparently, I left the blog post I just read was still pulled up on the computer screen. When I got in the shower, Josh had sat down and read what I had just read. I found him in the same state that I had just been in. His heart was broken. He turned to me and said, "We HAVE to do something. Now." I told him that he really didn't have a clue as to how much adoptions from Eastern Europe cost. I explained that from the research I had done in years past, that adoptions from those countries are expensive and the travel is long and you have to make more than one trip to adopt. I totally expected this to deter him. Money had been the main issue when we had discussed adoption in the past. I saw hurting children. He saw dollar signs. Lots and lots of dollar signs. Dollar signs that represented money that we did not have, or have any hopes of having anytime soon. Being that he is the sole provider for our family, I don't really blame him for being concerned with the money aspect of such a huge commitment.
So I reminded him of all those dollar signs that were floating in front of his eyes the last time we broached the topic of adoption. It didn't deter him in the slightest. He said that he didn't care about the money, that we "had to do whatever it takes" to get to those children and rescue them.
Where had my husband gone, and who was this man?? Had the Lord seriously answered the prayer I had just prayed like 5 minutes ago in the shower? The same prayer that I had prayed over a year ago when I surrendered my adoption desires to the Lord? When I had prayed it I truly thought that I was giving up my dream for good. Now God was giving it back to me. Josh was not only fully on board with adopting, he was passionate about rescuing orphans. God ignited something in Josh's heart that my poking, proding, and pushing never could have. My best efforts might have gotten Josh to reluctantly go along with my wishes. But the Holy Spirit had lit a flame in him that no one on earth could put out.
In the months that have passed since that time, Josh's passion hasn't wavered in the slightest. The hand of God writing on the wall could not have made the Lord's call for us to adopt any clearer. We have never doubted it for one minute. We may have had times of discouragement and fear, but never have we questioned if this was truly were God has lead us. I don't think that it is possible for God to have made it any clearer to us. It took a couple of months for me to navigate through my fears of what all adoption from Eastern Europe entails, but once again, Josh never wavered for one moment. We had no clue how God's plan would be accomplished in our life. It seemed so incredibly impossible. But we have been shown, time and time again, that with God, all things are possible.
The end of this story is yet to be written. I fully believe that the Lord's hand will continue to be on us as we follow him in obedience. There are still aspects of this adoption that terrify me, but I trust that God will give me the strength to obey him. In spite of the fears, I look forward to the rest of this journey. I long for the day when I can hold my little boy in my arms. God is good, and he is able to do exceedingly more than I could ask or even imagine. Praise be to the one who fulfills my dreams in ways I never thought possible. He is truly the giver of all good things. I cannot wait to see what he has in store for us in the months to come.
Showing posts with label surrender. Show all posts
Showing posts with label surrender. Show all posts
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
I think it's time to share....
our story.
Our adoption story. How this whole journey began and why. This could be a novel, so I'm going to do my best to summarize and just hit the high points. We'll see how that goes.
I've wanted to adopt...for like, forever. I had a desire to adopt long before I ever had the desire for biological children. I wasn't one of those typical girls growing up who day dreamed about their wedding, and their future children. I never sat around wondering how many kids I would have and what their names would be. I just didn't. I didn't not like kids. I baby sat alot as a teenager and was comfortable around kids and thought babies were cute. But I didn't desire children or motherhood. I was super boy crazy, so there was no doubt that there would be marriage in my future(hopefully sooner, than later), but the whole white-picked-fence-stay-at-home-mommy-of-several-children thing? Um, no thanks. A hot husband and a cool career was pretty much my life goals as a teenager. One day, when I was married, successful, and ancient(like 35), I would have a couple of kids. I had no real desire to give birth, so I thought it would be cool to adopt. Help someone less fortunate or whatnot. So when I became this really old dried up 35 year old, I just adopt me a couple of a kids. That was my plan.
Then college came around, and after a couple of years of trying to head down the career path that I thought I wanted, it came to decision making time. The career I was pursing was 7 day a week(usually), 12-15 hours a day, high stress, life consuming job, that didn't leave room for a family. Not only that, but it was going to take me a good 8 years or so, from that point, to finish all the necessary schooling, training, and qualifications, to be able to achieve my desired career. By that point(about 20 or 21 years old), I was starting to feel my first motherly pangs. I started thinking, maybe it would be cool to be a mom one day(not that I had despised the idea before that, it just had not ever been something I had given much thought to). So I decided to abandon my career dreams and pursue a more "family friendly" career. Teacher education. That sounded like a good career for someone who was going to possibly be a mom one day. Plenty of family time in the evenings and weekends and summers, because Lord knows I wouldn't be staying at home, homeschooling or anything crazy like that. Sometimes it's fun to look back at the plans I had for myself and just laugh.
Over the next couple of years my desire to have children grew, but the desire to adopt never faded. After Luke was born you would think that the completely amazing and forever life changing experience of becoming a mother would diminish any previous desire I had to adopt a child. But it did just the opposite. After Luke's birth it was like a switch flipped in me. I began to realize what an amazing gift a child is. An utter miracle. The idea that there were children out there somewhere in the world that didn't have parents that felt about them how I felt about Luke, was appalling to me. I would love that child, where ever he or she may be. That warm fuzzy feeling of "it would be so neat to adopt one day", turned in to a burning desire of "I KNOW adoption is in my future". I knew that I was capable of deeply loving a child that I didn't give birth to. I wanted to be a mother to a child whose mother either couldn't, wouldn't, or didn't want to be a mother.
Josh and I get married and over the next several years the topic of adoption is brought up. Often. I won't say that Josh completely resisted, but he wasn't passionate about it like I was. We'll just say that he was ambivalent, at best.
We had Raylen. That didn't slow me down too much. I dropped bits of adoption information here and there. I knew that it was not the right time for us to adopt right then, but I didn't want Josh to think that I had lost interest. I guess I thought if he heard it mentioned enough, that it would get stuck in his brain or something. He was still ambivalent though.
Then we had Treyson. I stayed in a grief induced mental and emotional fog for months after his death. Once the fog lifted, I was back on the adoption train. FULL FORCE this time. Treyson showed me how short life is and that it must be lived to the fullest. I did not want to live my life with regrets. I was so wounded from the loss of Treyson, that while I still had a desire for another child, I was unsure if I ever wanted to be pregnant again. That made the thought of adoption even more appealing. I was adoption crazed! I read adoption websites, adoption blogs, adoption anything I could get my hands on. I showed Josh videos and articles and pictures. Still, there was nothing but a polite, "That's cool", on his part. The more I pushed, the more he resisted.
Before you go thinking that Josh is heartless or anything, he is actually the exact opposite. He is a very tenderhearted person with the spiritual gifts of service and mercy. He has such a servant's heart and is always putting other's needs before himself. That is why it baffled me that he wasn't completely on board with this adoption thing. He felt sorry for orphans and the less fortunate and had a desire to help them, but it wasn't the permanant kind of help that I had in mind. The best I could get out of him, as far as a commitment to adopt, was that one day a long time away when we had more money a bigger house and older kids, he might consider us adopting. And let's just face it, the only reason I got that much out of him is because Josh rarely tells me no to anything. This was his way out of committing to something he didn't want to do, yet not have to straight up tell me "no". (oh, and did I mention that the man doesn't like confrontation, either?)
By this point I was really frustrated. I was passionate about adopting one day, and Josh just plain wasn't. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Here I was with a deep passion for something that I thought that God had called me to do one day, yet it seemed like that day would never come. I couldn't force Josh into agreeing to adopt. That has to be something that you go into in complete agreement. And even if I could get him to agree to it, that wasn't the way I wanted to do it. That wouldn't be fair to a child. I wanted Josh to be just as passionate about the whole thing as I was, but he wasn't.
I was faced with a decision. I could either 1. Continue down the path I was on of trying to convince Josh that adoption was a wonderful thing and we needed to do it in a couple of years, or 2. Let go and give it to God.
As much as the thought pained me, I knew that the right thing to do was to give it to God. That meant, completely taking my hands off of it, and trusting that if God had truly called me to adopt, then he would call my husband to the same thing at some point.
So on April 29th, 2009, I gave my desires to adopt to the Lord and stopped trying to control my husband and force him in to MY calling. If you are wondering how I know the exact date, it is because I journaled it in my spiritual journal. I don't journal alot, usually only fervent prayer requests and petitions to the Lord, and other major things. But this was a major thing to me. On this day I completely let go of it. As painful as I anticipated it being, it really wasn't. It was freeing. It was no longer my issue. I prayed that God would give Josh and I the same vision, in regards to adoption, whatever that vision may be. I was truly willing to give up my dream, if that was what God had for me.
Giving it to God gave me so much peace. I quit the research. I quit the adoption blogs and websites. I quit talking to Josh about it. I quit dwelling on it all together. I thought that this would be very hard, but really it wasn't. I had full faith that if it was meant to be, that the Lord would give it back to me, this time with Josh on board. And if it wasn't meant to be, then that meant that he had something even better planned for my life. Because he does know best, you know?
Surrender, again.
Two months later, I found out that I was pregnant with Kellen. It briefly crossed my mind that maybe this was somehow God's final answer about the whole adoption thing. That thought hurt, but I chose to trust that whatever his will was, that was best.
The months rolled by. No adoption talk. No adoption thoughts. If I heard of someone adopting I would think that it was wonderful for them, but in the back of my mind I thought that that was probably all it would ever be. Someone else's adoption story. If the Lord was calling me to minister in another way, then I was willing to do it.
Surrender.
Surrender.
Surrender.
Then July 1, 2010 happened.
And I will never be the same.
Our adoption story. How this whole journey began and why. This could be a novel, so I'm going to do my best to summarize and just hit the high points. We'll see how that goes.
I've wanted to adopt...for like, forever. I had a desire to adopt long before I ever had the desire for biological children. I wasn't one of those typical girls growing up who day dreamed about their wedding, and their future children. I never sat around wondering how many kids I would have and what their names would be. I just didn't. I didn't not like kids. I baby sat alot as a teenager and was comfortable around kids and thought babies were cute. But I didn't desire children or motherhood. I was super boy crazy, so there was no doubt that there would be marriage in my future(hopefully sooner, than later), but the whole white-picked-fence-stay-at-home-mommy-of-several-children thing? Um, no thanks. A hot husband and a cool career was pretty much my life goals as a teenager. One day, when I was married, successful, and ancient(like 35), I would have a couple of kids. I had no real desire to give birth, so I thought it would be cool to adopt. Help someone less fortunate or whatnot. So when I became this really old dried up 35 year old, I just adopt me a couple of a kids. That was my plan.
Then college came around, and after a couple of years of trying to head down the career path that I thought I wanted, it came to decision making time. The career I was pursing was 7 day a week(usually), 12-15 hours a day, high stress, life consuming job, that didn't leave room for a family. Not only that, but it was going to take me a good 8 years or so, from that point, to finish all the necessary schooling, training, and qualifications, to be able to achieve my desired career. By that point(about 20 or 21 years old), I was starting to feel my first motherly pangs. I started thinking, maybe it would be cool to be a mom one day(not that I had despised the idea before that, it just had not ever been something I had given much thought to). So I decided to abandon my career dreams and pursue a more "family friendly" career. Teacher education. That sounded like a good career for someone who was going to possibly be a mom one day. Plenty of family time in the evenings and weekends and summers, because Lord knows I wouldn't be staying at home, homeschooling or anything crazy like that. Sometimes it's fun to look back at the plans I had for myself and just laugh.
Over the next couple of years my desire to have children grew, but the desire to adopt never faded. After Luke was born you would think that the completely amazing and forever life changing experience of becoming a mother would diminish any previous desire I had to adopt a child. But it did just the opposite. After Luke's birth it was like a switch flipped in me. I began to realize what an amazing gift a child is. An utter miracle. The idea that there were children out there somewhere in the world that didn't have parents that felt about them how I felt about Luke, was appalling to me. I would love that child, where ever he or she may be. That warm fuzzy feeling of "it would be so neat to adopt one day", turned in to a burning desire of "I KNOW adoption is in my future". I knew that I was capable of deeply loving a child that I didn't give birth to. I wanted to be a mother to a child whose mother either couldn't, wouldn't, or didn't want to be a mother.
Josh and I get married and over the next several years the topic of adoption is brought up. Often. I won't say that Josh completely resisted, but he wasn't passionate about it like I was. We'll just say that he was ambivalent, at best.
We had Raylen. That didn't slow me down too much. I dropped bits of adoption information here and there. I knew that it was not the right time for us to adopt right then, but I didn't want Josh to think that I had lost interest. I guess I thought if he heard it mentioned enough, that it would get stuck in his brain or something. He was still ambivalent though.
Then we had Treyson. I stayed in a grief induced mental and emotional fog for months after his death. Once the fog lifted, I was back on the adoption train. FULL FORCE this time. Treyson showed me how short life is and that it must be lived to the fullest. I did not want to live my life with regrets. I was so wounded from the loss of Treyson, that while I still had a desire for another child, I was unsure if I ever wanted to be pregnant again. That made the thought of adoption even more appealing. I was adoption crazed! I read adoption websites, adoption blogs, adoption anything I could get my hands on. I showed Josh videos and articles and pictures. Still, there was nothing but a polite, "That's cool", on his part. The more I pushed, the more he resisted.
Before you go thinking that Josh is heartless or anything, he is actually the exact opposite. He is a very tenderhearted person with the spiritual gifts of service and mercy. He has such a servant's heart and is always putting other's needs before himself. That is why it baffled me that he wasn't completely on board with this adoption thing. He felt sorry for orphans and the less fortunate and had a desire to help them, but it wasn't the permanant kind of help that I had in mind. The best I could get out of him, as far as a commitment to adopt, was that one day a long time away when we had more money a bigger house and older kids, he might consider us adopting. And let's just face it, the only reason I got that much out of him is because Josh rarely tells me no to anything. This was his way out of committing to something he didn't want to do, yet not have to straight up tell me "no". (oh, and did I mention that the man doesn't like confrontation, either?)
By this point I was really frustrated. I was passionate about adopting one day, and Josh just plain wasn't. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Here I was with a deep passion for something that I thought that God had called me to do one day, yet it seemed like that day would never come. I couldn't force Josh into agreeing to adopt. That has to be something that you go into in complete agreement. And even if I could get him to agree to it, that wasn't the way I wanted to do it. That wouldn't be fair to a child. I wanted Josh to be just as passionate about the whole thing as I was, but he wasn't.
I was faced with a decision. I could either 1. Continue down the path I was on of trying to convince Josh that adoption was a wonderful thing and we needed to do it in a couple of years, or 2. Let go and give it to God.
As much as the thought pained me, I knew that the right thing to do was to give it to God. That meant, completely taking my hands off of it, and trusting that if God had truly called me to adopt, then he would call my husband to the same thing at some point.
So on April 29th, 2009, I gave my desires to adopt to the Lord and stopped trying to control my husband and force him in to MY calling. If you are wondering how I know the exact date, it is because I journaled it in my spiritual journal. I don't journal alot, usually only fervent prayer requests and petitions to the Lord, and other major things. But this was a major thing to me. On this day I completely let go of it. As painful as I anticipated it being, it really wasn't. It was freeing. It was no longer my issue. I prayed that God would give Josh and I the same vision, in regards to adoption, whatever that vision may be. I was truly willing to give up my dream, if that was what God had for me.
Giving it to God gave me so much peace. I quit the research. I quit the adoption blogs and websites. I quit talking to Josh about it. I quit dwelling on it all together. I thought that this would be very hard, but really it wasn't. I had full faith that if it was meant to be, that the Lord would give it back to me, this time with Josh on board. And if it wasn't meant to be, then that meant that he had something even better planned for my life. Because he does know best, you know?
Surrender, again.
Two months later, I found out that I was pregnant with Kellen. It briefly crossed my mind that maybe this was somehow God's final answer about the whole adoption thing. That thought hurt, but I chose to trust that whatever his will was, that was best.
The months rolled by. No adoption talk. No adoption thoughts. If I heard of someone adopting I would think that it was wonderful for them, but in the back of my mind I thought that that was probably all it would ever be. Someone else's adoption story. If the Lord was calling me to minister in another way, then I was willing to do it.
Surrender.
Surrender.
Surrender.
Then July 1, 2010 happened.
And I will never be the same.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
How the Lord Used the Undies Drawer
*I honestly could not figure out what to title this post, so I went with that. This is a reeeeeaaallly long post, but you gotta hang in there 'til the end to find out the meaning behing the title.*
God is so good. So completely and utterly good. At times, it leaves me speechless. But this is not one of those times. This time is one of those times where God's goodness has me bursting at the seams! I literally can't keep quiet about how amazing it has been to see his hand guide us in the past several days.
It has been almost two weeks since I posted my prayer request post. After I posted that request I stepped my adoption research up a notch. Even I didn't know that was possible. It already felt like I was going fast a furious with it. When we surrendered to the call to adopt, we started broad, considering every possible country to adopt from and method by which to adopt. We didn't want to limit God in anyway, or just assume that he was leading in a certain direction. We knew that he called to adopt special needs, but that is a VERY broad catagory. Not only is it a broad catagory, but there are orphans in every country that the United States is allowed to adopt from that fit into the special needs catagory. So while we had narrowed it down a little, there was still much whittling to do to narrow it down further. After researching different countries, we learned that we are not eligible to adopt from all countries. Each country has its own set of requirements that foreigners(that would be us) have to meet, and we don't meet every country's criteria. Stupid rules, if you ask me. But nobody asked me. So while I'm not a fan of the guidelines of some countries, I chose to see it as God closing that door and narrowing down our search.
I pretty much had ruled out international adoption for now, and narrowed it down to a very awesome Christian agency in Houston, or a CPS adoption through Buckner. We have done the first part of the preliminary paperwork with both and it was time to pick a path and take the next step. Problem was, Josh wasn't completely on board with either.
Ugh.
Every time I tried to get his opinion about which way we should go, he would say he didn't have a peace about either.
Double ugh.
When God originally called us to adopt he did it through our discovery of the plight of special needs orphans in Eastern Europe(GREAT story that I still plan on sharing with you when I get the chance). When we decided to adopt, we knew that we would be adopting a special needs child from that part of the world one day, but we didn't know if that was exactly where God was calling us to adopt from right now. If you know much about adoption at all, you know that international adoption is a different and more difficult process, in many ways, than domestic adoption. And on top of that, adopting from the majority of the countries in Eastern Europe is a completely different ball game. Very early in the research game it was as though that door was quickly shut. The Ukraine and Russia are VERY expensive to adopt from and they require TWO semi-extended trips to finalize your adoption. Plus BOTH parents have to travel for the first trip.
Paying between $50,000-$80,000 to be away from my children for about 6 weeks not only seemed impossible, but I didn't WANT to do it. Door shut. Just can't do that right now. I kept telling Josh that the exorbitant amount of money wasn't the problem. Whether the adoption costs $1000 or $100,000, God is going to have to provide the money. Plain and simple, we don't have it. The scary, and nearly impossible, part of an Eastern European adoption, for me, is the travel. Being away from my children for that amount of time(overseas, none the less) is not something I feel capable of doing. Just can't.
Regardless, that is where Josh's heart was. Even after I laid out all the facts for him about why it just couldn't work right now, that's still where his heart was at. To be 100% honest, my heart was in Eastern Europe also, but I could not fathom such a difficult undertaking at this point in my life. And by "difficult undertaking" I mean, to adopt from the area of the world that I consider to be hardest, at least in my opinon.
We reached this dead lock about a week ago. I was frustrated, to say the least. All my countless hours of researching various countries and agencies and methods of adoption, only to have Josh and I not be able to whole-heartly agree.
Then Josh had to pull a typical "Josh". He said that even though his heart was in the Ukraine, he understood how I felt about traveling there and that he would be on board with whatever method I chose.
Sigh.
Why does he always do that? He just has to be so darn agreeable. Not only did he say that he would be on board with whatever path I chose, he said that he would use virtually the rest of his vacation for the year for us to do the required training to adopt.
Double sigh.
This should be good news, right? But it just felt all wrong. I took a step back to examine my heart and I quickly saw that over the previous week I had been doing much more researching/thinking/planning than I had been praying and seeking the Lord. It was giving me serious anxiety to feel like we were right back at square one. But worry and anxiety are not from the Lord. And not only are they not from the Lord, they are a sin. I should have seen all my stressing and worry and a big flashing red light that I was doing this on my own, and not relying on the Lord. It helped to have a little reminder from my husband that if God calls us to do something, then he will give us the strength to do it. I finally relented. I gave it all back to God, and told him that I'd go where ever he calls me to go. Even if it takes years to get there. Even if it feels impossible.
But luckily, God is not bound by what we consider impossible, now is he? THIS is where the story gets good...
I have an A.W. Tozer quote written on a piece of paper that I leave in front of my computer so that I will see it several times a day. It says,
God is so good. So completely and utterly good. At times, it leaves me speechless. But this is not one of those times. This time is one of those times where God's goodness has me bursting at the seams! I literally can't keep quiet about how amazing it has been to see his hand guide us in the past several days.
It has been almost two weeks since I posted my prayer request post. After I posted that request I stepped my adoption research up a notch. Even I didn't know that was possible. It already felt like I was going fast a furious with it. When we surrendered to the call to adopt, we started broad, considering every possible country to adopt from and method by which to adopt. We didn't want to limit God in anyway, or just assume that he was leading in a certain direction. We knew that he called to adopt special needs, but that is a VERY broad catagory. Not only is it a broad catagory, but there are orphans in every country that the United States is allowed to adopt from that fit into the special needs catagory. So while we had narrowed it down a little, there was still much whittling to do to narrow it down further. After researching different countries, we learned that we are not eligible to adopt from all countries. Each country has its own set of requirements that foreigners(that would be us) have to meet, and we don't meet every country's criteria. Stupid rules, if you ask me. But nobody asked me. So while I'm not a fan of the guidelines of some countries, I chose to see it as God closing that door and narrowing down our search.
I pretty much had ruled out international adoption for now, and narrowed it down to a very awesome Christian agency in Houston, or a CPS adoption through Buckner. We have done the first part of the preliminary paperwork with both and it was time to pick a path and take the next step. Problem was, Josh wasn't completely on board with either.
Ugh.
Every time I tried to get his opinion about which way we should go, he would say he didn't have a peace about either.
Double ugh.
When God originally called us to adopt he did it through our discovery of the plight of special needs orphans in Eastern Europe(GREAT story that I still plan on sharing with you when I get the chance). When we decided to adopt, we knew that we would be adopting a special needs child from that part of the world one day, but we didn't know if that was exactly where God was calling us to adopt from right now. If you know much about adoption at all, you know that international adoption is a different and more difficult process, in many ways, than domestic adoption. And on top of that, adopting from the majority of the countries in Eastern Europe is a completely different ball game. Very early in the research game it was as though that door was quickly shut. The Ukraine and Russia are VERY expensive to adopt from and they require TWO semi-extended trips to finalize your adoption. Plus BOTH parents have to travel for the first trip.
Paying between $50,000-$80,000 to be away from my children for about 6 weeks not only seemed impossible, but I didn't WANT to do it. Door shut. Just can't do that right now. I kept telling Josh that the exorbitant amount of money wasn't the problem. Whether the adoption costs $1000 or $100,000, God is going to have to provide the money. Plain and simple, we don't have it. The scary, and nearly impossible, part of an Eastern European adoption, for me, is the travel. Being away from my children for that amount of time(overseas, none the less) is not something I feel capable of doing. Just can't.
Regardless, that is where Josh's heart was. Even after I laid out all the facts for him about why it just couldn't work right now, that's still where his heart was at. To be 100% honest, my heart was in Eastern Europe also, but I could not fathom such a difficult undertaking at this point in my life. And by "difficult undertaking" I mean, to adopt from the area of the world that I consider to be hardest, at least in my opinon.
We reached this dead lock about a week ago. I was frustrated, to say the least. All my countless hours of researching various countries and agencies and methods of adoption, only to have Josh and I not be able to whole-heartly agree.
Then Josh had to pull a typical "Josh". He said that even though his heart was in the Ukraine, he understood how I felt about traveling there and that he would be on board with whatever method I chose.
Sigh.
Why does he always do that? He just has to be so darn agreeable. Not only did he say that he would be on board with whatever path I chose, he said that he would use virtually the rest of his vacation for the year for us to do the required training to adopt.
Double sigh.
This should be good news, right? But it just felt all wrong. I took a step back to examine my heart and I quickly saw that over the previous week I had been doing much more researching/thinking/planning than I had been praying and seeking the Lord. It was giving me serious anxiety to feel like we were right back at square one. But worry and anxiety are not from the Lord. And not only are they not from the Lord, they are a sin. I should have seen all my stressing and worry and a big flashing red light that I was doing this on my own, and not relying on the Lord. It helped to have a little reminder from my husband that if God calls us to do something, then he will give us the strength to do it. I finally relented. I gave it all back to God, and told him that I'd go where ever he calls me to go. Even if it takes years to get there. Even if it feels impossible.
But luckily, God is not bound by what we consider impossible, now is he? THIS is where the story gets good...
I have an A.W. Tozer quote written on a piece of paper that I leave in front of my computer so that I will see it several times a day. It says,
"God is looking for people through whom he can do the impossible. What a pity we plan only the things we can do by ourselves."
Here I had been working so hard at trying to figure out how we would be able to accomplish what God has called us to do. I was trying to pick the path that I thought was do-able. The goal that I was capable of achieving. Notice all the I's? No wonder I was so worried and anxious. I'm not capable of doing all that much on my own. I had good reason to be concerned about trying to take on something as huge as adopting a child in my own strength and with my own wisdom and resources. So, once again, I surrendered everything to the Lord. I told him that I would stop trying to do it my way and that I would just follow where he leads, in spite of how difficult and scary that may be. Immediately, all the worry and anxiety were gone, and nothing but that sweet peace that passes all understanding. In the days that followed, God gave us a direct peace about pursing an Eastern European adoption. Impossible? Maybe for us, but not for God.
I quit with the hours of research and decided to just sit back and wait for the Lord to direct. Novel idea, I know. Honestly though, that's hard for a person with my personality type. He's already given us the direction, so I'm ready to just barrel ahead full speed. I daily had to choose to spend less time on the computer doing research, and more time on knees seeking the Lord's face. He quickly removed my blinders about my notion of a Ukrainian or Russian adoption being impossible. An independant adoption of one or two special needs orphans in the Ukraine was only going to be upwards of $30,000. Not NEAR the $50,000-80,000 that our first research had revealed. Our first information was on a Russian agency adoption of 1-2 healthy children. Very different from an independant adoption of a child with Down Syndrome or Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. Don't get me wrong, we don't have 30k just lying around, but that was just God showing us that once we do things his way, nothing is impossible. The Lord chose to keep me blinded to this seemingly simple piece of information because he knew that if I knew it, that I would suddenly think that maybe I could do this thing on my own.
So here we were praising the Lord that we didn't have to raise as much money as we had originally thought, and that the process wouldn't take as long as we thought either. Once we commit to a child, we could have that child home with us in as short as 7 months. That's super-fast in the international adoption world. Here was God starting to open doors, possibly much faster than we had anticipated.
First kink. We don't have passports. That may sound like a simple problem to fix for most of you, but we are folks of very humble means, and we also don't have an extra $250-300 it takes to get Josh and I passports. My birthday is later this month, so I decided that I would use any money that I got for my birthday to get my passport. Half the problem solved right there. Josh's birthday is at the end of November. When I told him that I was going to use my birthday money to get my passport he said, "Great!" What I really wanted to hear him say, is that he, too, would use any money he got for his birthday to get his passport.
But he didn't.
I had looked up info on getting passports, and when I saw how long it takes to get them in once you have applied for them, I got a teensy bit worried. I wanted to ask him if he would consider using his birthday money to get a passsport. But I bit my tongue. Instead, I gave it back to God, and in return he gave me back that sweet peace of his. No worries. He was in control. Aaaahhh. This was much better than when I was trying to figure it all out myself.
Later, that.very.day, I made a very random decision to clean out my jewelry drawer and switch it with my undergarment drawer. This was random for several reason. 1.I have many other much more pressing areas of my house that beg for organization. And, 2. Cleaning out my jewelry drawer and swapping it with my undergarment drawer was not on my cleaning list that I tend to stick too very closely. (Just a tad type A, eh?)
Despite the sheer randomness of it, I got to cleaning anyway. Amidst my underwear drawer what do you think I found...besides underwear, of course?? An unmarked envelope with 300 bucks in it!!! I am so stinkin' serious!! I marched straight in to the living room and held out the money to Josh and told him where I found it. He took one look at it and said, "We can get our passports!" Praise God, yes we can!!
I've always heard that God works in mysterious ways, but I honestly never thought he'd make money appear in my undies drawer. However he chooses to work, though, I'm fully on board!!
Next week Josh and I will be applying for our passports!! This is only our first step of many towards bringing our special kiddo home, but it is very exciting! I can't wait to see how he is going to continue to work and provide as we chose to obey him and walk by faith daily.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Trust and Obey
Trust and obey.
For there's no other way,
to be happy in Jesus,
but to trust and obey.
God is good. So good. He is so very faithful to his children. We don't have to earn his faithfulness. If that were the case, the Lord would have given up on me a long time ago. Luckily, his faithfulness is not dependant on my performance either. Nor is his faithfulness to us dependant on our faithfulness to him.
"What if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God's faithfulness? Not at all!"
Romans 3:3-4a
He is faithful to us not because of who we are, but because of who he is. That is just a part of who he is. Faithful.
"Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful."
Hebrews 10: 23
But, when we choose to be faithful to him and his word, we have the opportunity to reap the benefit of the blessings that he has been waiting to lavish on us.
"The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it."
1 Thessalonians 5:24
In the past few months, God has been leading our family in a new direction. New paths can bring with it a mixture of emotions. Fear, excitement, curiosity, anxiety, and joy, just to name a few. This new direction for our family is no different. Inspite of the mixture of emotions, God has been so very faithful to us as we have chosen to walk by faith in the direction he has called us. It amazes me the blessings the Lord pours on his children just because we chose to obey him. Don't get me wrong. I'm not going all Joel Osteen on you, claiming monitary blessings in exchange for obedience to the Father. I do believe that the Lord does give monitary blessings at times. But the majority of the time, the gifts he is waiting to give us are so much more than what the world sees as the blessings we should desire....health, wealth, and happiness.
I am utterly amazed on almost a daily basis at the ways to Lord has blessed an encouraged our family as we have begun our journey of obedience. He has placed, and is continuing to place, beautiful jewels of support and kindred spirits in our lives. He is continually bringing the encouragment of other sisters in Christ who have walked, or are walking, the same walk of faith he has called us to. Oh, the blessing of being obedient to him! I feel as though he had a literal storehouse of blessing that he was waiting to pour out on my life. All I had to do was say, "Yes, Father. I will obey and do what you have asked me to do." And voila!, he opened the floodgates! It as though he said, "Oh, my precious child! I have just been waiting to give you these treasures! I am so glad that you have chosen to trust and obey!"
There are reasons why I am not at liberty to share what the Lord has commanded us to do at this moment in time. But I promise, as soon as I am I will shout it from the mountaintops! Even though I can't give exact details of how the Father is working in our family, I can encourage you to follow the Lord in obediance, no matter what it is he is asking of you. I promise that he has blessings just waiting to pour out on your life when you chose to follow him whole-heartedly.
..."'Test me in this,' says the Lord Almighty, 'and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.'"
Malachi 3:10b
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Are you willing?
I read this post this morning and just had to share it. I could identify with what the Lord has taught him, because it is so similar to what the Lord has been revealing to me. Not that he is calling me to be a Kenyan missionary. But then again, you never know...
Regardless of the call, I am willing to follow.
Regardless of the call, I am willing to follow.
Sweet Surrender
I have been trying to post for about 4 days now. I finally have been able to get a bit of extra time and motivation to conincide with each other, so I started a post. I typed, and typed, and typed...and typed some more. After all that typing I still hadn't said all that I wanted to say! The post was long winded and just plain boring. I know that if I get bored reading my own writing about my own life, that other folks just might die of boredom. So, I scrapped it and I'm starting over. It may take several posts to let you in on all that God's been doing in our family, but I'm bound and determined to do it! Not just for your sake,(because I know that all of you are just dying of curiosity to know what is going on in my super exciting life *wink*), but for my own sake also. Posting is theraputic for me, and it helps to get my thoughts down where I can read them. And as long-winded as I can be, writing it on paper isn't always a viable option. Now, to get to the point...
I posted here about fully surrendering my life to the Lord's will. I've learned, in the year and a half since that time, that surrender is a continual process. It started out with the desire and willingness to fully turn every aspect of my life over to the Lord, but what I thought was the completion of my surrender, was actually the beginning of a whole new journey. And what a glorious journey it has been, thus far! It turned out to be very ironic that the title of my blog is "Surrender". When I picked that title I had a very specific area of surrender in mind, that being our situation with Treyson. But that trial started a domino effect of yielding my entire life to the Lord's control. Not that there haven't been bumps in the road, and times when I found myself, once again, trying to be in the driver's seat of my life, but the process has been far more amazing than I had anticipated.
I keep a spritual journal, of sorts. As I said earlier, writing is theraputic for me, and though I don't write in it every day, I do make an effort to write down major issues I'm dealing with. I write down prayers and thoughts about difficult problem that no one can fix but the Lord. I know that the Lord should be the first place to turn with any problem or difficulty, but it is so easy to try to handle things on my own and only seek the Lord when I feel overwhelmed and that the situation is out of my control. Therefore, alot of my spiritual journaling is desperate pleas to God to intervene in some situation or another. I am in the process of learning how to give even the seemingly meanial things in my life over the Lord, but I tend to only journal when I am feeling really good, or really bad. Journaling has been a blessing to me because I have been able to look back and see how God worked in some very difficult circumstances that felt utterly hopeless at the time. I also can see how He has been able to bless my life beyond measure as I have learned to truly submit to him.
He has given us financial peace after years of extreme burden.
He has transformed my husband into a man with a consuming passion to follow God's will for his life with complete abandon.
He is turning me in to the submissive wife that I never thought I could be.
And He is leading our family down a path that we would not have chosen for ourself, but we are joyful, knowing that in the center of His will is where we find peace.
I posted here about fully surrendering my life to the Lord's will. I've learned, in the year and a half since that time, that surrender is a continual process. It started out with the desire and willingness to fully turn every aspect of my life over to the Lord, but what I thought was the completion of my surrender, was actually the beginning of a whole new journey. And what a glorious journey it has been, thus far! It turned out to be very ironic that the title of my blog is "Surrender". When I picked that title I had a very specific area of surrender in mind, that being our situation with Treyson. But that trial started a domino effect of yielding my entire life to the Lord's control. Not that there haven't been bumps in the road, and times when I found myself, once again, trying to be in the driver's seat of my life, but the process has been far more amazing than I had anticipated.
I keep a spritual journal, of sorts. As I said earlier, writing is theraputic for me, and though I don't write in it every day, I do make an effort to write down major issues I'm dealing with. I write down prayers and thoughts about difficult problem that no one can fix but the Lord. I know that the Lord should be the first place to turn with any problem or difficulty, but it is so easy to try to handle things on my own and only seek the Lord when I feel overwhelmed and that the situation is out of my control. Therefore, alot of my spiritual journaling is desperate pleas to God to intervene in some situation or another. I am in the process of learning how to give even the seemingly meanial things in my life over the Lord, but I tend to only journal when I am feeling really good, or really bad. Journaling has been a blessing to me because I have been able to look back and see how God worked in some very difficult circumstances that felt utterly hopeless at the time. I also can see how He has been able to bless my life beyond measure as I have learned to truly submit to him.
He has given us financial peace after years of extreme burden.
He has transformed my husband into a man with a consuming passion to follow God's will for his life with complete abandon.
He is turning me in to the submissive wife that I never thought I could be.
And He is leading our family down a path that we would not have chosen for ourself, but we are joyful, knowing that in the center of His will is where we find peace.
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