STOPS along our WAIT....

STOP ONE

This stop mostly belongs to Erik – because I was on a completely different path than Adopting… I wanted to turn our family of FOUR into MORE as we attempted to become a larger family through In-vitro.  The girls were four and one and Erik and I have always just dreamed of having a BIG family!  Through this financial, emotional, physical and spiritual experience we were NOT able to grow our family in this way. However, even though the idea of in-vitro was not in God’s plan for us…  through this process God showed me how he answers prayer and I became EVEN closer to the God of the UNIVERSE!  

....Shortly after this experience Erik brought up the idea of ADOPTION! My heart was just not there…

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

STOP TWO

My girls are 13 and 9 and we plan a family mission trip to Nairobi, Kenya! Hmmmmm… Perhaps God will give me a “SIGN” that adoption is in my future… Well, our experiences in AFRICA definitely drew us close to the AMAZING people who live there and the desire to serve them and the passion to care for them but… We visited several orphanages... The one in Thika, the children were visiting a relative or close friend during Christmas… and at Tumaini http://www.tumainiministries.org/ (which means HOPE in Swahili) - A beautifully run organization which provides a home environment of love and hope for orphans in Kenya through the spirit of Christ. At the time there were over 50 kiddos there - and all these children live as a FAMILY. No child in this home can be adopted - The wonderful woman taking care of these children wanted them to have a sense of family, consistency, sisterly and brotherly love.  Some of the kids don't leave until they are married...  The last group of AMAZING people we met were the Joy Divine Children’s Organization http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=278445161140.  This ministry that Fred Mwaura and his mother have organized help street boys and orphans by giving them a HOME, food, LOVE, health care, an education and most important the HOPE of Jesus Christ!  Regardless of the ‘signs’ I was looking for – GOD definitely opened up my eyes and I am HUGELY thankful for that!

STOP THREE

Girls are 14 and 10… another year passed and it was back to Kenya for Christmas!  This Christmas we collected donations from the girls schools, small group, church, etc… and we carted over a TON of luggage to share with the Joy Divine Children’s Organization! It was the BEST Christmas our family has EVER had!! 

 

…Upon our return Erik confronts me AGAIN with the idea of adoption… from AFRICA. This time he was more serious and expressed how this is on his heart and if I would just pray about it… I did! I prayed, and prayed and prayed… then I started to ‘GOD-OOGLE’ everything about adoption from AFRICA on the Internet… I don’t even know when it happened exactly but all of a sudden I was on FIRE to bring home a little one (or two) without a HOME, a FAMILY, a future… I was OFFICIALLY on board! THANK YOU JESUS! 

"Once our eyes are opened, we can't pretend we don't know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, KNOWS that we know, and holds us responsible to act." Proverbs 24:12

STOP FOUR

Well… at this point I was in a scatterbrain hurry to figure out what Adoption Agency to use… I must have applied at about 3 or 4 of them.  I would call and ask a few questions and ended up getting off the phone every time with an uneasy feeling… Until I found this thing on the Internet called BLOGS! Ha ha! What IS THIS STUFF! I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE it! I read stories, watched videos and decided to apply to ALL GOD’S CHILDREN INTERNATIONAL because of the RAVE reviews and stories I had seen! I made ONE phone call to them about the process and how it all works… and I got off the phone with a sense of PEACE! YES! We are moving along… in the right direction! Thank you GOD for putting this all in place... just the way you wanted it.

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

STOP FIVE

I can call this a WAITING STOP but, really it was like a WAIT? Let’s  GOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Since I had this BIG ole GIANT passion God placed on my POUNDING heart for orphans… just pushing me to go out and CONQURE the paperwork…  getting birth certificates, marriage licenses, passports, completing medical exams, criminal checks, employment verifications, letters of recommendation, financial statements, pictures of the family, the house, Notarizing, signing, sending, completing a Home Study… CREATING our Dossier!!!   (((SIGH))) It was DONE after 4 ½ months of serious craziness… we were there… OFFICIALLY Waiting on the AGCI WAITLIST!

"But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagls; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:31

STOP SIX

…Here we are today… after waiting for GOD to place this on BOTH of our hearts, almost a year and a half since we started the adoption process and 10 months, 1 week and 2 days since we were placed on the WAITING LIST… here we are sitting, ‘UNOFFICIALLY’ at....

on the little girls list and ‘UNOFFICIALLY’ 

on the siblings list!  WOWIE! Just the craziness and GODLINESS of how we are right here, waiting, right now to see our DAUGHTER(S) face is AMAZING!  I know there will be more STOPS along the WAIT before we are actually able to bring her/them HOME… but RIGHT NOW… THIS STOP feels REAAAAALLLY Hard! We are praying we see our little girl(s) face SOON! :) We LOVE her SOO SOO SOO MUCH already!