Our Experience with Adoption

Our adoption story thus far – plus an EXCITING update!!!

Know what my prayer has been this year 2020, unexpected and chaotic and anything but normal?

The parting of the seas.

For us, we stand at the edge of the sea, hands held fast, gazing out across the waters to the promised land. 

It is not for us to turn around…the glorious future does not lie in the land from whence we came.

This sea, so vast, so deep.

And there is nowhere to go but straight across.

Somewhere near the turn of 2019, our hearts were pressed with the calling of adoption.

After having our fourth and dealing with a series of debilitating health struggles, we decided we were done with having biological children. As time went by, however, we felt a different stir in our heart…

that we weren’t really complete, the yearning for another, the feeling that someone was missing…

this tug on the heart began a series of discussions, a one way road that led straight to the door of Chinese special needs adoption.

Hope in the Face of Discouragement

If you’ve followed the blog for any period of time, you may know China had it’s issues even before COVID hit hard. My heart was having enough trouble gripping onto some hope.

Yet in the midst of this, inklings of expectation still shimmered from within.

A glimmer, a firm belief that He who is Mighty does great things, moves mountains and parts seas for His people…and that, despite the current situation, He could make a way for us to somehow match up with our little girl.

Provision for a miracle.

Temptation is the lion crouching at the door (Genesis 4:7) and it’s always a temptation to ask What IF…especially for me…

But the beauty of His hand already…opening of a weighty door into the unknown, the amazement of financial provision that seemed to flow with such ease by His hand alone. 

The viewing of the many wonders that encourages the holding fast, the continuous grip of faith on this rip-roaring roller coaster.

Referral!

I had gotten to a place where I’d stopped praying to be matched. It is a different kind of sorrow to have to sit and wait while your child gets older and you can’t get them.

We were traipsing through the unknown territory of Not a Clue, oblivious to this little girl’s identity, when we might lay eyes upon her precious face, holding fast to His timing in the midst of adoption whirlwind. My heart was intent on praying for travel to open up to China, that the many matched orphans in waiting would have the ability to finally go home!! 

We came to that Wednesday, the first of a series of prayer and fasting days our church was encouraging, and my heart cried out on behalf of the multitudes, the children who seem to have no voice, yet need it the most. 

Late that eve, I spied the email, top of my in bin, a seemingly innocuous little subject line, yet carrying a formidable message.

I held my breath – was I really seeing this? We weren’t anticipating another list of kids to be posted until October, two months away. 

Then ran through my head all the excuses I could muster in an effort to self-protect –

…I’m sure this is another file with medical conditions too severe or questionable (despite my earnest prayers to not have to bear another “no” file)
…we’ll need to anticipate turning this one down
…what could possibly have come up in the middle of this dark and quiet period anyway?

Calming my nerves as best I could, I opened the attached file, and what happened next took my breath away…

Her face…the details…and peace.

Peace.

This was the fourth match we’d received over the course of a year, yet the first one I had viewed with such a feeling of peace and surety as my eyes lit upon the contents, first one detail, than the next.

There were no huge, troubling concerns in the records. No mountain of a special need we couldn’t climb. Nothing to suggest this wouldn’t work.

And she was darling.

With travel being closed and little hope to gather her up anytime soon, she would be slightly older than we had initially been planning for…but, when I look at her age next to those of our kiddos, she fell right in line. 

Isn’t it amazing how God does that? How He knows what’s best for us and works out all those details perfectly, despite our own thoughts and plans?

I hurriedly sent the email off to my husband, who was at work…sweet confirmation, he had that same wonderful PEACE response upon viewing this little girl.

Still reeling from all that’s taken place, I breath in a sense of awe at witnessing His miracle.

The parting of the seas.

Uncertainty in the Journey

This incredulous movement of His hand in matching us is something we hold dear – but it isn’t the end of the story. 

As I’ve written this post, more things have transpired…Life is messy and raw and things are rarely perfect, as much as I’d like them to be!

We’ve graciously received more documents from the orphanage, including pictures, videos, updates on her development.

It’s exciting for such to pile into our email box, but my heart skips a beat and I catch the holding of breath, unwrapping these things. We see the complicated nature of a special focus adoption, as we gather each new piece of information and discover there’s more to this little one than what was reported on her initial intake sheet.

What do we do with all this uncertainty?

Were we wrong in thinking this little girl was the one for us?

What is God doing?

I’m limited in scope, unable to see the end of the story like God Himself, yet I remember the beginning.

I remember where we were when we started this whole journey – clutching a persistent and deep longing to open our home and share love and life with a little one in need.

Starting at a place where we asked, “Can we or should we adopt?” the cry of our hearts had become “How can we NOT adopt?”  

We knew God to be Jehovah-Jireh and that, if this was His direction and leading, He would provide for us and make a way. He would see it through and complete the good work He was starting in us (Philippians 1:6).

It was such an exciting step to really take that leap of faith into YES… Looking back, we clearly see that hand of God opening one door after another from that point on as we walked forward in obedience to travel the path to adopting our next child. 

And yet, here i am, wondering if we missed a turn along the way.

Embracing Joy

Tidbit to consider…what if this journey isn’t just getting to the finish line of new little feet crossing our threshold?

What if He desires more along the way… a bold and daring change… my internal workings, quiet thoughts and subtle moments, entirely yielded over to Him?

Gracious to me is His workings as He reveals the crevices of my heart, sheltering cobwebs of self and me-driven emotion. Overcome with these heart shadows and, honestly, fed up with feeding my fearsome worries on a daily basis, I move in boldness to simply turn to Him in my time of need.

To have an uncomplicated faith.

And where I commit, He tests… the fearful thoughts dive in and, instead of wallowing in the dismay, I whisper truth to my heart and gear up in confident expectation of the good workings of a good God. No matter how that looks.

That parting of the sea…it’s not there for me to just rejoice in getting what I wanted –

💕 It’s there to bring glory to Another…

💕 to cause me to rely on and trust in Him…

💕 to bring a deeper knowledge of who God is and to love Him with all my heart

Because whether this sweet girl is waiting at the end of the pathway through the mountainous waters, the miraculous God is there for me.

His mercies are new every morning and his blessings are present every day.

He calls me to seize joy for the daily gifts, regardless of the time length in which they’re mine…my kids with their own precious uniqueness…a kind act from my husband, performed in my moment of deep need…and certainly, being able to hope in and pray for this tiny one’s healing, salvation, love, family.

So I embrace joy in the gifts of each day, even if things up only being a possibility. 

We trust and hold fast that it will all be right in the end, no matter the coursing of the sea.

Big Obstacles Ahead

So where do we go from here?

Surely, we continue to turn to Him, His leading and guiding as we gather more information on this precious one. In time, we’ll know for sure if He intends to provide her as part of our family…relying on Him each step of the way to speak to us.

With God moving in the huge hurdle of even being matched, in the midst of crazy COVID time, our attention turns even more to the fact that there are many, MANY orphans with heart-heavy families just waiting to bring them home. In China alone, there are over 500 families before us who are also waiting for the green light of travel.

The heart sighs at all those children stuck in poor circumstances and conditions, on hold month after month, not able to be with their family, in their forever home – a place where they can finally heal and grow. Those orphanages are NOT a good place for them to be.

Our passion yearns and pleads for the Lord to move speedily and mightily in this matter. We know He has a plan and we’re unaware of the specifics – if, when and how. If He calls us to wait and wait longer, we trust His timing, as we always have…and we will keep approaching his throne on behalf of the many children and their families who wait.

On top of this, we have need of an important document to be received as soon as possible, so we won’t need to go through the process of renewing our home study.

If any of this touches your heart, will you consider joining us in prayer as we travel this timeline? We would be so honored and blessed…

The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. -James 5:16

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction… – James 1:27 

Anchor of our hearts, the beauty of pure religion – tending to orphans in their affliction, mirroring God’s adoption of us as His children, deeply informing our passion for God’s heart for orphans. 

“Adopting one child won’t change the world. But for that one child the world will change.”
– Unknown