We have a Referral!

WOW! This certainly came quicker than we ever dreamed it would..In some ways this has been going on a long time, but we have been prepared for the wait of 2-3 years. The call came in the afternoon and even though chances were it would be a girl...(I have felt in my heart it would be a boy!) Mike was at the Cubs game (huh? the Cubs??) the excitement could not be contained-and so I gave him a quick call to let him know what was going on. I gave him some details and when he came home we talked more about it and prayed God would give us clarity on whether to go forward. I had to get in touch with doctors to review his medical file. It amazes me how God worked all these details out. I was able to get in touch with our pediatrician and a wonderful cardiologist in MA and he did a review of his file and gave us all the information to help us understand the heart condition. The medical file is not that detailed, but God provided such peace that this was indeed our child. His name is Lu Sitong and he will be three on June 30. He has a repaired heart defect and we will have him evaluated when he arrives home to see what follow up needs to be done. We were given a short biography and a few photos. Some other details: "Little Sitong is outgoing , active, naughty and handsome. Sitong likes to play cars and fondle admiringly whenever he gets them. He also likes to play with other children. He brings a lot of happiness to others." Our kids are so excited and all of us have fallen in love him. We have been praying for this child for nearly 2 years and it is truly amazing how God has woven our hearts together during this time. Now putting a face to our prayers and thinking of him in the orphanage we want to bring him home now!

Walking by Faith

A friend sent me this devotional and it really spoke to me at a time when there were so many questions about how this would all work and what it would look like in the end... In so many ways it is a step into the unknown, but knowing God is guiding it makes it safe. It was about wanting to know whether this really was His plan. Stepping out when you don't really know what the road will look like. Having to trust with no guarantees about what the end result would look like. It spoke of God calling us to obedience without really showing us the path we would travel or what the end result would be...kind of a test would we obey without a road map?

"You see, I have not learned to trust God in the easy ways of faith. I have not learned to trust God by reading a book or listening to a great sermon. Nor have I learned to trust God by hearing how my friend trusts God. No, I am learning to trust God by stepping out into an adventure of obedience and discovering for myself that He is trustworthy. "

Obeying when God hasn't revealed the steps along the way or the final destination is challenging. But when we choose to walk by faith and not by sight, God gets all the glory in the end because we KNOW we couldn't have done it on our own!"

Why Adoption?

We want to write this blog as a record of the journey God has taken us on and His faithfulness along the way. I want our child to read this and be able to really see our great God in their story. This journey began in our hearts long ago but it began to take flight in December of 2006. At the dinner table one night Mike and I both discovered we had conversations about adoption that day. I had spoke to my hair person who has fostered and adopted many kids. I told her how wonderful it was that her and her husband had done this. I shared the wonderful verse in James 1:27 with her...."Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and keep oneself from being polluted by the world." Mike spoke of a conversation with a man at his office that had visited orphanages in China and the heartbreak of all these orphans and this was something that had tugged at Mike's heart before. We had actually spoken of this years before after watching a documentary, but actually stepping into this and doing it was a different story! That night we spoke of the possibility of God desiring us to become involved in this. We decided we would pray about it and seek God's plan. Why not us-but there were the roadblocks-and there were many, but if God was in this He would make it happen! God spoke to us clearly in many ways in the following months! In fact looking back on my journals just prior to this I can see God was preparing my heart for something big...It seemed everywhere we turned was confirmation that this was God's plan. From the time our family was in the car all listening intently to a radio program on the orphan crisis centered around the verse in James, to the CD I received that Christmas from my sister Colleen who had no idea this was even going on in our hearts! It was a Steven Curtis Chapman CD...I knew his story and had just heard it on that radio program. I didn't open the CD until I got home because I had a feeling God would speak through it. I sat on my bed and cried as I read the story of adoption and the card that fell out "ever considered adoption?"! I smile at the creative ways God confirmed His plan and it scares me to think we may have missed this incredible opportunity. When we thought about all the obstacles, we could have said no. Thankfully the call to obedience to His plan prevailed!