Our story (Part 1)

Now that we are home and settled, I thought it was about time to tell our adoption story more completely.  Many have heard the first half, but the Lord continues to work in our lives.  I have a few reasons for writing this all out.  First, I want to testify to God's work in our lives and proclaim His faithfulness in leading our family.  Second, as we share the Lord's work, we hope it encourages others in their Christian walk or their search for truth.  Third, to remind myself of what the Lord has done over the past several years.  It is always good to stop and remember...

Evan and I never talked about adoption while we were dating or engaged.  We thought we would wait a few years into marriage and then maybe have 2 kids, possibly three.  We found out we were pregnant with Isaiah just about 9 months into our marriage.  He was quite the surprise.  About a month or two after he was born, Evan began bringing up the possibility of adopting our second child.  I thought he was just suffering from the affects of parenting a newborn.  I always thought adoption was a nice thing for other people to do, but had NEVER considered it for us.  Evan continued to bring it up to me, and at one point I directly told him that I had no interest in adopting and that I was more than happy to eventually just have more of "our own".  The Lord really convicted my heart of my attitude, and as Evan continued to share his desire to adopt (he wasn't pestering me, it would just occasionally come up in conversation), I finally told the Lord that if He wanted us to adopt, He had to change my heart.  I committed myself to praying about it and studying what the Bible  had to say.  We began praying about it as a couple, too.  As we continued to pray and study God's Word, the Lord began to soften and burden my heart for the fatherless.  I'm talking 180 degrees.

I learned several things through that time.  First, I began to understand my personal adoption into God's family.  Scripture clearly teaches that those who trust Jesus Christ as their  Savior and Lord, are adopted into the family of God.  Jesus paid the "adoption fees" when He received God's wrath for my sin on the cross.  I can now approach the God of the universe as His adopted daughter.  It really is remarkable. 

The second thing I learned was God's incredible passion for the fatherless.  He sees and knows each orphaned child, and deeply cares for them.  He also commands His people to defend and care for those that cannot care for themselves.  His passionate heart for the orphan became very clear to me and I had to confess my self inflicted ignorance, and ask forgiveness for having such a small view of how God might choose to work in our home and family.  We, as  Christ's church, are His hands and feet on this earth, to care for those that He cares for. 

As my heart began to change, Evan and I started talking logistics.  We began praying about how God might specifically be calling us.  We discussed, researched and prayed about domestic vs. international adoption, and began to feel very strongly that the Lord was leading our family towards international adoption.  We felt disabled by the prospective cost of international adoption.  As we prayed, we felt the Lord's encouragement that He would use His church to help us through this process.  We didn't have a dime, and borrowing money was out of the question.  It would take us years and years to save that much, and we felt the Lord pressing very strongly on our hearts.  "Just trust Me--walk by faith, not by sight--I will provide".  And so we took a HUGE step of faith and began contacting adoption agencies and home study agencies.  We sent out a letter to our Christian friends and family, telling them what the Lord had been doing in our lives and asking them to pray along side us.  We shared that we weren't sure how the Lord would provide and totally put ourselves out there to see if anyone felt led to walk with us on the adoption journey.  Within a few weeks of sending that letter, we had several friends call to tell us that the Lord had already been working in their hearts to prepare them to receive our news.  These friends said that they felt the Lord leading them to give to help us start the process.  We received close to $3000 from them, and I remember weeping at how God was beginning to provide.  Many more friends committed to covering us in prayer, which was a huge comfort to us. 

About the same time that we were beginning the process, our church started an adoption ministry called Open Hearts, Open Homes.  Their purpose was to come along side adoptive and foster families in their ministry to these children.  We participated in the first Orphan Care Bible study that they offered and were overjoyed to receive financial assistance through our church as well.  They provided us with a no-interest loan, based on what they estimated we would get back from the adoption tax credit.  They also opened a fund in our name where friends and family could give tax deductible donations towards our adoption.  We also received a matching grant.  It was incredible to watch God graciously provide for us.  We were very humbled as we watched our church family give, sometimes sacrificially, to help us adopt a child!  We were brought to our knees in praise and prayer on a regular basis during those early days of adoption. 

I remember one major lesson that the Lord was teaching me during that time.  I had unknowingly put God in a tiny, little box.  I am, by nature, more of a skeptical and cynical person, apart from the work of  Jesus Christ in my life.  Prior to this time, I would hear stories of modern day miracles and how God was working.  I would roll my eyes (in my heart---is it possible to roll your eyes in your heart?), and think "whatever".  I hate to admit that, but it is true.  I had grown pretty stagnant at that point.  The Lord really shook me up as He took us on the adoption journey. 

Many people ask us how we chose our adoption agency and country.  Simple... prayer and faith. We requested packets from multiple adoption agencies and were sorting through all of them.  My sister had heard of this agency called All God's Children International.  She thought they sounded like a neat agency, so I contacted them and asked for a packet.  They sent a book called "The Strength of Mercy", which was written by the co-founder of the agency.  It was a miraculous story of how God led them to adopt their daughter.  After reading that and learning more about AGCI, we felt they were a good match for us.  The story of their beginning really challenged my skeptical nature, as I began to realize to what degree I had placed God in a box.(AGCI is a Christian agency with a huge heart!  We highly recommend them to anyone and everyone that is interested in adoption).  At that time, there were many countries with open adoption programs.  Each country has certain requirements for adoptive families.  Things like how long you have been married, your age, income and number of children in the home all helped to narrow down our options.  We were very young for the adoption process, so that ruled out most countries.  We also had a very limited income, which knocked out a bunch more. It was down to Vietnam or Ethiopia.  Ethiopia was a brand new program at the time.  Once again, we talked and prayed over our options, and Evan felt strongly that Vietnam was a better fit.  I trusted his judgement and we proceeded.


I am out of time and need to think about how to communicate the next phase of our journey.  Stay tuned for "part two". :-)