Not For A Moment

Well, I have really  been challenged this week on a number things.

1. Ultimately....GOD....You are in control.  This week we finally saw an end to the strike in Honduras.  In our human mind we cannot grasp how things like this can happen.  Sorry, let me step back and let some of you that might not have heard.  Their children's program in Honduras had been on strike since Oct. 2.  As of Oct. 19, the strike ended.  What this strike did to the orphans...I can't even allow my heart to go there.  That my daughter could have been greatly affected by this just overwhelms me!!  My heart just aches to think too much on this!
 A song that really has brought me comfort on this is by Meredith Andrews.  check out the YouTube video for the words to this song.  Hopefully it will touch your heart as much as it has touched mine.  The reminder that God is Constant, God is Good, God is Sovereign...Not for a moment will God forsake me or my daughter!!

http://youtu.be/wkix3Tg8L5E


When they say that adoption is not for the faint of heart, they aren't kidding!

2.  Challenged by the fact that I haven't been as faithful in keeping this blog updated like I originally want to be.  I think that it is a matter of avoidance.  Not that I don't want to but I think that the reality is that the longer the time goes by that we have nothing to update, what to I say.  And if I do start thinking about it too much it can get discouraging.  But thanks to a friend mentioning (thanks Kim) that she checks our blog for updates  (there have been many others that have mentioned this but it hit home yesterday).  Almost every I check blogs that I follow (adoption related and non adoption) and look forward to seeing if there is anything new.  Obviously there are those of you that are doing that to ours.  The challenge is that i do want to document our thoughts about our journey to encourage others as well as for our daughter so that she can see our hearts during our time of wait!  I am going to try to be better!

3.  Challenged by God's word.  I try to follow Proverbs 31 ministry email devotions every morning.  This morning the scripture that was shared was

"As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." Isaiah 55:9 (NIV)

Does anyone else see a theme....God is there and at work...in me... Growing me.  Yesterday I was able to be able to spend some time with a friend who  just had twins a week ago.  What a blessing to be able to do that.  With a little one in tow, this would not have been an easy thing to do.  I have had some health challenges that I have had to face over the last month.  Again with a little one in tow, could have handled it but would have been much more challenging.  My prayer...Andy's & my prayer from the beginning is that God would be seen through our journey.  If I knew that we would face the challenges that we have (nothing compared to some journey's) would I have had the same prayer?   ABSOLUTELY!   I have found myself clinging to God for His strength!  LORD, carry us through this journey!  Join us with our little one soon and wrap your loving arms around her helping her to know that she is loved!

Another Week gone by

Well, it is another Friday.  Another week of silence has gone by.  Will we get an update?  We hope there is some good news.  The founder of our agency returned from Honduras at the beginning of this week.  It sounded like it was a good meeting, but what does that really mean?  The committee was supposed to meet 2 weeks ago, then last week and then we have heard sometime the last week of September. 

Since then there have been some things that have made more the process make more sense.  I read a post from another adoptive mom on why the wait is so long.  A point she made was (if you have gone through the paperchase, you understand, if not it is a long time of gathering "your life" in paperform-birth cert., marriage lisence, financial documents etc).  The adoptive world says this could take you 4-6 months.  We did it in 3-4 (ok, so crazy momma set in) we were very focused on getting it together as quick as we could b/c I knew this was the only time I could control things. Now, think about all these children that in essence need to have the same paperwork pulled together for them...ok, probably not the same financial paperwork since they won't have that, but some of these children don't have even the equivalent of a birth cert or # assigned to them.  That all has to be checked into to see if there is anyone available to care for them in their home country.  Wow, alot of work for a very few number of people available to do this job.  Please join me in prayer today praying for these people, what an overwhelming task that they have!!

God has also been laying it heavy on my heart to pray for orphan children.  Andy and I have also recently seen the softening of our girls hearts to orphans.  When I say that, let me step back and say that for quite some time it has been there but through certain situations recently we have truly seen God softening their hearts even more.  So AWESOME to see God at work.  Praying for some good news soon!!!  Thanks for following our journey with us!

check out this blog

I have been wanting to write this for a while and just haven't made myself sit down to do it.  Part of it being avoidance in realizing that we still don't have an adoption update to give and part of it being making the time.  I wanted to share with you all about a blog i came across while following a facebook group.  it has been awesome to see the fingerprints of God on our adoption journey, usually when i need them most...funny how God works that way:)!

I was directed to this families company for t-shirts.  in wanting to find out more about them I clicked on their blog to find out their adoption journey.  Wow, it humbled me.  Just when I was thinking "poor us, why are we having to wait so long when all we want to do is welcome into our hearts, arms and lives a little girl who needs a home and a family, i read their journey. http://www.teeswithapurpose.com/blog - wow, what a journey.  As is says in Jer. 29:11 "for I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.  Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me and I will hear you."  I know that our journey was laid out from before the beginning of time.  That God has led us down the path we are on at this moment in time.

The other thing that seems to be helping to get me through this journey is finding out that we shouldn't even have a number in line.  How crazy does that seem since our paperwork has now been in country for 13 months?  well, that is what we have been told.  we were accepted back in June by "slipping through the cracks".  Do I believe that statement?  No way, I believe that God pushed us through those cracks.  For those of you that are reading this and don't have your number yet, I don't mean it to sound like God didn't push yours as well.  what I do mean is that we are where we are because our daughter will be ready at the same time our paperwork will be ready.  For whatever reason, she is not ready to come home, either she is not born yet, she hasn't been abandoned yet or her paperwork has not cleared or even many other reasons.  Please be in prayer for our daughter as well as the many other families and their children as we continue to wait on word for our children to be ready  . Please also be praying for the  workers as they try to do all the work they have to do down there in caring for the children and doing all the work that goes into the paperwork to prepare children for families.

Moving On Up - Number 64

We were contacted by our agency today and told that we have been given a new number.  We have moved up to number 64.  One step closer!

Thought You'd Be Here

In August, I worked on the music library on our computers to make sure everything was up to date, etc., and in the process I deleted the "playlists" on my computer, so now and then I will go through an album and choose some of my favorite songs to create a "playlist" on my computer. This afternoon, I was listening to Wes King's "A Room Full of Stories" from the mid-90's. There was a song on the album that brought tears to my eyes for the first time. The title is "Thought You'd Be Here", and the line that really got me was "I never knew that silence could make me so deaf. I never knew that I could miss someone I never met..." The adoption process has been and will be much longer that we were originally told, and longer than we anticipated, yet throughout the process we have been reminded that God is at work. God's timing is perfect and we continue to trust him. I found a youtube video of the Wes King song, with a brief introduction from Wes King about the song.