In January we announced that we are adopting a little girl from China.
We have been amazed at how quickly God is putting the details together to bring our Abigail home. We are now just a few papers away from submitting our dossier to China which is a really BIG step in the adoption process. The dossier consists of numerous papers about our family. It contains everything from medical forms, financial statements, the home study, birth certificates and references, to many, many more papers that verify the fact that we are capable of bringing another child into our family.
This is the part of the journey where we really need the help of family and friends. I will be completely honest with you here; This is the part I have struggled with. I did not want to ask for help. However, God began speaking to my heart through a trusted friend. During one of my conversations with her I told her about my reluctance to ask for help and she very matter-of-factly told me,
"Oh please ask for help.
Please allow your friends to step in and become a part of
Abigail's story."
So, here is where we could really use some help. We need to pay a lot of fees in order to send our dossier to China. We have put about $6000 in already and could use some help with the next $8000 we need to send our paper work on. Abigail's adoption will end up costing us well over $35,000.
If you would like to donate to Abigail's adoption you will see on the top right hand corner of my blog a button that you can click and it will take you directly to place where you can donate. The top button comes directly to us and the button below it takes you to a site where you can receive a tax deductible receipt for your donation. The difference for us between the two is that we will receive the money quicker through the top button but the bottom button offers you the donor a tax deductible receipt and we will receive it in 6-8 weeks.
Many of you have already become a part of Abigail's story through prayers, finances and emotional support and we are very grateful for all of you.
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First thing is, this is not our story but rather God's story and how He asked us to be a part of it.
It is so hard to put into words the depth of emotions we have walked through over the past couple of years, but I will lift the curtain a little and let you in on what has been going on in our lives.
About 3 years before we moved to Indiana (@2008) our oldest son revealed to us that he had been struggling with headaches for years. We were stunned by this news and thus began our search for answers to bring him relief. We saw doctors, performed numerous tests, and met with neurosurgeons only for them to come to the conclusion that they found nothing wrong with him.
With no answers from the established medical community; we were left with a child that was still struggling and in some sort of pain everyday. We truly felt helpless. But then God arranged for us to meet several people along our way that helped us with diet, therapies and eventually introduced us to the world of sensory processing disorder where we found most of our answers.
As we walked through our son's struggles our eyes were opened to how much children need their parents. Children need a voice. They need someone that will step into the messy areas of their lives and never give up (although I know I did give up on several occasions but God always sent someone to pull me back up).
Today our son is doing very well. He still struggles in areas but through God's grace and mercy he is a completely different kid than he was in 2008. He is more settled and peaceful and the degree of struggles he encounters on a daily basis has significantly diminished.
As our time in therapy was coming to a close God began placing a new desire in our hearts.
He clearly asked us if we would be willing to help other children.
Would we be willing to step into another child's life that desperately needed love and protection?
About a year and a half ago God led us to a conference here in Louisville that was on helping children that come from difficult places.
We were invited by 3 different people one of which was our occupational therapist who "just happened" to be a speaker at the conference. (Also, our therapist "just happened to be starting an orphanage in Europe.")
When the main speaker began speaking and describing the children she worked with both my husband and I sat there stunned. She was describing about 90% of what we had walked through with our son over the past 5+ years. We sat there speechless.
When the speaker ended her session I remember walking over to our occupational therapist, who was behind her display table, and I just started crying. She turned toward me and gave me a hug and said;
"This is why I wanted you to come. You needed to hear this.
You needed to be here."
God understood where we had been.
He wanted us to know that He cared
and
He wanted us to know that He was putting into motion
the next part of our lives.
Gently God began planting seeds in our own hearts for adoption.
We started praying over the many children that needed families.
In November of 2014 God laid on my heart to go back and visit a particular website I had been to many times. This website featured many children that were looking for families.
As I scanned all of their beautiful faces one little face jumped out to me
and I clearly heard God say;
"She is yours, will you go and get her?"
I called my husband and our children in one by one and asked if any
one of the children jumped out to them and
every single one of us picked her!
Ever since we saw her picture we have been actively pursuing her to make her a part of our family. We are in a major paper chase right now and we have seen the Lord fight for us in many ways we never dreamed possible. God is weaving our stories together perfectly and we eagerly await the day when we can hold her in our arms.
