Saturday, November 27, 2010

The Process is L-O-N-G

We are working on our homestudy right now and I am just struck by all the paperwork involved right now. Truly, I am just impatient to have our child home already. In this process, it is more than worth the time spent on all the details, but I just want my child right now. I want questions of who he or she is answered. I just want the first meeting and to take my child home on the 30 hour plane ride and come HOME for good. Will we have a boy or girl? How old will they be? What will their smile be like? What little quirks will they have? What will I feel when I see him or her? What will parenting be like? I am ready, but of course, not really. Waiting waiting waiting. God please give John and I strength, wisdom and courage for this long process. I need Your peace.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

I feel the need to clarify something. More than one person has asked me why we are not considering adopting from the U.S.
What is necessary to understand first is God's calling. I cannot express how profoundly called we feel to international adoption, specifically Ethiopia. All children are equal and God desires for all of them to find homes. I cannot tell you how many times a day I think about and pray for our child. They are our child already, regardless of whether they have been conceived yet or not. He or she is our family.
I think it is important to clarify the suffering these children go through. At the bottom of our blog, there are statistics that outline what suffering occurs. To sum up, these children are subject to extreme poverty, very low life expectancy, AIDS, witnessing the death of hundreds around them, as no hospitals have medicine to help, child slavery, forced prostitution, malnutrition, torture, brainwashing, and the list goes on. How could you NOT believe these children need to be helped? Also, there is not infrastructure in Africa to help these children as there is in the United States. They are orphaned by the millions, with hardly anyone coming to their rescue. The government does not even know they exist, they have no social security numbers, and most of the time they do not even know their birthdays. The hospitals don't really even keep a record of it.
I watched a video, The Invisible Children, where the suffering of the children of Africa is documented and children are interviewed. The little children say "don't forget about us when you go back to America. We are human beings too". I can't express to you how much these words haunt me. I DO NOT FORGET. As a Christian, I believe we are human beings and children of God first. The country you were born in pales in comparison to God's plan. We are called to go into all the world and preach the gospel, defend and protect the orphans. My Christianity and sense of God's calling does not stop at the borders of the U.S. My child is stuck in Ethiopia, and we need to get him or her out.

To my child:

I am praying for you everyday. I love you. I can't change what happened in your life before I met you, but I am determined through God's grace to do everything I possibly can to nurture you and help you become the adult of God He wants you to be. You are my child and I love you unconditionally already. It makes my heart break to think of the things that you might be going through. I am waiting for you. I am here.