New

I spent a good majority of yesterday working in my yard preparing my flower beds for the new growth of spring. As I was weeding yesterday I noticed there were some beds that really didn’t need much work and there were some that had quite a bit of junk in them that needed to be cleaned out. This seems to be a direct parallel to our lives.

This time gave me an opportunity to contemplate on Sunday’s message and the verse that seems to be popping up in my life a lot lately. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” (2 Corinthians 5:17) Sunday was the grand opening of our new church building and it was an exciting time filled with new faces. It was one of those services where you leave and there is no doubt that God was in your midst and is moving in a mighty way. I’m extremely excited for the future of Centerpointe and the opportunities I am going to have to serve there.

This process of new and preparing for the new is the dominating theme of my life right now. I have vowed to prepare the ground of my heart for my new children and I believe that is why there is now a hunger and a thirst for God in my life more so than ever before. There is a lot of new going on in the lives of the people around me as well. I have some friends whose lives are changing dramatically, a cousin who is getting married in December, and a mother who has decided that after 27 years of teaching she is going to retire to take care of her grandchildren while I am at work. My mom’s willingness to join with me in my desire to care and love the orphans of the world by entering into a new phase of her life makes me feel extremely blessed and fortunate.

As winter draws near there is always the thought of the coming spring. This winter is going to be a winter of waiting and some days I may be more patient than others. However, I have hope that along with spring will come two little beautiful Ethiopian boys into my life and I will never be the same. The thought of spring coming brings to mind a song I recently heard by Steven Curtis Chapman, "Spring is Coming". I went to see the Chapman family in Lousiville last week. Mary Beth's book is amazing and the way this family's faith has sustained them is truly inspiring. The lyrics from this song just sum up a hope that can be found no where else than in Jesus and makes me long for the day that I see him face to face.

Faith

Sometimes this whole process seems very surreal. I talk about my children and I dream about the future with them and I have yet to see their faces. I am buying toys for them and am making plans for their room and I don't even know their names. I heard something recently in a sermon I was listening to about the battle of Jericho. The speaker defined faith as speaking of something that has not happened as if it already has happened. That is what God has called us to do and how he has called us to believe as his followers. I have faith that very soon I will hold two little boys in my arms and my world will never be the same.

As of today my dossier is on its journey to our nation's capitol. My placing agency expects that to take about a week and then it will be off to Ethiopia. It is anticipated that once in Ethiopia it will take 2-6 months to receive my referral. Each stage of this journey is another step closer to the moment where my faith and reality collide.

Planting Trees

This morning I went to the yard sale my church was having to raise money for the fixtures in the new building. Mostly I was going to support the church but there is part of me that is now somewhat addicted to going to these sales and buying cheap toys for the boys. On the way we passed a greenhouse that sells trees. There are four sequential signs, Love God, Love Your Family, Plant a Tree, We have the Trees. It just made me laugh.

Tonight I spent the night at an adoption conference in Lexington. It was an evening with a mix of uplifting music and a message by a leading spokesman for adoption in the body of Christ. It was a great night. I have to say that the message that touched my soul the most was part of a song sung by Andrew Petterson. The lines were "He took a plane to Africa, He gathered up into his arms an orphan son. So many years from now long after we are gone this tree will spread its branches out and bless the dawn. So sit down and write that letter, sign up and join the fight, sink in to all that matters, step out into the light. Let go of all that's passing, lift up the least of these, lean into something lasting, planting trees." It is impossible not to note the symbolism in beginning and ending my day with the same thought of planting trees.

Monday morning I am headed up to Cincinnati for a meeting at the Department of Homeland Security, well actually the USCIS Office (US Citizenship and Immigration Services). This is the last step for me until I receive my referral.

He Provides (oh and my dossier has been sent)

I heard a quote from Corrie Ten Boom the other day, "Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God." The speaker was relating this to taking financial risks, stating that God always pays for what He orders. If God has provided the vision, he will back that vision.

I find this to be coming true each and every day as I travel this journey with My Heavenly Father and Friend. The yard sale was a success. It could not have been a more beautiful day and I was able to collect quite a bit of money. However, for me that is not what made it successful. It was a success because of those that rallied around me to donate their time and extra stuff to the sale. It was all of the people throughout the day that spoke to me about adoption and the encouragement they gave. It is the woman that works with my mom who gave her some money because although she failed to make it to the sale wanted to show her support. God will provide the money but He will also provide those along the way to help me through this journey. I am so very grateful!

Pictures from the yard sale:


I received an email last week that some requirements for the dossier had been changed in regards to Ethiopia's adoptions. This caused a little delay in sending out all of my paperwork because I had to gather together a few more documents. I finally got the last bit of information needed yesterday and I was able to drop that off at the FedEx Box last night. It was a great feeling to have this step completed.

Cleaning House

In attempts to raise some money for this whole adoption thing I've decided to have a yard sale. One of the things that has resulted in is hours spent cleaning out my house along with my parents house. There is something that I find very satisfying about removing unnecessary stuff from my house. Spending so much time cleaning out the material parts of my life left me with time to reflect on the need we all have to occasionally clean out our lives. Sometimes it is necessary for me to remove all the spiritual and daily clutter that builds over time and just spend time with my heavenly Father and Friend. It reminds me of an older Shaun Groves song called Welcome Home. I love the imagery of this song as it parallels our hearts to that of a house. It continually played through my head as I pysically worked through the rooms of my home.
On the adoption front, I'm still waiting for my home study agency to get my home study written. I got the last few documents needed for my dossier notarized this week so once I have my home study report approved I will be able to send in my dossier to my placing agency. I have high hopes that I will receive a copy of my report this week for review.

Embrace

I spent this morning worshiping with a group of believers at Embrace church. It is a church that meets in the KY theater whose primary focus is to embrace God and embrace others who have "been hurt, rejected, broken and burned out on just looking religious." The reason for my being in their midst was to listen to Shane Claiborne speak. His approach to peaceful, simple living and following the ways of Jesus is a unique voice in the Christian community today. He had just returned from a trip to the holy land and discussed how many of the areas there are walled up. He showed several images of paintings on these walls that depict what it could be like on the other side. To me this is symbolic of our world. Jesus seeks for heaven to come to earth and for us as his followers to help bring that to a reality. To peer through the world in which we live and see the reality that could be - a world without war, poverty, hunger, and hate; a world where we truly embrace one another!
My favorite quote from Shane this morning was this, "The closer we are to God, the less we want to throw stones at other people."
Although this isn't related directly to how my adoption is proceeding, it is part of the story of the things that continue to inspire me to follow after Jesus and try to do my part to make our world a better place.

Hard Stuff

First off my homestudy and dossier responsibilities are almost complete. All the reading and meetings are done. I am now just waiting on them to write up the documentation and then I will be able to send off all of my documentation and begin the waiting. I received a newsletter this morning from my placing agency that gave an update on several families that had just received their referrals from Ethiopia. Just reading it caused me to be hit with a new wave of how real this is. One of the things that my homestudy worker said to me in our last meeting keeps playing over and over in my head. She was talking about how quick my FEI Clearance came through and she said, “God must have your babies ready for you.” Knowing that my little boys are out there and God knows who they are, what they look like and all of the details that have to be worked out so that I can hold them in my arms makes me glad that I believe in a big God.

Although the past months have been extremely exciting on many levels in regards to the adoption moving forward, they have also been hard. Tonight I will be going to the second visitation in as many weeks for a close friend’s parent who died from cancer. Another close friend was diagnosed with breast cancer earlier in the summer and is undergoing treatment and the mother of another close friend was diagnosed with leukemia. There is an incredible song by Josh Wilson called “Before the Morning” that brings me hope in the midst of being sad for my friends. My favorite line from that song is “Would you dare, would you dare to believe, that you still have a reason to sing, Cause the pain that you’ve been feeling it can’t compare to the joy that’s coming.”

The closest I can come to that joy on this earth is knowing what God has called me to and running with reckless abandon towards that. This includes not only following this whole adoption thing through to its finish but also striving to know God more every day and mold my steps to follow after Him. Even though I fail at this frequently I find peace in knowing that He is continually there with arms open wide. The Starfield song called “The Hand that Holds the World” speaks to this – “No greater joy is there than this, to know for what we’re meant to live; to hold your hand, to touch your face, to find ourselves in loves embrace; I want to stand before the King, Join in the song that heaven’s sings, I want to hold the hand that holds the world.”