Ephesians 1:4-5 says "Even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. This is what He wanted to do, and it gave Him great pleasure." Let that sink in a minute. God chose us and loved us even though we were sinful, dirty, undeserving, and on and on I could go. He WANTED to do it!!! I don't know about you, but that makes we want to scream praises to Him and shout out the biggest THANK YOU ever imaginable! We deserved DEATH but are given the opportunity to have LIFE eternal if we are willing to accept this free gift. That's good stuff right there!!!!
When I was 15 years old, I felt 2 very strong callings from the Lord in my life. The first was that I was to marry a minister. Check. The second was that I was supposed to adopt a child from Asia. It was a clear message from the Lord that this was an act of worship that He wanted me to do no matter what. He brought me to this passage in Ephesians and it was like He laid it out for me very clearly. He called me to action. There are about 163 million orphans reported in the world. 163 million children in need of a home....that is a heartbreaking statistic! It is time to do something about this.
J and I began dating over 10 years ago. One of our first conversations centered around the 2 callings in my life. It was so clear to me how God was in the middle of all of it because J had already accepted God's call to full time ministry and he was completely on board with adoption. Our conversations during those first few months of dating really solidified it in my heart that this was the man God had created and prepared for me and an adoptive journey was the path that He had for our family. We were married in 2005 and in 2009, we welcomed our beautiful little girl Ella Kate. We knew we had to wait until we were both 30 to officially begin all the paperwork and the long road to bringing our daughter home. What we weren't expecting was our sweet Walker who surprised us in 2012. We can't imagine life without him now, but it did delay our process a little bit since the youngest child in the house must be 1 year old before the home study can be completed. =) I am amazed at how the Lord is at work in our family. We have really been able to have some special conversations with Ella Kate about how our family is going to change and it is so sweet to hear the precious prayers that she offers up for her sister and all the orphans in the world. It is a blessing in deed to see the Lord softening her heart and making her aware and sensitive to the fact that there is a lot more to this life than just her.
As we begin this journey, will you please pray for our family? We can not do this alone!!! We will be updating on this blog and our family blog with specific prayer needs, ways you can help, as well as documenting every step along the way as we get closer and closer to bringing our little one home. Thank you for taking the time to read my ramblings, but thank you even more for praying for us and supporting us on this amazing journey that God has set out before us.
