Thanks for your support of our adoption journey. We would love for you to join us in praying that God would give us wisdom, patience and perseverance as we go through the process to adopt our children! We appreciate the many people walking this adoption journey with us in prayer! ~Jon & Bethany

November 4, 2011

An Actual UPDATE!

This, unlike many of our posts in the last 9 weeks, is an ACTUAL, REAL UPDATE with actual, real progress that we are PRAISING GOD FOR!!

Our agency has received a copy of baby R's Abandonment decree!

Here's what happens next (as I (hopefully) understand it):
1. Abandonment decree
2. DRC government will wait 30 days to see if any family member surface and protest the decree that baby R is an abandoned, orphaned child.
3. After these 30 days are over, they will issue a "Non-appeal certificate"! {To my understanding, after this point we are free & clear to adopt him!}
4. There is a 2 week waiting period, and then a birth certificate will be issued (I'm thinking/hoping our names will be listed as his PARENTS!)
5. Wait for a court date to OFFICIALLY ADOPT him!
6. After baby R is officially our son, we just wait for an Embassy date to go to DRC &  bring him home.

While we are excited to be moving forward and making progress toward baby R being our son, it is also saddening. We learned a little bit more of his story. He was abandoned in a market, someone found him and took pity on him and tried to find his parents, but no one knew anything about him, so the kind stranger took him to an orphanage. I wish I knew the reason his birth mom abandoned him and left him there. Could she not afford to feed and care for him? Whatever it is, I'm thankful that she chose to let him live and left him in a place where he was sure to be found. I'm praying for her today, wherever she is, if she is even still alive. I'm sure her story is filled with much suffering. I pray that she would know Jesus as her Savior.

We are so sad for all the suffering that orphans worldwide go through every day, but we are thankful that the Lord has led us to this little guy. We have been and will continue to PRAY that nothing would prevent us from being able to adopt him and bring him home to be part of our family forever. It has been a long 10 months in this adoption process, but I pray daily that God would give me faith to believe that He will help us rescue orphans, and that He will help us adopt and bring them home to our family forever. I know that He is the one who called us to do this, so I am trusting in His plans for our family and our adoption story.

Thank you for everyone who is praying with us! We know God hears the prayers of believers! Please pray that we would get a referral for our little girl very soon!

"Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation.
God settles the solitary in a home."
Psalm 68: 5-6
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PS- Don't forget to wear an ADOPTION SHIRT to church this SUNDAY in honor of Orphan Sunday.

5 comments:

  1. Praise our Lord God Almighty!!! Thanks for sharing your joy with us. :-)

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  2. So happy for you! Praying that the next steps go smoothly and quickly! :)

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  3. Oh my goodness!! Finally some GOOD NEWS!!! So incredibly excited for your entire family. Cannot wait to meet your new son. :) xoxo

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