quick prayer update

We have unfortunately not heard ANY news on baby girl's case or on baby R in weeks.
But for any of you out there who still read this & have stuck around all 16 months of our adoption journey thus far, we wanted to let you know how you can specifically be praying with us. {THANK YOU for your support through prayer! It encourages us more than you will probably ever know.}

1. PRAY that we would pass court for baby girl this week!! (Or even that we passed last week and we just don't know it yet!)

2. PRAY that we would get pictures of baby R. We have not gotten a single update (medical info, pictures, or otherwise) in the past 9 months other than being told that he was moved to a different orphanage. He was supposedly moved 2 weeks ago to his new orphanage, so please pray that God would be merciful & let us see his face so we will know he is alive & well!!!

3. PRAY for their continued protection, and that God would uphold their lives and sustain them every single day! We know that every day that an orphan survives in the DRC is a miracle- so we are asking God for daily miracles until the day He finally unites our family!

Praising God for my newest son & praying that baby girl will officially be "ours" soon! And that God would allow us to be united as a family and bring our children home very, very soon!!

A message from your big brother

Baby brother and baby sister, we have a message from your big brother, Jonah, to share with you today:


{You can watch it on Youtube @ http://youtu.be/kdMGJYxgIo8 }


Jonah is also excited to announce our newest FUNDRAISER below:

Please PRAY with us for 2 members of our agency who arrived in the DRC yesterday!!! Pray for their safety and protection and for a very productive trip! Pray they would get to see ALL of the children referred to families and get plenty of pictures and video. And pray with us that all the children, including our son & daughter, would  be united with their forever families SOON!

In Christ,

More Answered Prayer: We got a REFERRAL!!!!!

Friends, I am about to weep tears of JOY as I type this, and it finally sinks in that this is really happening, our last 5 months of prayer have been answered:
WE GOT A REFERRAL FOR A LITTLE GIRL!!!!

We found out yesterday that she passed her medical and sent official notice to our agency today that we accept this referral for the beautiful baby girl, who we'll call "baby girl" for now! =)

She was just 45 days old at the time of her medical exam a couple weeks ago, so almost 2 months old now! And she is a healthy, precious little one! She weighs around 13.5 lbs!

Please Rejoice and PRAISE GOD with us for all that He has done & all that he is about to do! We do still need to get her abandonment decree and birth certificate, but we want to take a minute and pause and just give GLORY to God for all the ANSWERED PRAYER that we've had in the last week!

Thank you Lord for entrusting this baby girl to us! Thank you for giving us the priveledge of being her and baby R's parents, raising them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, loving them, caring for them everyday! We can hardly wait!!!  Please help us get her paperwork in the next week or two so we can officially ADOPT our son and daughter and bring them home this spring!!!! Please give us patience and help us to trust in Your timing.

We are working frantically hard to get all our child-specific paperwork printed, signed, notarized, certified and everything else in the next 24 hours!! These documents have to be in the DRC before our court date in order for us to pass court and be officially declared as baby R and baby girl's PARENTS! =)

"Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!" Psalm 107:1

Rejoicing in God's lovingkindness to His people,

one big answered prayer!

Well friends,
We got an exciting email from our agency last evening..... {drum roll, please.....}

WE GOT APPROVAL TO GET BABY R'S BIRTH CERTIFICATE!!!

So that is one HUGE answer to prayer! We are one step closer to bringing him home!

But it also means that we really need to get a referral for our little girl VERY soon. We don't want to delay his adoption. And obviously want to have him (and our daughter) home with us as soon as possible.

We got an email from our agency on December 27th telling us about a little girl that should be paperwork ready soon. It was not exactly what we've been praying and hoping for (an official referral), but it is SO close!

Would you please PRAY with us that our agency would receive the medical, abandonment decree, AND birth certificate for this little girl (or whichever little girl the Lord has for us) by next Friday?? That would be the most AMAZING 5th wedding anniversary gift I can imagine!!!! {Yep, that's right- our 5th Anniversary is next Friday.} I know it sounds like a huge request, but nothing is impossible for God. And we don't want to not receive this great gift from Him because we have not asked Him for it.

" Give ear to my words, O LORD;
   consider my groaning.
² Give attention to the sound of my cry,
   my King and my God,
   for to you do I pray.
³ O LORD, in the morning you hear my voice;
   in the morning I prepare a sacrifice for you^[a] and watch.
 ⁴ For you are not a God who delights in wickedness;
   evil may not dwell with you.
¹¹ But let all who take refuge in you rejoice;
   let them ever sing for joy,
and spread your protection over them,
   that those who love your name may exult in you.
¹² For you bless the righteous, O LORD;
   you cover him with favor as with a shield."
Psalm 5:1-4, 11-12

Next stop after we get our official referral for our daughter???
COURT!
To officially adopt both of our children! To legally become their PARENTS!
I mean seriously, I can hardly believe it as I type this out. Thank you Lord! Help- me to cling to and trust in your Sovereign plans for our family! That they are for our good and YOUR glory! And help me to have faith to believe in Your plans, even when Your ways are so much higher than our ways that we can't fathom what you're doing. I PRAISE you Jesus, that Your grace is sufficient for me and that Your power is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:9).

Rejoicing & Praying Expectantly,

a new year

We begin this new year full of hope. Praying constantly for orphans, our adoption, and for God to place two beautiful children made in His image in our home this spring. Praying for Baby R, whose unofficial first birthday is just a month away. Praying that God would wrap His protecting hands around baby R, and that He would protect him from any harm, disease, or hunger. We pray the same for our daughter, whoever she is, where ever she is right now (we trust that God knows). We pray that God would give us a referral for our little girl before we get baby R's birth certificate, or even that we would get them the same day!
We pray for patience, peace, and perseverance in our adoption journey and praise God for a renewed sense of HOPE that He has given us lately! We PRAISE God that HE is sovereign and He knows the plans He has for our family, and we trust that they are for our good and His glory!

We pray all the families we know that are adopting and caring for orphans, that God would knit their families together through adoption in a way that displays the gospel to the world around them and brings Him much glory. We pray that the Lord would execute justice for the orphan and give victory to families whose road to rescue orphans has been long and hard.

We pray that thousands of orphans worldwide would be placed in loving, gospel-centered families in 2012! Would you join us in praying? In being like the persistent widow in Luke 18 and faithfully asking God over and over to execute justice for orphans around the world and be merciful in placing them in loving families?
"And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. ² He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. ³ And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Give me justice against my adversary.’ ⁴ For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, ‘Though I neither fear God nor respect man, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming.’” ⁶ And the Lord said, “Hear what the unrighteous judge says. ⁷ And will not God give justice to his elect, who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long over them? ⁸ I tell you, he will give justice to them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” Luke 18: 1-8

Let us PRAY and not lose heart,

New President and lots of Praises!

First off, the winner of the 2nd Presidential election in the Democratic Republic of Congo was finally announced today: Joseph Kibala, the current president, was re-elected by a majority of the vote. However, please keeping PRAYING for the DRC, because the opposition leader who ran against him is rejecting the results and has declared himself as president, according to the BBC.  This has a lot of people worried about violent protests. Your prayers for peace & God's protection of the innocent are much appreciated!!

In other news, we have been PRAISING THE LORD this past week or two for so much answered prayer in lives of our brothers and sisters in Christ!

*We're praising God with our friends Weyland and Katie who've been waiting years for their 2nd domestic adoption, and they are at this moment on their way HOME with a baby boy! They had around 17 birth mothers look at their profile and then change their mind and not pick them to adopt their baby. Heartbreaking. But our entire church family at Immanuel has been crying out to God on their behalf and He has answered in His timing! He has given them a son!

*We're praising God with another couple from our church who are currently in Ethiopia with their kiddos, hoping to bring their children home by Christmas. We are PRAYING God would do it and work out every single detail for His glory!

* We're praising God with our friends, April and Everett, who are in Ukraine right now hoping to rescue 3 precious children!! We're praising God for the way He has worked out the details so far and that they were able to meet their 2 boys just the other day!! (You can read April's super sweet post here.)

* We are also Praising God for the encouraging posts we've been reading on David Platt's (author of Radical) blog! We are rejoicing in their beautiful story of adopting a little girl from China! Their story and the pictures make me so excited for the day that we get to go to DRC to bring our children home!

We also have gotten little tidbits of information lately that help us know how to PRAY for our adoption more specifically. So if you are out their pleading with God on our behalf, (we are SO thankful for you) here is how you can be praying right now:
1. Pray that God would grant us a referral for a little girl before we get baby R's birth certificate!!!
(Our attorney is changing the way he's doing referrals slightly,so that he isn't giving a child as a referral until he has their abandonment decree in hand. This is probably wise, and will be better for families coming after us. So when we get a referral for our little girl she will already have her abandonment decree & we can hopefully get her birth certificate in time for court.)
2. Pray for continued protection of baby R and our little girl from harm, disease, neglect and hunger. And pray that we could bring them home soon! We're hoping by some time in the spring to be home as a family of 5. =)

"The Lord is righteous in all his ways
 and kind in all his works.
The Lord is near to all who call on him
to all who call on him in truth.
He fulfills the desire of those who fear him;
he also hears their cry and saves them.
The Lord preserves all who love him,
but all the wicked he will destroy."
Psalm 145:18-20

Calling on the Lord,

Pray for DRC Election results!

Please continue to pray with us for the DRC, that there would be peace throughout the country as the election results are supposed to be announced today.

According to this article by BBC news, about 3,000 people fled Kinshasa (the capital city) over the weekend in fear of violence and rioting once the results are announced.

Please remember the 4 million innocent orphans in this country as you pray, that God would protect them from harm, especially our baby R and all the other children matched with families!

Elections Today, PRAY!

The elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo are taking place today. Please PRAY for peaceful elections and peace and respect when the results of the election are announced on December 6th.

Pray for the safety and protection of baby R and all orphans and innocent people now and for the coming weeks and months.

And please pray with us that God would grant us a referral for a little girl this week!! We have seen Him answer many prayers in our friends lives lately, and know that He hears the prayers of believers. We pray that He would be glorified in placing a little girl in our family this week so you can praise the Lord with us!!

Praying for our Daughter & Elections

Will you take a minute right now to PRAY with us for our daughter and son? Will you PRAY that God would grant us a referral for our little girl very, very soon? We have had our referral for baby R for 3 months now, and have been waiting to be matched with a little girl "any day." Please PRAY that that day would be SOON, even this week!

We know that God is the one who gave us this desire to rescue orphans,to adopt a boy and a girl, and we are trusting that His timing is perfect, even when it's taking way longer than we could've anticipated.

Also, please PRAY with us for the upcoming Presidential election in the DRC. Please pray for peaceful elections in this war-torn, newly democratic country. (I believe this is only their 2nd democratic election!) And pray that whomever is elected will be supportive of adoption and not hinder orphans being rescued.
You can read a little more about the elections in Congo here.

a long, hard road

Man, I have been overwhelmed today with the long, hard road that so many families we know are on right now in their effort to rescue and care for orphans.

I will share more about that in a minute, but first I want to remind myself of something. We are now 10 months into our journey. It has been longer and harder than we had planned, and it is far from over. But my God is the God that created the universe and everything in it. And He is in control. He is sovereign over all things. We found out this week, after reading over a translation of baby R's Abandonment decree, that we had read his birthday wrong! (We forgot that the French switch the day & month around when writing out the date.) Well, we actually found out that it wasn't even his birthday, it is just the day that he was found in the market. The day that the orphanage caregivers knew that he even existed. And while it kind of breaks my heart because I feel like I just lost 2 months with this little guy, whom I pray will one day soon be my son, it is okay because God already knew. So our sweet baby R is not 7 months old like we thought, but 9 months old. Just 3 months away from his 1st birthday, which I was really hoping he would get to spend with us. I just wonder how old he was when he was found in that market. How many days or weeks did he spend with his birthmom? But I will probably never know the answers to those questions. But these are small things in light of all the other things going on right now.

If you know Jesus as your Savior will you please pray with us for our adoption and some of our friends and acquaintances?
Will you PRAY for our friends Justin and Bonnie who have been persevering on this crazy rollercoaster of adoption even longer than us? Will you pray that the Lord would give them strength and faith to endure the rest of their journey & that He would MOVE on behalf of orphans in Ethiopia, especially their son and daughter, so that they can come home to their Christ-centered forever family very soon?

Will you PRAY with us for another family we know adopting from the DRC whose baby has died before they could bring him home? We know this pain of losing a child you had never met face to face but already loved more than words can describe. Please pray that God would comfort them, and give them a peace that surpasses understanding (Phil 4) as they mourn the loss of their baby boy. Please also pray that God would give them strength to persevere in the midst of their pain, as they have a referral for another little boy as well. And while you're praying, please PRAY that God would heal this little guy, who is currently in the hospital.

Will you PRAY with us for all families who are adopting, that God would give them (us) the patience, strength, and perseverance that He promises to provide through His spirit (Gal 5:22) to all who believe in Christ alone for salvation? Will you pray that we would bring glory to God in the midst of the trials we face during the process of rescuing orphans and that more Christians eyes & hearts would be opened to the 147 million orphaned children around the world? And would pray for us to not grow weary and to remember that any suffering that we go through during the process to adopt is WORTH IT to save the life of a child made in the image of God? And these sufferings are little compared to what orphans worldwide go through every single day.

Thank you for crying out to the Lord with us. He is our Creator. Our Redeemer. The King of kings.
"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. ²⁹For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. ³⁰And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified." Romans 8: 28-30

I don't know exactly what God's plans are for our family. But I trust that they are for our good and his glory. This is the post I wrote just 5 days after baby R was found in the market last February... at that point we still thought we were adopting from Ethiopia. God has opened and closed many doors since then and we are confident that He has directed our paths to where we are now, so we are trusting in Him in the midst of all the crazy twists and turns!


Clinging to Christ,

a few prayer requests

Wow, does anyone else feel FUELED on to pray more after answered prayer???

As I've been rejoicing over the Lord healing our little Baby R, I have been fueled to pray CONFIDENTLY and EXPECTANTLY!

To all believers out there who know that they are sinners, falling short of God's glory and not keeping His law perfectly, and are deserving of God's judgement and wrath for all the things they've done & failed to do, but are trusting in Jesus' perfect sinless life and the fact that He absorbed the wrath of God that their sins deserve on a Roman cross for all who would believe in Him. If you are trusting in Christ Jesus ALONE and NOTHING that you do or have done, then you are a believer in the gospel and we would LOVE for you to pray with us because we know that if you're a believer then you have been ADOPTED by GOD and are now his sons and daughters (our brothers and sisters)!! And we know that God delights in answering the prayers of His children!
"⁷And will not God give justice to his elect {believers}, who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long over them? ⁸I tell you, he will give justice to them speedily." Luke 18: 7-8

Here are our main requests right now:
1) Pray with us that God would be merciful in defending the rights of the orphan and move mountains to bring our friends Justin & Bonnie's children to the transition house in Ethiopia & bring them HOME soon! Pray for their 2 children and the hundreds of orphans in Ethiopia who are paired with families waiting for them, that God would unite them SOON!
2) Pray for God's continued protection of our little guy, Baby R, who is 5 months old! We pray daily that the Lord would protect him from any harm or disease and that we would be given a referral for a little girl very soon so we can move toward bringing them both home!!!
3) Pray that God would guard the hearts and minds of the many adoptive families who are currently in the long process to rescue orphans!  Please pray we would not be given over to anxiety and fear, but that we would hold fast to the truth, trust and hope in the Lord and be persistent in prayer.

Praying our babies home,

Falling on our Knees again

Well friends, I don't know what God is doing right now, but He is doing something.

Just yesterday I posted about how God was calling me back to pray with confidence that He hears and delights in answering prayer. And today I received a phone call that has given us reason to once again get on our knees before the Lord.

Our sweet agency worker, Cheri, called me around 2:30 this afternoon to tell me that the 5 month old boy we got a referral for about a week ago (Ya, we hadn't even announced this on the blog yet..) is in the hospital with malaria. She said it's serious.
So will you and every believer you know please join with us in asking God to heal baby "R" quickly and preserve his life so that we might adopt him and raise him up in the fear and admonition of the Lord?! We are praying that God would use this illness to showcase His power and His glory and remind us that He hears!! But no matter the outcome, please pray that we would be able to Praise the Lord and trust in His good plans for our family!

Here is one passage from yesterday that is FUELING my prayers today!

Luke 18: The Parable of the Persistent Widow

 ¹And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. ²He said, "In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. ³And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, 'Give me justice against my adversary.' ⁴For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, 'Though I neither fear God nor respect man, ⁵yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming.'" ⁶And the Lord said, "Hear what the unrighteous judge says. ⁷And will not God give justice to his elect, who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long over them? ⁸I tell you, he will give justice to them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?"

Fasting & praying on behalf of baby R,

Lord, help my unbelief!

I'm going to be totally honest and transparent here. I have been struggling the last couple of weeks. I have felt like I've been walking around wearing a dark, heavy cloak that I want to take off but just can't. I have felt Satan's presence close by, closer than the Lord it seemed. He's been attacking my thoughts, distracting me whenever I sit down and try to read God's word, whispering his lies to me. Rather than deal with this darkness, I have tried to numb the pain and distract myself with temporary pleasures. A fun movie here. A delicious bite of chocolate there.

Only last week the Lord brought great conviction within me. I realized that I have not felt sad and downcast because of the death of our baby girl, Leseli Joyce. {Although I do still mourn at times that she died at only 9 months old. I actually take great comfort that she is with our Heavenly Father.} I realized that the primary thing that has been pressing down on me is that I am afraid to go to God in prayer.  I prayed earnestly for Him to allow us to adopt the 6 month old boy we got our 1st referral for. We lost the referral anyway. I prayed earnestly that He would keep Leseli Joyce safe and healthy until we could bring her home. She died anyway.

I have been afraid to ask Him for anything personal. Afraid to go to Him in prayer. Afraid that He will not answer how I think He should. I have prayed for other people, but not for myself, and certainly not for our adoption. When I have mustered up the courage to pray, it has been half-hearted at best.

I have completely lost sight of who my God is and what He is like. I confessed all these things to my husband Friday night. Up to that point I honestly couldn't pinpoint WHAT was bothering me and making me feel so depressed. I told him that one of the only things I've been praying lately is simply, "Lord,  help my unbelief!"
Thursday night we went on our date night that we'd had planned for weeks. And it was there, listening to FLAME's concert, that the Lord began to help my unbelief. Flame's music is awesome, the lyrics are AWESOME, and he is so faithful to preach the gospel between every song (and in his lyrics). I can't even remember exactly what he said, but I stood there listening with tears of conviction in my eyes. At a rap concert of all places. We bought his newest CD "Captured" at the concert, which we had been meaning to get for awhile. We love his music and he is a member at our church so we want to support his music ministry. But God orchestrated all of this in His perfect timing. I popped it in the CD player in the car on Friday and listened to every song. I drove home by myself in the car Friday night, crying as I listened most of the way home. This may sound completely rediculous.. crying while listening to rap?! But it was the truth, conviction and encouragement in his lyrics that pricked my heart. (His lyrics are awesome, seriously, just take a listen to the previews on iTunes or Amazon and find out for yourself.)
One song in particular was music to my weary soul. It's the last one on the album, and after hearing it, I put it on repeat the rest of the way home. It starts out, "I just wanna be, I just wanna be, closer to your heart, closer to your heart. Everything I am it's because of you, it's because of you. Tonight I'm giving you all of me..."
And track 11 is an excerpt from our gifted pastor, Ryan Fullerton's, sermon on Daniel 10. The whole series through the book of Daniel was extremely powerful and encouraging for Jon and me last year, but hearing this sermon in the car Friday night was like hearing it for the very first time. {Side note: You can listen to any of Pastor Ryan's sermons for free online @ http://www.ibclouisville.org/resources/audio.} Wow, to say that I was convicted is an understatement.

So Sunday morning came and I was blown away by the way the Lord is at work. I had one of those Sundays where it felt like the Pastor was right to me. If you are struggling with going to the Lord in prayer right now, I pray that you too will be greatly helped by this morning's sermon by Pastor Ryan. {You can listen to it here: Prayer that Cries "Your Kingdom Come" Immanuel Baptist Church } I am honestly still processing and trying to learn everything the Lord is trying to teach me. I plan to listen to this sermon over and over again this week (and now all of you can keep me accountable to do that!). It was some seriously good food for my SOUL! He talked about the disciples falling asleep while Jesus was praying on the Mount of Olives and how they weren't being lazy or unzealous by falling asleep, but Luke says in verse 45 that they were "sleeping for sorrow." They slept because they were so overwhelmed with sorrow that Jesus, their dear friend and teacher, was about to die. But Jesus says to them in Luke 22:46, "Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation."

This evening we went back to church for a dessert fellowship with 3 of the international missionaries sent out from Immanuel to different parts of Asia. We got to hear how the Lord is working and answering our prayers that we've been praying with them. It was a much-needed reminder that God hears. Then we were blessed to have our brother who lives in East Asia preach a brief sermon on Luke 18. Guess what Luke 18 is about? PRAYER. Jesus told them this parable "that they ought always to pray and not lose heart" (Luke 18:1).

I feel like the Lord is lifting the heavy cloak from me. He is pointing my eyes from my weary feet to His perfect Son. He is sending encouragement to me through faithful, Godly men and women and His word. He is SO clearly calling me to PRAY. Please pray for me that I will boldly approach the throne of grace in prayer and not lose heart, but believe.

Thank you Lord for helping my unbelief!!!

Bear One Another's Burdens

We have written about our friends Justin & Bonnie on here before. They are a sweet couple from our church whose paths crossed with ours when we decided to adopt. We sought them out to glean wisdom from them before we chose an agency and officially started our adoption journey. (They were ahead of us in the process.)  They are in the midst of a very long process to bring 2 beautiful children home from Ethiopia. We have wept with them during their adoption process over may different things and got on our knees on their behalf and begged the Lord to have mercy and to act. Even now, we pray constantly that the Lord would help their son and daughter (who are officially theirs now, per Ethiopian court) to be released from UNICEF, brought to our agency's transition house, and COME HOME soon!!!!

As they wait and cling to Christ, they have even wept with us over the life of our baby girl, Audrey Joy, who beat us to Heaven and the loss of our referral for a precious 6 month old boy. Bonnie wrote a very sweet post asking for prayer for the DRC and our family that you can read on her blog.  We are so thankful for the many faithful brothers and sisters in Christ that the Lord has brought into our lives, especially through our church family @ Immanuel.  Countless people have prayed for us, wept with us, encouraged us, and served us.

We know that "Weeping may last for the night, but JOY comes with the morning." (Psalm 30:5) We cannot wait to be on the other side of this adoption road, with all of our kids home with us and to REJOICE with Justin & Bonnie and be able to look back and see God's faithful hand over every step. Until then, we will fight to cling to Christ and our hope in Him.

From Despair to Hope

Where do I begin? I have so many thoughts swirling around my head, so I apologize now if this post is all over the place, but that is how the past few days have been. I've been all over the place- emotionally and spiritually.

I confess that the first 24 hours after getting the news that our baby girl had died I was overwhelmed with feelings of DESPAIR. I kept looking at her picture and telling her, "I'm so sorry baby. Mommy loves you. I'm sorry I didn't get there in time." I felt like I had let her down. Like I didn't rescue her in time. And that is a gut-wrenching, despair-inducing way to think.

I kept questioning WHY GOD?? WHY??? WHY would You let this happen? When we were just months from bringing her home... when she would FINALLY experience the LOVE of Christ through our family. WHY would He let her die just days before our director got to Congo?? WHY would God let her die an orphan?? WHY did He not UPHOLD her as He promises to do throughout His word, especially in Psalm 146 that I've been praying through so often recently. WHY did you let this happen to our beautiful little girl, who is made in Your image???

I burst into tears every time I looked at her picture or thought about her all alone in an orphanage with NOONE to love on her & care for her. I burst into tears as I thought about our director showing up at her orphanage to give her our care package, only to find that she wasn't there. I burst into tears as our 18 month old son kept making silly faces at me, obviously trying in his little 18 month old way to "cheer mommy up." I burst into tears even when I learned the following day that she died in a Congolese hospital. It was somewhat comforting to know that she did receive medical attention, but broke my heart that they couldn't figure out what was wrong and HELP her. Basically, I've been bursting into tears a lot.

But I praise the Lord that He has not left me there, in my depair. He has surrounded us with our brothers and sisters in Christ who have been pointing us to Christ & truth while Satan has been trying to tempt me to believe his lies. Satan wants me to despair. He doesn't want me to have hope or believe that God is really good. {Sound familiar? Remember that the great deceiver used this same lie to coax Adam & Eve to sin & rebel against God's one rule in the garden... "God is withholding a good gift from you. He doesn't have your good in mind." See Genesis 3, and the outcome... and now ALL SIN and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).}

 So we are SO, SO thankful for the many faithful believers who have been pouring out their love to us, grieving with us, and encouraging us with the word of God. One of the pastors of our wonderful church, Immanuel, and a good friend of ours, Dom, called us Tuesday evening. His words to Jon were so encouraging and MUCH NEEDED that evening. Jon told him how we were struggling to understand Leseli's death in light of Psalm 146, "[the Lord] executes justice for the oppressed, ...gives food to the hungry... The Lord watches over the sojourners; He UPHOLDS the widow and the FATHERLESS, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin." As Jon mentioned in his post on Wednesday, Dom said to him, "She is no longer fatherless; she is face to face right now with her heavenly father. However she was suffering, God heard her cry and had mercy on her."
This hit me like a ton of bricks. Why had I not once considered this all evening? My reaction was so self-focused that I failed to realize the great MERCY God has shown her. Because she was just an infant and had not yet reached the age where she had chosen to rebel away from God, we can trust that she is in Heaven, face to face with her Heavenly Father. As much as I yearned to hold her and love her, God's arms are infinitely more loving and perfect than mine would ever be. She's in a place where, "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away" (Rev. 21:4).

Jon read this as we prayed together that night. "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways" (Isaiah 55:8-9). Who am I a sinful, imperfect human to try to understand the ways of God? He is infinite, eternal, and created the heavens & earth and everything in them, including ME. Of course I cannot understand WHY everything happens. I am not God. (Thank God for that.)

While I am still VERY, VERY SAD that Leselie Joyce had to die an orphan, that I will never get to know her, show her unconditional love, do mother-daughter things with her, or teach her about my loving Savior Jesus... I can find comfort in knowing that she is with our perfectly loving Heavenly Father and I will meet her one day and spend eternity with her because I am His child too. He adopted me when I was 20 years old when I placed my faith in Christ ALONE for my salvation & gave my life to Him. I now have full assurance that His only biological son, Jesus, paid the penalty of God's wrath that my own sins deserve ("For the wages of sin is death" Romans 6:23) so that I can be washed white as snow & so that I don't have to spend eternity seperated from God by my sin in hell.

Another sweet friend reminded me of Romans 8:38, that although I mourn the loss of our baby girl, "I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present not things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor ANYTHING ELSE in all creation, will be able to seperate us form the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." Praise the Lord!
In fact, not only can nothing seperate God's chosen children from Him, but He is actually using this trial and this suffering to test the genuineness of my faith & draw me closer to Him. "In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls" (1 Peter 1:6-9).

Though it has taken me a couple days to say this, I can now say with certainty that I am trusting that God has good plans for our family, plans to give us a hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11). We would still appreciate the prayers of believers!! This journey is far from over. Our mourning and missing our baby girl is far from over. She will always be missed. 

*You can PRAY that "the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard our hearts & minds in Christ Jesus" (Phillipians 4:7).

*You can pray that like Paul, we would learn to be content in every circumstance (Phil. 4:11) and trust that God is working all things together for good & making us more like Christ through our suffering (Romans 8:28).

*You can PRAY for us as we continue down this emotional rollercoaster of rescuing orphans. Leseli's death has reminded us just how badly the 4 million orphans in Congo (and 147 million in the world) need a family to RESCUE, love & care for them and protect them. We continue down this road in faith that this is what God is calling us to do, but we know that we are not promised a smooth ride with no heartache. Pray that God would guard our hearts and that the next referrals we get, whenever we get them, would be the children that we get to bring home and that God would knit into our family forever!

Thank you for walking this long, windy, uphill-downhill, crazy journey with us. It would be a lonely road without the encouragement and support of so many friends and family spurring us on!
 

We Love You Baby Girl.

This will officially be my first blog post…a tough place to start, but a good outlet for what’s going on in my heart and mind right now…

This week the director from our agency is in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Her main goal while over there: visit the children in line to be adopted, take new pictures and video of the children and bring them care packages put together by their new families.

We were so excited to get to put together a care package specifically for our little girl a couple of weeks ago; the adoption process can drag out and seem like it’s never going to end and sending this package to her allowed us to feel more connected with this sweet little girl! You can imagine the excitement and anticipation we were experiencing the past couple of days. I found myself checking my email more regularly throughout the day hoping to see new pictures of my daughter and get an update of how she was doing.

A couple of nights ago Bethany and I were just talking about how much we loved this little girl that we knew so little about. We talked about how it didn’t even matter to us what potential illnesses, disabilities or delays she could have, we loved her no less and couldn’t wait to meet her and bring her home.

Tuesday evening we finally got some news…

I was driving home from work and got a text message from Bethany, “Hurry home. I just got a call from CCI.” I hoped this would be good news but feared what that message might mean.

When I walked in the door Bethany was sitting at the kitchen table with a picture of our little girl in front of her and tears in her eyes. It was written on a piece of paper so she didn’t have to say it, “Our little girl died four days ago.”

We’ve been told that the adoption process can be a rollercoaster of emotions and to expect the unexpected, but man……………….…this really blindsided us.

After several hours to think about things and some encouragement from friends and family, I just want to share a few thoughts…

God is Sovereign. That phrase is thrown around a lot, and can sometimes seem like nothing more than a hard reality; just deal with it and move on. But if understood correctly, it is a glorious and comforting truth! It is helpful for me to think about what it would mean if God is not sovereign. If God is not sovereign, then God does not reign over evil, God does not work all things together for our good and we can have no hope in the midst of suffering. What good would it do to pray to a God that is powerless to sovereignly answer prayer? As R.C. Sproul put it, “…if God is not Sovereign, God is not God.” With this in mind, how awesome and powerful are these truths:

“The LORD reigns, let the earth rejoice; let the many coastlands be glad!” – Psalm 97:1

"Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases." – Psalm 115:3

"But he is unchangeable, and who can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. For he will complete what he appoints for me, and many such things are in his mind." – Job 23:13-14


“And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” – Romans 8:28

“More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope” – Romans 5:3-4

It is comforting for us to know that God is sovereign. We may have felt blindsided by this, but God was not. This was God’s providence. “Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father (Matthew 10:29)” The answers to our questions of why may not be completely answered on this side of heaven, and we are ok with that because we know that God has purposed this trial specifically for us in order to conform us to the image of his Son and glorify his name!

One verse that I was struggling to understand last night was from Psalm 146:9, “The LORD watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.” I couldn’t help but think about how she probably suffered and died from something that would have been preventable here in the States, how our director arrived in the Congo four days too late and how in just a few more months we would have traveled to pick her up and take care of her. How is the LORD upholding the fatherless here?!

I was helped when a friend called last night and prayed with me. On the phone he said, “She is no longer fatherless; she is face to face right now with her heavenly father. However she was suffering, God heard her cry and had mercy on her.”

As sad as it may be for us right now, God had mercy on this little girl and brought her home. Praise God, who in His sovereignty and mercy upholds the widow and the fatherless!

Now that she is deceased, we are allowed to share her beautiful face with you.

Her name was Leseli Joyce. We had already decided and filled out the paper work to change her name to Audrey Joy Meacham, named after my Dad’s Father, her great-grandfather, Audrey L. Meacham.

If you would consider, here are some ways you can be praying with us:

Pray that God would give us a peace that surpasses all understanding, knowing that God is a sovereign and merciful God.

Pray that we would not grow weary in the adoption process, which can at times seem like there is no end in sight.

Pray that God would uphold the fatherless in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (and throughout the world) and that many children would be able to be adopted by Christ-centered families.

In Christ,

Jon

PRAY WITH US

No referral for our little guy yet. Nothing too exciting on our adoption front yet... but our Director, Sue, from Celebrate Children is in Ethiopia right now!!! And we are praying that while she is there, she will be given the letter she needs to get many newly adopted children out of UNICEF's custody and into CCI's Transition house so their parents can come pick them up SOON!!
{If you aren't aware of how ANTI-ADOPTION UNICEF is, just read this article! It will help you think twice about EVER giving any money to them ever again!! As she says in the article,"Somehow in the process of developing a system to eradicate child suffering the very people that system is designed to help—orphaned children—have been forgotten." Go read it!!}

Please pray with us specifically for our friends Justin & Bonnie and the 4 other couples they traveled with just weeks ago!! They passed court and are officially the PARENTS of these precious children made in the image of God!! PRAY that they would get an embassy date soon and and be able to return to Ethiopia to bring their children HOME sweet HOME forever very soon!!!

We are also PRAYING for Sue's trip to Congo next week! She will be going from Ethiopia to Congo to meet with our Attorney, check on our children, and hopefully get lots of pictures and even VIDEO!!! We are PRAYING that we would get a referral for our little boy BEFORE she leaves CONGO so we will be able to get pictures & video of him too!! She'll also be giving our care package to "Little Sister"!!! {We went ahead and sent one to "Baby Brother" too, just in case!!}

Thank you for praying with us and for helping us bear one another's burdens as Christ-centered families labor to rescue orphans!

He gives and takes away

"The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." Job 1:21

Though I may not fully understand WHY this side of Heaven, the Lord is good even when he allows suffering.
He allowed us to get pregnant with our first child and took him/her away during our 10th week of pregnancy.
He allowed us to get a referral for an adorable little 6 month old boy and then find out one month later that we will not be able to adopt him.

We just found out today that his birth family has not released him to be adopted.
So we feel like we have had another miscarriage. We have lost another child. We are mourning, and still processing all of this.
You can pray that we would be able to say, like Job, "Blessed be the name of the Lord," in the midst of this trial. We will continue to pray for this little boy- that the Lord would place him in a family, even if it is relatives in Congo. We will pray for his salvation. And for the other little boy that God has for our family.

We are trying to rejoice in the Lord in all circumstances and bring him glory as we mourn, but not as those who have no hope- because our hope is not in the things of this world. It is in Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. But it is sad to think of this little boy, who we have been picturing as part of our family for the past month, and know that he is sitting in an orphanage in the Congo with no mother or father.

Cling to Christ,

Waiting

We are still waiting to find out if we will lose the referral for our little boy. Until we have our answer the Lord is not done working, so we will continue praying fervently on his behalf!!!!!

In the midst of this sad situation, the Lord has given us reason to rejoice. He is providing for our every need and for our adoption!!!!
As of June 30th (the last day to give to our Matching Grant), we received $5,590 in donations to Hand in Hand!!!
$5,000 was matched Dollar for Dollar, making for a grand total of $10,590 toward our adoption expenses!!!!!!

We are praising the Lord for every single one of you who gave! We are so humbled and encouraged by your generous giving!!

If you would like to make a tax deductible donation to our Adoption Fund, from this point on you can donate through Lifesong. To donate online, go to www.lifesongfororphans.org/bhProj.html.
To donate by mail, make your check out to "Lifesong for Orphans" and write "preference Meacham Adoption #2036" on the memo line. Then mail it to:
 Lifesong for Orphans
PO Box 40 / 202 N. Ford St.
Gridley, IL 61744

Praying for 2 orphan babies across the world! Lord, have mercy! Execute Justice for the Orphan & the widow! Place the lonely in families!

Prayer & Praise

We are currently in a state of PRAISE & urgent PRAYER!

We've been REJOICING and PRAISING the Lord for providing enough donations so that ALL $5,000 of our matching grant will be MATCHED dollar for dollar! (Making it just over $10,000!!) We have been SO encouraged and humbled by the generous giving of believers to help us bring 2 children into our family through adoption!! We are SO THANKFUL for each and every one of you who gave as you were able to our matching grant!!!!
**On a related side-note, if you are still planning on giving to our matching grant make sure you have it postmarked by June 30th!! That means you only have 3 days left to give to our Hand in Hand grant! Any donations over the $5,000 will still go toward our adoption costs as long as they are given BY June 30th. Anything sent in after that will NOT go into our adoption account, it will go to the general fund for Hand in Hand to assist other families in adopting.

So here is our urgent prayer request. We found out last night during a chat with our director that we could potentially LOSE our referral for our little boy THIS WEEK if our Attorney finds any living family members. We thought the Attorney had already completed this part of his investigation, but we heard last night that our Attorney believes the little guy may have living relatives. And if so, he may not want to move forward with trying to help him get adopted, even if he is a legitimate orphan.

Here's why: {Brace yourself, this is heartbreaking}
 The attorney knows of one situation where an adoptive family was walking down the street in the DRC and an extended family member of the child they were adopting saw them & ran after them. They went to the courts & protested the adoption & the adoptive family went home without the child. The extended family did not want to help raise or care for the orphan, they were simply jealous that the child was going to be taken to America. So the child, who was a legitimate orphan, with no mother or father to care for them, was left stuck in the orphanage without a family FOREVER.
 This seems to me to be man's sinful, selfish, coveting at its WORST. I cannot believe that ANYONE, much less a FAMILY MEMBER would prevent ANY CHILD from having a loving family that will provide for them. But this is the fallen world we live in. We're all born with a nature bent on sin. Sin abounds.

So in light of this, PLEASE JOIN US IN PRAYING for the little boy whose picture we have been staring at and praying over for nearly a month now. Please join us in pleading with the Lord on behalf of this Orphan and all orphans in the DRC and the world!! PRAY that nothing would prevent him from being adopted. We've been told that he is a legitimate orphan with no mother or father. PRAY that the Lord would graft him into our family forever and that we would be able to rescue him from a lifetime in an orphanage with no family. PRAY that we would receive good news this week from our Attorney! PRAY that we will receive the little girl's medical soon, even this week, & her official referral!

We know that our God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who created the universe is SOVEREIGN and GOOD. We believe that His word is true. So we trust that He will "work all things together for good for those who are called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28). Please join us in praying through Psalm 146 on behalf of all orphans and all who are oppressed.

"Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob,... who executes justice for the oppressed,
who gives food to the hungry.
The Lord sets prisoners free, the Lord opens the eyes of the blind.
The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down; the Lord loves the righteous.
 The Lord watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless,
but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin." Psalm 146: 5a,7-9

The Lord has seen fit to answer the first time I prayed for this child. He has given him to us once, we will PRAY without ceasing once again that He would let us adopt this child!