Before reading this please know that God calls people to adoption in many different ways. This is how He called our family. We are not adopting because of infertility or because we haven't yet had a second child biologically. Yes, we have struggled through infertility, but that is not why we are adopting. We are adopting because God loves adoption. We are adopting because we prayed for His desires to be our desires. We are adopting because through God, we can help make one less orphan in our world. We are adopting because we can't wait to love on our new "little one!" It is simple, God led us to GO NOW and adopt! Our hearts have always known adoption would one day be a part of our family, but God chose for us to go now. This is simply how His perfect timing came to be.
We are sharing it because we want God to be glorified.
Our testimony:
Psalm 68:5-6
Father to the fatherless, defender of widows-
this is God, whose dwelling is holy.
God places the lonely in families
this is God, whose dwelling is holy.
God places the lonely in families
. Well, we are excited to announce that God has led us to grow our family through adoption! We have just started this adoption journey and are at the very beginning of the process. We are with a wonderful Christian agency Lifeline Children's Services and are so blessed to be working with them. We know we will be pursuing an international adoption, however we are still praying about what country God is leading us to. Heather and I have always had a heart for adoption and have known since before Ethan was born that adoption was going to be part of our family. I remember sitting at the dinner table one night with Heather and Ethan and comenting on how God has blessed our family so much. Not only do we an abundant amount of love in our family, but we have and know the perfect love of Christ. We started talking about adoption and how we have been adopted by God and are now His children. We just knew that we wanted to share the love in our family and the the love of Christ with a child who may never experience that.
Like I said we have always had a desire for adoption, but we had "our own plan" as to when we would pursue an adoption. After we had Ethan we knew we wanted to evetually grow our family. "Our plan" was that we would have a second pregnancy and then years down the road, when we had saved more financially we would pursue an adoption. Well, God had a better paln for us and we are so thankful!
What I would like for you to get from our testimony is not that we struggled through some trials (everyone goes through trials at some point), but that God's grace was and is sufficient for us. It is His grace and His soverignty that has brought us to this awesome blessing of adopiton! Anyways, like Wes said, for a long ttime we knew adoption was going to be part of our family. However God's plan and our plan looked a little different. About a year and a half ago God placed the desire on our hearts to grow our family. About 3 months later we found out we were pregnant and ofcourse we were SO excited. Sadly, howerver shortly after we found out we were pregnant, we lost the oregnancy and had an early misscarriage. 3 months after that in Oct of last year we found out we were again pregnant. We were so excited, and rejoiced. However, once again we had another early miscarriage. That was probably the hardest time Wes and I had ever experienced in our married lives togetrher. To have the excitement, joy and promise of a new life and then it so quickly taken away is hard. We struggled. A lot. However, it was during those moments of pain and the months that followed, God was so graicous and faithful to us. We prayed and asked God to fill our hearts with joy. Even though we were aching, to please fill our hearts with joy. Joy in the many blessing He has already given us, joy in the goodness of God, and joy in Christ our Savior. He was faithful. He allowed us to be joyful in our sturggles. Not that it wasn't ever hard. Not that it wasn't ever painful. But we were able to see the joy in the satifaction of Christ and His goodness.
What I would like for you to get from our testimony is not that we struggled through some trials (everyone goes through trials at some point), but that God's grace was and is sufficient for us. It is His grace and His soverignty that has brought us to this awesome blessing of adopiton! Anyways, like Wes said, for a long ttime we knew adoption was going to be part of our family. However God's plan and our plan looked a little different. About a year and a half ago God placed the desire on our hearts to grow our family. About 3 months later we found out we were pregnant and ofcourse we were SO excited. Sadly, howerver shortly after we found out we were pregnant, we lost the oregnancy and had an early misscarriage. 3 months after that in Oct of last year we found out we were again pregnant. We were so excited, and rejoiced. However, once again we had another early miscarriage. That was probably the hardest time Wes and I had ever experienced in our married lives togetrher. To have the excitement, joy and promise of a new life and then it so quickly taken away is hard. We struggled. A lot. However, it was during those moments of pain and the months that followed, God was so graicous and faithful to us. We prayed and asked God to fill our hearts with joy. Even though we were aching, to please fill our hearts with joy. Joy in the many blessing He has already given us, joy in the goodness of God, and joy in Christ our Savior. He was faithful. He allowed us to be joyful in our sturggles. Not that it wasn't ever hard. Not that it wasn't ever painful. But we were able to see the joy in the satifaction of Christ and His goodness.
A couple of months ago in Sept we knew God was saying to go now! Stop tip toeing around, and just go. Trust Me and start this adoption journey. Well, as excited about this as we were, there was just something holding me back. And that was just heartache for the two miscarriages we had experienced and the aching and longing for a second healthy pregnancy. Well, I prayed and said God, if you want us to go now. To adopt now, we are ready. I prayed and said God, I can't heal my heart. I can't do it. I need help. Well, about two weeks later Wes and I "just happened" to experience another trial. Those two weeks that I went throught that trail were very hard. However, it was during those two weeks that all of a sudden what I once saw as important no longer was so very important. All I wanted was to come out of that trial I was experiencing, and get on the other side, so we could begin our adoption. He is faithful. He graciously answered my prayer. He used that trial I experienced for His good plan and for our good! God faithfully and graciously answered my prayer. John 13:7 says, "You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand."
So that kind of brings us to today. The very beginnign of our adoption journey! We are beyond excited to see the Lord working in our lives. We are beyond excitement to see who the child is that God has already chosen to be a prat of our family! We are thankful that God told us to go and adopt now. We are thankful He chose us for this adoption journey! We are thankful He gave us hearts to obey and follow Him!
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