Forever by Grace: January 2013

Many things have happened since I posted last! We are certainly staying busy with church and trying to prepare for our son to come home! The last couple months have been a whirlwind of excitement, joy, stress, and tears. Let me fill you in quickly on what our life has looked like in the last few months. We officially filed paperwork to make our son a permanent Weldon, began our 30 day adoption judgement time period, we raised our age range for our second child referral from under 1 to under 3 years, we have prayed and grieved with my family over the sudden loss of my cousin, both of us have gotten over a couple sicknesses, both of our cars have been broken into, my car was stolen and then found, we have been rear ended twice (no damage was done), we traveled to Michigan for Christmas, and we had some very dear friends visit us from TN. Let me tell you that the Lord has sustained us through some of the most difficult times of our lives. God has been so kind to us and our faith has grown since we moved to KY. Our new church has been slowly growing and we have been seeing people come to know Jesus. People are worshipping Jesus and joining our fellowship. God is working and we will continue to follow the Lord’s Will! We know that we are doing something right because the devil’s fiery darts are coming at us from all directions. I know what some of you are thinking. “Why are you guys there? Wouldn’t it be better to be in a suburb somewhere? You guys should move to the other end of town.” I have thought the same things but my heart is redirected each time I pray. The Lord wants to use us to be His hands and feet in this community. He wants us to love the unlovable. Encourage the weary. Feed the hungry. Minister to the broken and hurting. That is why we are here! Sometimes following Christ doesn’t make sense but in the end it’s the best for His glory.

Recently, I had a friend that traveled to the DRC to get her daughter and she graciously brought E a package from us. She traveled to the orphanage and got some of the sweetest pictures of our dear little boy! I wish I could post a photo of him! For his safety we are unfortunately unable to post his picture! But let me tell you, He is BEAUTIFUL! His smile is big and his eyes are joyful. I cannot wait till I get to witness his goofy little personality first hand. E loves to make silly faces at the camera. There were many photos with his tongue sticking out! We received a group photo of the children at the orphanage and our son was in the front. We cracked up at what he was doing! He was holding his giant shorts up, his shirt was on backwards, and he had the biggest smile on his face. You just gotta love little boys! It melted my heart! We were also able to see photos of when E opened his care package from us. He held up our photo album to the camera with a huge smile on his sweet face. You can see the care package in my previous blog post! I have prayed that he would feel SO deeply loved by us and his Heavenly Father. Right now we are waiting for our 30 day adoption judgement to pass. Once we pass this 30 days then we will be able to file for final court dates in the DRC and we can make travel plans. Being united with our son is just around the corner!! I cannot express the joy I have dreaming about hugging him for the first time! Continue to pray for our second referral. We have opened our age range to be 3 and under. Seeing the group photos of the children at the orphanage opened my heart to accepting another older child. It grieved my heart to say we would only be willing to accept a child under age 1 when there were so many older children. We will see what God does. I have surrendered my heart to the Lord. I know that God has selected the children I am supposed to mother.