Our Adoption Journey Pt. 2
Filed under {!-- ra:000000001848142500000000552daf40 --}{if 'Our Adoption Journey Pt. 2' == '52home' && category_name == '52home'} Motherhood | Adoption {if:else} Motherhood | Adoption {/if}We’re still waiting for the phone call that we are going to be parents again. In the meantime, I’ll bring you up to the present in our adoption story.
For us, adoption was actually an easy decision. Once we determined that our desire for more children was from the Lord—but that it wasn’t wise for me to give birth to more children—adoption was simply the next step.
Within days of beginning to pray about adopting, several women separately came to us and told us they had been praying for us of late and wondered how they could pray more specifically. Their kindness was yet another reminder of God’s personal care for our little, but expanding, family.
We continued to seek counsel from family and close friends in our church—all of whom were very supportive and excited for us to pursue adoption. But once we had decided to adopt, there were a whole host of other decisions to be made: domestic or international, agency or private, boy or girl, infant or toddler or school age child? So we widened our circle of counselors, contacting friends near and far who had adopted or who had some connection to adoption.
Janelle first threw out the idea of adopting kids close to Jack and Tori’s age and the more we thought about it the more excited we became. Having all our kids close in age would allow us to do things together as a family instead of our attention being divided between older and younger children.
As we asked around, one particular international adoption agency kept coming up. Everyone had wonderful things to say about their love for God, heart for orphans, and commitment to integrity. We concluded this was the right agency for us.
On a getaway for our tenth anniversary we got the first of what we hope will be several more happy phone calls: we had been accepted by the agency and were beginning our adoption journey. We couldn’t have received a better anniversary gift.
When we reviewed the countries available through this adoption agency, we first thought that one Asian country in particular was the best fit, but after a few months it became clear that there were some practical hurdles for us—specifically the uncertainty of being able to adopt two older children at the same time. Our contact at the adoption agency confirmed what we had already begun to think, that we should pray about switching to Ethiopia. “Take the weekend to pray” she encouraged us.
In God’s kind providence, we had already invited dear friends over to lunch, along with their four children whom they had recently adopted from Ethiopia. When we planned the lunch, we didn’t know we would be considering a change in countries. But God knew.
Our friends’ wise counsel, and their beautiful, joyful, children only served to increase our faith and desire. And the strong support from our families provided further encouragement and confirmation. We applied for the Ethiopia program, and began the paper-chase.
So that brings us to the present. Waiting. I sit each morning in my blue chair to meet with God and I see our family picture on the wall across the room. I try to imagine two new faces there. God-willing, soon.