It's been over 3 weeks since I have updated. I keep meaning to and then get sidetracked...
As you read in my last post, we got 5 pictures of our beautiful girl on August 14!! We all love looking at them over and over again!! We still have prayer cards. If you would like one please let me know. We are so thankful for your prayers!!
On August 15 we got our i800a approval letter!! That was just 6 days after our fingerprinting appointment! So we are now allowed to bring an orphan into the United States.
We are waiting on her original medical and child study documents to get to us from the orphanage by snail mail. It's been almost 4 weeks. Praying they get here soon!
After that, the next step will be the i800 which looks at our daughter specifically. An i800 approval means we can bring a specific orphan (our daughter) into the United States. But there will still be 2 more things (Article 5 and No Objection Certificate) that will have to be approved before our case finally goes to court in India. We do not travel for court. Once our case passes court the orphanage will apply for her passport and soon after we will travel to India to get her. Still a lot of waiting to do.
But here is an amazing God story for you...
On August 18th I spent most of my day filling out an application for Lifesong for Orphans (more on that in another post). We had to send an adoption testimony in with the application. I went to my very first blog post to just copy and paste our story. As I was reading back over our story that night God just hit me with this part, "But in early 2014 Britt bumped into an acquaintance from Grace Point Community Church in a hospital waiting room. She told him about Crisis Rescue International that she had just been on a mission trip with...God really began to put India on our hearts."
After some research in things like old Facebook posts and Britt's hospital mileage log we figured out that the not-so chance encounter with the acquaintance in a hospital waiting room was on April 11, 2014. Y'all...our daughter was born in India on April 12, 2014! So around the time our baby girl was born in India, God was putting India on our hearts! This baby has been ours since before she was born! How amazing is our God!?!! I read this quote on Facebook recently, "Before I laid the foundations of the earth, I thought of you and of the days you would live on earth. I planned out the people and the places I would give you." We are SO beyond ready to get our baby girl home with us and I can't wait to share with her just how God has woven her adoption story together!! It just blows our minds!!
This past Monday God put another beautiful rainbow in my path! This is number 7 :)
Caught this picture on Thursday of our boys! I can't wait for baby sister to be added to the bunch! These brothers are just as excited and anxious as Britt and I are to get her home!
I like to end my blogs with the things that God is teaching me because I hope He can use it to teach you in whatever situation you are going through...
- "Adoption is costly. It's full of unknowns, scary diagnosis, and loneliness. It's full of paperwork, stress, and delays. Adoption is also full of Jesus. It's full of hope, grace, and promise. It's full of freedom, strength, and love. It's full of redemption. He adopted you and I."
- "It's never easy or pleasant to simply wait, but it is the key to seeing God move on your behalf. Trust, delight, commit, be still, and wait. Your fretting will disappear, and God will bring the victory."
- The enemy will try to limit your praying because he knows your praying will limit him.
- "But there is a WHO beyond the why, and I can tell you He's good, wise, loving, and He withholds no good thing from those who walk in His ways (Ps. 84:11). This is the God I love, trust, and seek to obey."
- Hope is more than wishing things will work out. It is resting in the God who holds all things in His wise and powerful hands. - Paul David Tripp
One last thing...We celebrated Matthew's 3rd birthday last weekend! That boy is still talking about his Minion cake!!
Please continue to pray that we will have baby sister home with us on her 3rd birthday! She is 7 1/2 months younger than Matthew. We may have partners in crime on our hands! ;)
