Blessings

Hello, friends!

I had another post in the works, but I really felt inspired to share with you a little bit of what God has been doing around here. First, I have to tell you about the MANY people that we have discovered through this adoption process who are also inspired to adopt. When we were first thinking about adoption we really had a fear that adopting a child into a military family might not be the best thing for the child. Boy were we wrong!

At the time we really only knew one family who had adopted. While they are the most humble and Godly family, I'm going to brag on them a little bit because they have been such an inspiration to us. I met the mom of this family in my MOPS group in Missouri. I was immediately drawn to her sparkling eyes and sweet smile, but more intriguing to me was the fact that she had two two-year olds. What's so special about that? Well, one was blond haired and looked JUST like her mama's clone, while the other has the most beautiful chocolate skin and curly black hair and they were obviously not both her children. After striking up a conversation with this amazing woman I found out that she has five sweet children, two biological, two from China and one from Haiti. Oh, and her husband was in Korea for a year. WOW! God used this family to help us overcome our biggest fear! These children (two of them have major medical issues) were not hurt by being in a military family, instead the whole family was blessed because of their choice to adopt. What a story!

When we moved here to Washington we chose a church pretty quickly. We didn't choose the church because of this, but we soon found out that the pastor and his sweet wife had three beautiful children from Korea. At this point we're thinking... Okay, God, we get it... We had the privilege of watching this family bring home a fourth child who has "designer genes." Sweet Ella Grace, who couldn't walk when she came home, has made amazing progress and has been such a source of joy to everyone who meets her. What an inspiration this family has been to us through the whole process. Their support has been more than we could have ever asked for, and just being able to witness their family grow has been a miracle to us.

Friends, if that were all this wouldn't be a God story! Everywhere we have turned lately it seems that someone else is adopting. When we were still on the fence about adopting I mentioned something about it to a dear friend of mine who was travelling to Ethiopia on a mission trip. She then told me that she was hoping to find a little girl there to adopt. Her sweet daughter is now home with her! When we finally told our neighbors about the adoption (we were a few months into the process at this point) they told us that they had always wanted to adopt and now they are also in the process of adopting out of foster care! A new neighbor friend that just moved in was adopting when she found out she was pregnant. Now she is thinking of becoming a foster parent. Every time I tell someone that we are adopting we find out that they have always thought about it or want more information. God is doing something BIG and I feel so incredibly blessed to be a part of it!

I know that not everyone is called to adopt, so please don't misunderstand me. What I do want to get across is that our God is RELENTLESS when he is pursuing us. Ben and I came up with every possible excuse about why we shouldn't and couldn't adopt but God was not going to just let us go. He has continually pursued us and shown us that we can do this, and that we just need to rely on him. So, my question for you is what is God after you about? What has he been chasing you down with? Maybe it's something life altering or maybe it's just something small like mending a broken relationship. Whatever it is, I pray that you will give in to God and watch him pour his blessings out over you. God is good!!!

Love you, friends!

B, E & H