But the Lord determines his steps. Proverbs 16:9
I've been wanting to put into writing our adoption journey thus far, but just haven't taken the time to do it. We recently applied for a grant, which required us write it out and what a blessing it was to look back! It's a little lengthy, but I wanted to have a record, for our family, of how the Lord has led us so far.
Our Adoption Story began many years ago as a young family. At the time, Travis and I had only two little ones - Caleb (2) and Mason (1). God began to stir my heart after a gal from church returned from a mission trip, and shared some of her experiences in orphanages she visited. When we got home that evening, I shared with Travis what I was thinking. “I’ve always thought we would adopt!” was his reply. This is typically how we roll - he usually has the great ideas first and it always takes me a little longer to catch up. :-) Having just gone through a miscarriage, I committed to praying about the possibility, as I wanted to make sure I wasn’t just responding emotionally.
The years passed, and our family rapidly grew. We both still had a desire to adopt, and we prayed that God would lead us if it was His desire. Each time we welcomed a new little one to our family, I wondered if God would have adoption for us one day, or if he was closing that door.
After our sixth child was born I experienced some complications and we decided it would be too risky to try and have more children biologically. Quite honestly, that was a hard thing for me to accept. My plate was full, and I was so thankful for the blessings we had been given, and yet I grieved at the thought of never again experiencing the miracle of pregnancy and a new baby. As I wrestled with God over it, I wasn’t ready to think through adoption, but through a series of events God began to stir my heart once again.....
Each summer Travis and I are able to attend our State’s Homeschool Conference in Denver, which has been a pivotal event for us in developing and refining our vision for our family. During the summer of 2011, one of the speakers was R.C. Sproul Jr, an adoptive Father who spoke on adoption. The Lord began to stir Travis’ heart, but I was still busy sorting through my grief about childbearing with the Lord.
Several weeks later, one of Travis’ co-workers lost her 11 month old baby in a tragic crib accident at daycare. It was the second daughter they had lost, the first had died at a week old of a rare blood disorder. To our knowledge, neither of the parents knew the Lord and the funeral was one of the saddest events I have ever experienced. It brought me to a crossroad in my relationship with God. The following days I cried many tears as I tried to make sense out of such tragedy. I didn’t know how someone without the Lord could possibly survive such heartache.
During this time I picked up Mary Beth Chapman’s book at the library. I had previously avoided reading it, as I thought I couldn’t handle it, but now I was desperate! I wanted to know how she had processed the loss of their daughter.
As it turned out, about two thirds of her book detailed their adoption experience and I was hooked. God used her life, and began to turn my heart, once again, towards the ministry of adoption.
As we began to pray and research what this might look like for our family, we laid out all of our options before the Lord and asked him to direct us. Domestic or International? Open or Closed? What agency should be use? Due to our family size and income, it appeared that we were not eligible for most international countries. The countries that we were eligible for required several trips, which did not seem feasible for our family.
It appeared that domestic was our only option, and we were peaceful with that. We have always taken a strong pro-life stand, and helped to support our local pregnancy resource center, so we began to pray that God would use our family to prevent an abortion from happening, even if we never knew. We decided on our tenth wedding anniversary that we were going to step out in faith, trusting that God did indeed have adoption for our family!
We found a wonderful Christian agency in Florida, and a fantastic agency in Colorado to do our homestudy. Our values and parenting styles lined up well with each one, and we were thrilled to be working with both. At Colorado Adoption Center, we met with the director who explained that they did no advertising and didn’t even have a website; they relied solely on word of mouth and prayer. (We couldn’t even find a phone number for them, we had learned of them from our Florida agency!) Julie (the director) then proceeded to share story after story of how God had brought them babies and wonderful Christian families. I felt like we had just met a modern day George Mueller! After our first homestudy visit was complete, Travis turned to me and said “I feel like we just had a great visit with an old friend.” That’s a gifted social worker!
We began our process in the summer and were done with things by Christmas. While it was fun to wonder if we might one day get a little girl that looked like us, we also weren't completely peaceful (or confident) that God was going to have that. As we began to pray about opening ourselves to other options (but still thinking domestically), God began to do the unexpected. He began to stir our hearts towards China, specifically children with special needs who might be deemed “unlovely” in the world’s eyes.
As a little girl I can remember seeing pictures in Redbook magazine of families who had adopted many children, all with special needs. At the time, I can remember thinking “why would anyone want to do that?”. It was a perspective that only God could change!
I only had one friend who had adopted from China, but the last time I had seen her had been almost 15 years ago at a fundraiser for her adoption. I wished I could ask her some questions, but I had since moved to another city and we had lost touch shortly after that. I would have loved to have found her again, but had no idea where she was.
Our reasons for wanting to adopt were simple - we loved the idea of adding another girl to our family, but more importantly we felt strongly that adoption was at the heart of the gospel. We wanted to adopt because amidst our “unloveliness”, our selfishness, and our sin, we had been chosen! We had been redeemed, given a new life, a new identity, and a new glorious, perfect father! How could we not want to offer an orphan this opportunity, to become a child of God, who the world would most likely overlook?!?
To be honest, I was a little resistant at first towards the idea of special needs - like most parents we were praying for a “healthy” daughter. And yet, once again, God turned my heart. As God was drawing our hearts towards China, He began to show us the medical needs of many of the waiting children. We learned that in China, medical services must be payed for before a procedure can be done. Often, mothers who do not have the resources to have treatment done, will abandon their child out of sheer necessity - it may be their only hope for their child to survive. I cannot fathom the grief that would come from making such a selfless decision. How different from the United States. And how different from our family’s situation.
Travis works at a hospital. We have benefits that would make most people green with envy. The bill for my last c-section was $25,000. We paid $125. $15 for 10 months of pre-natal care. We have excellent medical care in Greeley, and Denver Children’s Hospital is 45 minutes from our front door. People travel from other states to bring their children there. We have always desired to be good stewards of the resources God has given us, but we had never before thought about how we could be good stewards of our medical benefits.
God was clearly doing something in our hearts, and yet we had several major obstacles. The agencies we were working with weren’t Hague accredited (necessary for China). We didn’t have $30,000, and the biggest one of all - we didn’t qualify. Not only did we have too many children for China’s requirements (they want no more than 4 in the home), we didn’t even come close to their income requirement - $90,000 for a family our size. We began to pray that God would some how open that door - maybe for a future adoption down the road.
Meanwhile, as we waited for a birthmother to pick us, we began to pray for some specific children in a Foster Home in China. We held a “Family Birthday Party” for all six kids and invited over 100 people. Instead of gifts, we asked them to bring supplies for an orphanage in China and we had a great time packing them up and shipping them! We began getting emails about precious little children who needed families. Occasionally I would call, but the answer was always the same - “we’re sorry, but you don’t qualify”. At the same time, our hearts were being drawn more and more to the children of China needing families.
Eventually, we were led to CCAI in Denver. I spoke with a wonderful lady named Hillary, who explained that China will make exceptions on family size if the family is willing to adopt a special needs child. Exactly what we desired! She also thought we might qualify financially. Because we rent out our home in town, (and we rent a farm where we live) we can count all of the rental income as “income”. We don’t see it that way, because we just use the money to pay the mortgage company, but China sees it differently. Hmmmmm. Additionally, she said we could include some things that Travis is compensated for at work, such as mileage, benefits, paid time off, etc. I wanted to jump through the phone and hug her! Our only hesitation was that we would have to switch agencies, losing several thousand dollars in the process. Was that being good stewards? We decided to pray and wait for God to give clarity before making any hasty decisions.
We were nearing our eleventh wedding anniversary, and made plans to go stay at a Bed and Breakfast in Fort Collins and go to dinner at our favorite Asian restaurant. The morning beforehand, I prayed that God would give us a clear sign in regards to if we should pursue China or not. While we were at dinner, the subject of our adoption came up. Travis shared that he felt a peace and confidence that the Lord was leading us to switch agencies, and pursue a daughter from China. I was thrilled! I shared my prayer with him, and told him that if he was confident and peaceful, I could be confident and peaceful too!
After dinner we headed to Old Town to walk around. As a worship leader and music lover, Travis wanted to stop and listen to a band that was playing. While we listened to the first song, I thought the lead singer looked a lot like my friend Jill’s husband. In my head I could hear Travis teasing me - “You always think you see people that you know!”. As the song was concluding, I looked to my right, and there was Jill; my friend I hadn’t seen in 15 years, and her daughter whom I had never met! “Jill!” I yelled! I threw my arms around her, “You’re my sign! I prayed for a sign!” Having no idea what I was talking about and not having seen me for 15 years, I’m sure she thought I was a bit crazy. However, I felt like God had clearly brought us together as a confirmation.
After working with both of our agencies to be released with their blessing, we began to pursue our China adoption last fall. The past year and a half has been an absolutely exhilarating journey; neither Travis nor I can think of any other time in our lives when God has provided and directed us so clearly. We have experienced Jesus in a whole new way - I feel like I’ve been having a personal revival. We’ve had encounter after encounter with the Lord, which always deepens our intimacy with Him.
Some of the other encouraging blessings have been that God has been growing us as parents and changing us (for the better I think! :-)), and we have come to understand our own adoption as God’s children in a fresh new way. It has even given us a new fire for the Great Commission, as we’ve realized that international adoption has a distinct aspect of fulfilling the Great Commission. It’s given us an excitement about how God might want to use our children and family in the future to reach other nations.
More recently, Travis brought up the idea of bringing home both a little boy and a little girl from China. I had been thinking the same thing, but on two separate trips. ;-) In usual fashion, I was initially quite resistant to the idea of doing it all at once. However, God has once again changed my heart of stone ;-), and given me a true excitement about bringing home two this time. We are now eagerly awaiting “the call” to say we’ve been matched, and even more eagerly looking forward to seeing how God leads us through the rest of this journey.
