Prayer Requests

I've been meaning to post this for two weeks. Seriously, it is on my actual written down "to-do" list. I was reminded again this morning so now I'm buckling down.

I believe that God goes before us. I believe that prayer is powerful. If you were to ask what the number one thing we need is it would easily be prayer.

And a toothbrush for Sam. (That's just my own little fixation lately. I should just go buy one.)

People have asked what they can pray for specifically so here goes:

- Pray for the judge in our case. Pray that the Lord would soften her heart towards us, that she would understand in her spirit the things we can't put on paper and be mindful of our little Sam when making her decision.

- Pray for Sam. Pray that God protects his small heart and gives him happy days waiting for us. Pray that he would understand what is going on and adjust easily to the major changes coming his way.

- Pray for Us. Pray that God would prepare us to be good parents and shining lights. Pray that we deal well with the stresses coming in the next two weeks. Pray that we love each other well and have patience with one another. Pray that God gives us the right words to speak while we're in court. Pray that we get rest while traveling, and for easy travel. Pray that we stay mindful of the bigger picture while dealing with the minutiae that this adoption entails. Pray that we seek God in times of trial and weariness.

-Please pray for Tim, he has had a lot of work related stress with a couple of difficult situations.

We are so blessed in this adoption. Blessed beyond even our comprehension. God has already shown up in such big ways that it feels selfish to ask for more. But we do.

I've read so many prayers in the bible lately that begin "God of the angel armies" and that's how I've been beginning mine. God is prepared to do battle for us if need be. And God always wins.



Thank you all for praying. We appreciate it more than you will ever know.

Prayer

We are home, which is good. I missed my bed and my shower and my cats.

But home is missing the most important thing, Sam.

And we have come home under a black cloud. For those of you who haven't heard, the entire Russian adoption world is in an uproar because of one stupid woman. You can read the whole story here

Because of this one stupid woman Russia may freeze adoptions altogether. Worse still for us, she's from middle TN. I have to be optimistic and believe that God can work it out and everything will be fine. Prayer can move mountains and change hearts. I won't go into detail about how I feel about this woman but I hope the authorities will do everything they can to ensure that this doesn't happen again and so that Russia knows that we are serious about protecting their children that come here.

Other than that we are trying to get over jet lag and do the piles of laundry. We've already been to costco to get photos printed as well as the grocery store and target. We have community group tonight and then it's back to work tomorrow. I'm going to start working on our paperwork for dossier 2 so that we can get it in the mail.

Please pray as often as you think of it for the following things:
Pray that Russia keeps adoptions open.
Pray that our FBI fingerprints would get completed very quickly, we can't send our paperwork in until we get them back.
Pray for Sam. Pray that he knows we are coming back as soon as we can.
Pray for us that we endure the wait well and don't worry but put our faith in God.

Things we have done this week:

• Printed out 2250 pages on our printer.
• Printed out 500 return envelopes
• Printed out 500 regular envelopes
• Spent what feels like a million dollars on stamps, ink, paper, pens, etc.
• Perforated the bottoms of 750 pages so that they would easily be tear off.
• Cleaned the house (at least the bottom portion of it)
• Met with Bethany
• Cried about S (okay, that was just me and just a little bit.)

That doesn't look like on paper how much it feels like. I'll talk about Bethany and then tell you what all the printing is about.

Tim and I went to Bethany on Monday to meet with our social worker and have a conference call with the woman in charge of their Russian program. Basically we got no real news. They are still working on it. Little S does have a sister but someone may be trying to adopt her separately. It's funny that they won't let people outside of Russia split up siblings, but they will let Russians do it. We know that if God wants us to get E we will. So we made a decision to get moving on our homestudy and when all the paperwork is complete we'll revisit the decision about St. Petersburg. We can always submit our dossier to Russia for a referral and if S becomes available in that time we can switch it. It was a good meeting though because our social worker, Lisa, seems really in our corner and like she wants to do whatever she can to help us get S. That was good to hear. Although it does seem like if we have to wait for a referral we might not have to wait too long because we would want a boy.

As for all the printing. Tonight is the big night of our Both Hands letter stuffing party. I'm trying not to be worried. Tim of course is not worried. His faith in this kind of stuff is bigger than mine. I just feel like we've put so much into this both time wise and financially that if it doesn't work we will have taken two steps backwards. I know that God is bigger than this, it's just the believing it part.

If you're coming tonight I will tell you that my mom is making cheesecake brownies and apple cake and we're getting two huge stuffed papa murphy's pizzas as well as a couple of regular ones, so you won't leave hungry.

Pray for S today. I don't know why. Just pray for him. Maybe it's a newly sprouting mom's intuition but I just feel like he needs it.

Let the paperchase begin!

As of yesterday, Tim and I have officially applied to be adoptive parents! The formal application, as well as a bunch of other paperwork, and a rather large check were put in the mail yesterday and will hopefully be at Bethany on Monday. It feels official now. It feels like I can say "Tim and I are adopting a child" now and not just that we're thinking about it.

We're still trying to get more info on S. Pastor Marty said it would be a good idea to get a better picture of his background and we agreed. Hopefully there won't be anything there we aren't prepared to handle. I'm still a little unsure of what we could handle. I ask myself a hundred questions a day. Would we be able to care for a child who were deaf? What about a child that didn't talk? What about a child with slight medical needs? This needs to be prayed about more I guess. God will bring us the right child at the right time and if that child is S than that's wonderful.

I do feel like even if S isn't meant for us this isn't all for naught. In the past few weeks I've become S's prayer warrior. I pray for him constantly. Pray that he's laughing, or that he's warm, or that he's not hungry. Pray that he can sense God's love and our love even in the orphanage. I pray that someone would make him a paper airplane like I do for Kal, the four-year-old that visits my Sunday school class. I pray that he's not sad and that he can come home with us soon. I pray about new spiderman sneakers. I pray that he can wait, and we can wait. I pray for joy in the waiting.

It does sort of feel like people are trying to get us to adopt a baby or a younger child, but Tim and I both feel like God is calling us in a different direction. A four or five year-old is much less likely to get adopted than a baby and I feel like this is the right direction. We know that it will be harder but both of us love a good challenge. God is preparing our child just like he's preparing us. I know it.