We are praying hard about this adoption situation. Right now we are going to continue through with the approval process and get that out of the way. After this is complete we will probably sit back and wait until the Lord leads us in the right way. It would appear that there are some "road blocks" so to speak and I had a very dear friend remind me that sometimes they are "God's red flags". She is so right! I have been feeling lately like maybe now isn't the right time to adopt. I don't know why...I just know that has been the sense I have been feeling. We would still LOVE to adopt and still have a hearts desire to do so, however, we feel that right now we need to be on our knees seeking the will of the Father. If we finish the home study approval and do what is required to maintain "Resource Family" status, when the Lord leads us to the correct child(ren) we will be prepared completely for them. It may take a month, maybe a year or more but if there is one thing that I have learned in my life, it is that ONLY when it is in God's perfect timing and plan that things work out properly. If I involve myself so much that it is MY way and not God's way - they will fall apart and be very hard to repair. So - for now...we wait and pray, and pray, and pray and pray.

Blessings,

I have been reminded and encouraged after my last post on the adoption process, that the LORD is in control! He knows exactly what is happening and why. There are 3 children in the system right now, they were available, then were placed on hold, and are now available again. These 3 children are "perfect"! When dh and I read about them we both looked at each other, had goosebumps and said "these are them"! Now, the Lord may have different plans, and if He does then I am positive He will have someone else for us, but right now these 3 appear to be the "ones". Please continue to pray that the Lord's will be done and that I may continue to have patience in this situation. Thank you so much for commenting in my last post (you know who you are!) and reminding me that the Lord is in control. And for encouraging me to continue on! May God bless you!

Trusting Jesus for everything,

I am REALLY, REALLY, REALLY having a hard time with this process! Remember how I posted a month ago that my case worker was done with our homestudy and was turning it in on the 5th of August?!?! Well, after waiting a month with no word I got in contact with the head person of DFACS where we took our IMPACT class and where our homestudy would be turned in. My case worker still hasn't turned it in!!! Come to find out she needs one more form from me - but when I called her about it she said I left a message for you and wondered why you hadn't called me back. Isn't her job supposed to entail calling me back if I don't respond or if she never got an answer??? By the way, I never received that message on my phone so either it got lost somewhere in the wires or it never happened. I am now in the process of getting the final form but that could take a week since my Dr. has 3 business days to even call me back to find out what I need. grrrrr!!!! I am ready to just throw in the towel!!! Sorry, just had to vent...I want to adopt so badly and it just seems like she isn't doing her job. I mean, no contact with me in the last month - just left us to assume that she turned it in on the 5th of August. How much longer would I have had to wait before I figured it out?!?! Oh well, the Lord knows what He is doing through it all! Resting in Him...

Okay, our caseworker finally called us back today (we have tried to call her since Saturday to find out whether she had finished the paperwork and turned it in) and told us that she hadn't looked our record in about 3 weeks and that she didn't know if there was anything else we needed to do. She hasn't gotten our fingerprints yet, doesn't know whether to turn our study into Bibb County or Houston County etc, etc. Now, while she is a wonderfully nice person, we are really upset because other than the fingerprints she should have had everything else done. We talked to her just before Father's Day and she was going to have it turned in by the 13th of June. Wow! 1 month later and still not there. I am soooo frustrated right now I could cry! But, this means we won't be approved now until the end of August at the earliest. No children in our home before October now. Well, I guess that means I just need to pray and trust the Lord even more. He knows what is going on and knows why, too. I will focus on my children, my husband, my house, school and what I have at my fingertips now and allow everything else to happen in time as it will. The Lord is good through it all!

We have a contractor coming Monday to give us an estimate on our bathroom floor. Our insurance company wasn't helpful, so we are going to do it ourselves. It will cost us less in the long run to jus tpay someone to do it rather then having the insurance take care of it. Long story, but basically we know how they get their reputation! Praise the Lord anyway...His ways are the best, even when we don't think so!

Blessings,
JAD's Mama

Be careful of nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6-7 KJV

Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD. Psalm 27:14

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. Proverbs 3:5-6

These are 3 of the verses that I have been focusing on since this past weekend. I hadn't really had too much time to dwell on the adoption process during the month of June due to so many things happening. But this past weekend it hit full force. We are still in the waiting process and I am struggling to remain calm about the results. We are so close to the final approval that I feel I can't breathe when I think about it. I get so excited about the prospect of actually being able to meet the children that we would like to adopt that I have a hard time thinking about anything else. So, I need to stop and repeat these verses and trust the Lord and take care of what HE has already blessed me with in the meantime. It is ALL IN HIS HANDS!!!

 

Another week is upon us and this Tuesday will be our 4th IMPACT class. We will only have 3 more after this one. Yea!!! Each week that passes brings us closer to the finale and being able to bring more children into our home and our lives. We have 2 sibling groups & 2 individual boys from our State that we are currently waiting to get information on. The sibling groups each have 3 children (1 girl & 2 boys in each). Their ages differ though (10, 8, 4 & 9, 5, 4) and they each have some difficulties that we are praying over whether we could take them on or not. The 2 individual boys are 7 & 1...one has severe autism and the other is 'medically fragile' (we don't know why just yet). We are carefully & prayerfully considering each of these options and waiting to see what the Lord will work out. We are willing to accept whichever child or children He wants to place in our home regardless of what medical / developmental difficulties may come with it. We can't do anything at the moment except carry on with our classes and home study, and once it is approved (mid July at the latest) then we can take the next step. Patience has never been one of my strong virtues and this is really becoming a challenge for me...to sit and just wait and to have complete trust in the Lord that His will be done. I mentioned in a previous post that we have subsribed to the Family Times Virtue Packs (www.familytimes.org) so every month we have a new virtue to learn with our children. Well, May's virtue was PATIENCE....Waiting until later for what you want now. "Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord." Psalm 27:14 NIV ... WOW! I needed this one to get me through this month!! The Lord is awesome!!! Don't know just how much I will be getting on here this week as I plan on spending more time with my dc...we will be finished with school on Wednesday...another yea and Praise the Lord!!! Have a blessed week!!!

Well, it is official!!! The 4 siblings we wanted are being held for another family. We called the adoption supervisor who was working with us this morning due to the suggestion from one of our instructors for our class. So now we know we can start to look for another/other child(ren). I truly hope and pray that the family takes good care of these 4 precious babies. We are getting information on a sibling group of 3 who have been in the system for 4 years. The oldest is deaf and they want to adopt them out together. They are 10, 8 & 4 and we would love to have them. We have no problems with learning sign language and with the deafness, the caseworker will probably allow us to homeschool the children while we wait for the adoption to finalize. The possibility is great because we are too far from the School for the Deaf and she won't be able to attend regular school. So, that is where we are. Praise the Lord for His great love!

I am in complete amazement at what the Lord can do! Our county’s adoption supervisor and the adoption supervisor in the county next to us graciously allowed us to take the IMPACT training in the neighboring county. When we did the Orientation last night (another gracious move on the part of our local DFCS…they gave us a one-on-one orientation, Q&A session) they told us that the fact that we got into an IMPACT class as quickly as we did was definitely rare and basically said that there very well may be a “higher power” behind all of this. (now, we know that the "higher power" is definitely the Lord, but I guess government employees aren't actually supposed to admit that out loud) We had already told them that we were leaving it up to the Lord and if these 4 siblings weren’t for us, then He probably had another family out there that could provide for them what we can’t and that we believed God has a child or children already picked out for us…we just need to wait on Him. They wanted to know why we wanted these children, because,(their words not ours) it was very rare for anyone, especially people with any children already, to want to adopt 4 siblings that are bi-racial and who are going to have some emotional and behavioral problems due to their trauma. All we could tell them was the truth…that the Lord laid those children on our hearts and that led to us actually taking the step forward to get through the process. We told them that we believed that whatever was the Lord’s will would happen and we know that He will not steer us wrong. We also told them that to us, race doesn't matter...it isn't what we are on the outside but rather what we are on the inside that counts. That is exactly what we are trying to instill in our children, also. The Lord has His hand on this and I don’t know where He is going with it but I do know that we will be following with a great excitement to see what the end results will be. Whatever they may be, we will be thankful for His guidance and provision! God is SO good!

 

PRAISE THE LORD!!! We have been given the okay to take the IMPACT class in a different county! It starts tonight and end the last Tuesday in May! Isn't the Lord AWESOME!!!!! I totally believe that His hand is on us and this situation and it is ONLY through Him that this is taking place the way it is! Thank you Jesus!!!

The Lord is REALLY trying to teach me patience!!! I got a phone call a few minutes ago from our case worker. She told me that we had received the wrong information last week and that the orientation class was to be held next Tuesday night instead of tonight. hhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmm. Well, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Never rely on what you think you know." Proverbs 3:5 Good News Bible Yes, HE is teaching me patience.
Praising Jesus!