School's In; School's Out

It's been an exciting week at our house.  We have started homeschooling, and it is going well so far!  I think it's going to be a bit of an adjustment for all three of us, having to be disciplined to do school work at the kitchen table or on the couch, where we're used to doing fun things!  But we'll get in a groove soon, I'm sure.  We started on Monday the 13th, which is early, but I need to ensure that we are ahead of schedule.  When Jim and I go to China, we'll be gone about two weeks, and when we return with our sweet girl, we'll need to have time to acclimate to our new life, and won't want to rush back into tight schedules.  So, we got a head start!

On another note, Jim has finished his Executive MBA program at the University of Denver.  His graduation was last Friday.  He looks much happier than the boys, don't you think?  

We are having our first home study visit tomorrow evening.  Very excited to get this part of the adoption process going!  We will have three visits over the next two weeks.  We're also continuing to get documents in order and notarized.  Jim's birth certificate from Pennsylvania seems to be taking the long route, but I'm sure it will get here eventually.  Finger printing and background checks done last week . . . we're on our way!

* A couple notes about this blog:  I have fixed the comments option.  Everyone should be able to comment now!  Also, if you would like to get blog updates via email, put your email addy in the box at the right.  

She Has a Name!

Hi all,

Thanks for following along on our journey.  We are so grateful for the encouraging comments and prayers, and most of all for friends who believe with us that God can do awesome things!

We've finally decided on a name for our sweet little girl.  She will be Caylie Jiu Chang.  Jiu Chang is her Chinese name, and we will leave it as her middle name.  She may want to use it in the future; we will leave that up to her.  (Jiu is pronounced "geo", but run the e and the o together quickly.  Chang has an "ah" sound, instead of a.)  I am a little leary of posting her current surname in a public place, so I think I will wait awhile on that.  But it is the name given to all of the children in her orphanage; and is the first part of the city name in which she lives.  I think that is so sad, not to have an actual family name.  We can't wait to give her a forever family with us!

We have scheduled the dates of our home study visits and continue to gather documents for our dossier.  We are excited to see things coming together!  Please continue to pray that this process would go smoothly and that papers and documents would be taken care of in a timely manner.  Please pray with us, as well, that God would supply the finances for each step of this journey.  We know that He is faithful in what He has called us to!

On Saturday the boys and I went to our adoption agency's annual picnic.  It was fun to see so many families with their children who had been adopted from China and Korea.  I kept thinking of NEXT summer when we will have our Caylie with us, as well!  Saturday was the also the day of Jim's very last EMBA class.  He will be graduating this week.  We are proud of him!

We GET to Trust God Even More!

Hello friends,

Thank you so much for your kind and encouraging words regarding our adoption.  We are so excited to see what God is doing and what He will do.  Please continue to pray for adoption reform in Vietnam and for our current proceedings to go smoothly and without delay.

Most of you know that I have been a teacher at our church's Christian school for the past few years.  Our youngest boys have been students there.  MCS has been a huge part of our lives, especially since it is a ministry of our church home.  This summer enrollment was way down.  Way, way down, compared to previous years.  We prayed and talked it up and advertised as best we could.  But in the end, there was no change in the situation and it was decided that MCS would be closed.

Since that day, many have expressed concerns for us, in terms of my job, my boys' education, and the financial requirements of our adoption.  We so appreciate your prayers through this time of change for all of us, including the other school staff and families.  I am going to home school the boys this year, and then see what next year brings.  We know that God is faithful and will meet every need, and that what He calls us to He will enable us to do.

The very day that we said YES to God and committed to our little girl in China was the very day we were told I would not have a job.  I don't think that is by accident, but by the Providence of a living and loving God.  He has a plan that is different from what we had thought, both for my time and for our finances.  I can now be home with time to work on the many steps of our adoption, and will be able to be an at-home mom when we bring our little one home.

 However, the biggest thing is that we will now have the chance to trust God more for the finances of this adoption.  It seemed pretty easy when I had a salary, and suddenly that is just not there.   I don't ever want to lament, "Oh man . . . now we HAVE to trust God more."  I want to say "Wow.  Now we GET to trust Him more!"  It's never a bad thing to learn to trust Him more!  We now have no idea how God's going to do this, but that's OK.  He does.  We will hold firm to the promises of His Word:  "The One who calls you is faithful and He will do it."  ~ 1 Thessalonians 5:24

BIG NEWS! Our God is so good!!

Hi Friends!  I'm sorry for the delay in updating.  We've been waiting for some news, and finally got it today!

PLEASE KEEP PRAYING for the people in Vietnam who are working toward adoption reform to do it well and do it without delay.  Please keep praying that the United States will enter into a new adoption relationship with Vietnam as soon as it is possible to do so.  We are trusting a great big God, whose heart is for the orphan, to see it through!

In the meantime, as we have been researching international adoption, God has open our eyes to the plight of the orphan even more than ever, and has made us aware of "waiting children".  These are children in many countries of the world who will never be referred for ordinary adoption because they are not totally "perfect" in one way or another.  We have felt all along that perhaps God had even more for us in this new venture than we were first aware of, and we were right.  (Yeah . . . we should really stop putting God in a box!)  After praying and talking and praying and researching, and pushing doors to see if they would open, a brand new door HAS been opened, and God has given us the vision of TWO little Asian girls in our home!

 God has introduced us to a little three-year-old girl in China and we are in the process of adopting this sweet little one!! She was born in February 2009 and abandoned shortly after birth, as so many are in China.  We can't wait to take her out of the institutionalized environment she has been in all her life, and bring her to our home where she will have unconditional love, security, family to hold her and give her attention every day, and the hope of Jesus.  We know that she is going to blossom and grow in so many ways!

 Please know . . . this is in NO WAY an "instead of" or "in the place of" our adoption from Vietnam.  We know without a doubt that God has called us to Vietnam adoption!  In no way are we giving up on that!  Please keep praying that walls will be knocked down in that arena, so that so many children will find forever families!

Here are a couple pictures of our new daughter.  Just today (!) we received our pre-approval from China to adopt her!  We are so happy and excited.  :0)

Isn't she adorable??  We are so thankful to God for the gift of her in our family!  Please pray with us that proceedings would go quickly, and that we would be able to bring her home from China without delay.  (No forgotten papers sitting on desks in either country!)  We have received our pre-approval and will begin home study soon.  We're also gathering documents for our dossier to be sent to China.  It will take a few months.  Please pray for our little one's heart to be prepared for this transition and journey.  

Was I Love When No One Else Would Show Up?

God began to speak to me about international adoption while I was reading Francis Chan's Crazy Love.  (A must read, by the way.  It's a life-changer.)  And while I was getting all excited about trusting God to do awesome things and using me in the process, He began to speak to me about some things that I've been missing.  I know He wants to move me way beyond where I've been with Him, but He's shown me that if I want to be used in the big things, I need to be faithful to the small things He's put in my path.  He showed me several areas where I've just been content to "drive by" people and situations, and have not been willing to really put myself out there and be the hands and feet of Jesus.  

I was in the car one day after school and heard this song by Sidewalk Prophets.  Turn on your speakers and listen.  The words are so powerful.  "Was I Love when no one else would show up?  Was I Jesus to the least of us?  Was my worship more than just a song?"  I've had to examine my motives, my words and actions (or lack thereof), and the way I see the people around me.  I need to see them with the eyes of Jesus and love like He does.

"I wanna live like that, and give it all I have, so that everything I say and do points to You!"

Things We are Praying For!

We are so grateful for our family and friends who are supporting us in this adventure with God, and who are praying with us.  Thank you so much for believing with us in a great big God, for Whom NOTHING is too hard!

• Pray that God would nudge the hearts and minds of those in Vietnam who are working on adoption reform.  Pray that they would see the urgency of completing this task well and quickly, for the sake of thousands of Vietnamese children in orphanages.
• Pray for those in the United States who make decisions about adoption agreements with other countries, that they would see the importance of returning to adoption relationship with Vietnam as soon as possible.
• Pray for God to work in the hearts of those who are caring for the children at the Que Huong Charity Center, that they would see the importance of real family nurturing for their children; that they would begin to consider allowing their children to be adopted out.
• Pray for the children in these orphanages . . . there are so many of them.  Many know nothing except for the institution they came to as babies, and have never known the love of a family or the hope of our Jesus.
• Pray that we would hear God's voice clearly guiding us.  We want to take steps of faith whenever and however He asks us to.  We want (we need!) to be right where He is . . . we don't want to run ahead of Him and try to do things in our own timing or our own way.  Neither do we want to find ourselves afraid of anything He asks, thus lagging a step behind.  
• PRAY THAT GOD WOULD BE GLORIFIED!  We so want to see Him do something that only He can do!  We want everyone who is watching and waiting and wondering to say in the end, "That could only have been God!"  He is in this, friends.  His heart is for the orphan.  (Psalm 68:5,6a; James 1:27)

Below is a video of the orphanage that we are praying for.  The orphanage that we would like to adopt from.   It is rather long, and I'm not sure why some of the footage is included, but this will give you an idea of the many, many children who need to love of a family.

I will go before you 

    and will level the mountains;

I will break down gates of bronze

    and cut through bars of iron.  

~ Isaiah 45:2

Fears, Doubts, and Confirmations!

There was a night a couple of weeks ago when Jim and I were on our knees before our Father, asking Him to bring about this thing which He had spoken to us and trusting Him to do so.  It was a powerful time, and we knew without a doubt that we had heard Him and that He was about to do something huge!  That night after we'd gone to bed, I just laid there, suddenly freaking out, and thinking "Noooo!  It's too hard!  It's too scary!  She doesn't even speak English!  I don't want to do this, God!"  Those thoughts just kept coming and God let me wrestle with that all that night and into the next morning.  And then He said to me, "OK.  You don't have to do this.  You can forget about it, and stop talking about it, and stop praying about it, and just keep doing your life as it's been, and go sit on the couch and watch baseball.  OR . . . you can say yes to something hard and scary, and watch Me do something awesome!"

 And so I said, "OK, God.  I chose that.  We want our lives to point to You."  And since that day my focus has remained firm.

Sometimes it's hard to see that this thing will ever happen.  That Vietnam will ever be open to adoption while we're still young enough to do it.  That this sweet little girl will ever be with us.  It seems more impossible every day, especially when we see nothing changing; emails to the orphanage aren't returned; we are turned down for an adoption home study, because no adoption agencies are currently accredited for Vietnam adoptions.  It's easy to get discouraged and think there's no way it will ever happen.  But God is bigger than all of that.  He's not wringing His hands or saying, "Oh dear.  What will I do now?"  He is true to His Word, and speaks confirmations to us all the time:

• Over the past couple of weeks, Jim and I have prayed about who to share our news with.  Some evenings I've been sitting on the couch with my laptop while he is sitting at the kitchen table working on his studies.  I would be asking God to give me wisdom about who to share with, and at the moment I thought of someone, Jim would say from the kitchen, "How about so-and-so?", and it would be the very same name.
• We want to take steps of faith:  Having a home study done.  Learning some Vietnamese.  Getting Joy a passport.  I was thinking about these things the other day, and worrying that it was foolish to do them so early, especially when we have seen nothing changing.  But then God brought to my mind a picture of Noah, building that ark for 120 years when it wasn't even raining!  Later I was telling Jim the things I had been worried about, and he said, "Noah, why are you building that ark?"  God had spoken the very same thing to both of us.
• We are so very thankful for friends and family who support us in following Jesus, and who pray with us and give us encouraging words.  One friend told me that she'd told her husband the day before getting our news that she knew we'd be adopting from Vietnam!  Another friend told us a story of friends who had adopted twin boys from Haiti, and in the photos of these boys were also pictures of their best friend, whom they'd had to leave behind.  Some time later, the family got word that there were several children in Haiti who needed to be placed for adoption quickly.  The family decided to adopt again, and when they go their new referral, guess who the child was?  The best friend of their boys.  :)  When I heard that, it just confirmed to me that God can bring this little girl to us.  He knows her name.  He knows right where she is.  He is able to move people and paperwork and adoption laws and mountains to bring her to our family.  (And how knows what else He has in mind?!)

Be encouraged, friends!  God is at work around us all the time!

"Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah, "I am the LORD, the God of all mankind.  Is anything too hard for me?'"  ~ Jeremiah 32: 26.27

Another picture of "our" little girl, with a friend of Jim's.   :)