Faithful

We continue to be amazed at the Lords faithfulness.

From the moment we started  planning our trip back here to zambia I was fully aware of all the things that needed to line up perfectly, in order for this to work out. We had/have so many things pending from so many different arenas…so many balls in the air…and many people telling us that we “shouldn’t get our hopes up”. What were we hoping for was not very likely. The first being getting our adoption finalized in the first 20 days of our trip. This was necessary as I, Tina, needed to present for that and had already booked a return ticket for February 16. The Lord cut this time in half and we had our adoption finalized by the Zambian court in just 10 days! This, in and of itself, is a miracle.

Our next hurdle was our US home study and something called an I-600A. You see, you need this approved before we could go to the US embassy to get her adoption finalized on the US side and get her a Visa package. Since July of 2014, USCIS have been increasingly strict in their home study approval process. And in doing so delaying the approval process by months. We were told by our social worker that this process could take 3 months…probably even more. She also told us that every single case she had submitted since July had come back to her, asking for more information. Even more, she told us that upon further research she was finding a 100% first time rejection rate for all home studies. Monday morning I opened an email from my dad informing me that our I600-A (our home study) had been approved…first time through in just 8 weeks! We were blown away by this and just so humbled that the Lord indeed heard our cries for mercy, our pleas for favor, and had richly prepared the way for us.

This journey, not just our adoption journey, but these past three years have been  a time of transition. There have been extremely difficult times, uncomfortable times, painful times. There have also been times of laughter, and joy. God has so blessed us through our difficult times by keeping us close to him. And rejoiced with us in our victories. He continues to speak to us through gentle whispers, songs, scripture. One morning during devotions, prior to booking our tickets for this trip I felt the Lord telling me to move forward with our plans. Book the tickets. Nothing about that timing seemed right…it seemed very unpredictable and unlikely that we would accomplish anything in that time frame. But again I heard the gently whisper, trust me. I knew that He was going to do something amazing, and I was so excited to see what that was going to look like.

As I was preparing to leave the US for our trip here I was visiting with the boys teachers and just prepping them for the time we would be away. And while talking with one, I just broke down crying. The stress of it all, the pain of missing my boys, and just how overwhelming it all seemed. But I remember looking at her through the tears saying, “I just know that God going to do something awesome, and I can’t wait to be a small part of it.” So this is just the beginning of the awesome story God is writing…I can’t wait to tell you the rest! We will keep you posted!