Fighting Impatience

So I feel like I am waiting for the referral call all over again...but this time, thank the Lord, I have a sweet face to stare at as I wait.
It is no suprise to those who know me that I am IMPATIENT! I get irritated easily over things that mess up my "flow"(whatever that may be! ha!). So what does our God, who has a great sense of humor I might add, ask me to do? ADOPT! One of the things in this life that requires more patience than anything else I know of! He planted that desire in me years ago, and this last year really reved it up and here we are following in obedience (though it can be painful) smack dab in the adoption "process". We waited what seemed like eternity for our BIG CALL...it came just last week and I was READY! Ready to get the paper work signed, notarized, shipped, make phone calls, print pictures, bring it on! But what now has the Lord asked us to do???
WAIT SOME MORE!!! HOLY COW!!!! So....here we are....waiting for the last of Micah's blood tests to come back before we can even send off the paperwork I was so eager to finish and make it official!

I am re-reading "Future Grace" by John Piper, but skipped back a few chapters to one that I really needed to re-read again!!
Faith in Future Grace vs. Impatience
Lots of you who read this are waiting yourselves and so I hope this encourages you as it does me and reminds you of how good our God is!

"~Impatience is a form of unbelief. It's what we begin to feel when we start to doubt the wisdom of God's timing or the goodness of God's guidance....
~Patience is the capacity to "wait and endure" without murmuring and disillusionment- to wait in the unplanned place and endure the unplanned pace ...
~Patience is the evidence of an inner strength. Impatient people are weak, and therefore dependent on external supports- like schedules that go just right and circumstances that support their fragile hearts. Their outcomes of oaths and threats and harsh criticisms of the culprits who crossed their plans do not sound weak. But that noise is all a camouflage of weakness. Patience demands tremendous inner strength...
~the glorious might of God (referred to in Colossi ans 1:11) that we need to see and trust is the power of God to turn all our detours and obstacles into glorious outcomes...
~The key to patience is faith in the future grace of God's "glorious might" to transform all our interruptions into rewards."

So this may be a detour and interruption in my mind, but by faith in my God, I know that this wait will only bring about a glorious outcome!
Thank you God for strengthening us as we wait and for bringing about a glorious outcome, even when we can't see it...my faith is in You!

Prayer request

So it has been a full week since our big day last week when we got to see the sweet face of our Micah T.
The sad thing is, we haven't been able to officially say "yes, we want to be his parents!...yes, get our paperwork movin'! yes! yes! yes!" Though that is EXACTLY how I feel!!
See, he has one last blood test to be done....and our agency wants us to have ALL the information possible before we make it official. WELL the lab is out of the supplies they need to run this test so here we are waiting again!
I am asking all of you who care enough to even look at our little family's blog, to please pray that the lab gets their supplies, runs the test, and gets the results to our agency QUICK! The mommy in me wants to fly over there, scoop him up and say "who cares about labs....he is ours!!"
It doesn't quite work that way though, so I am clinging to my God and resting in his Truth....

"In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him WHO WORKS OUT EVERYTHING IN CONFORMITY WITH THE PURPOSE OF HIS WILL, in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the PRAISE OF HIS GLORY"
Ephesians 1:11-12

I know in the big scheme of things, God is working this out...conforming it to the purpose of His will and it will all be for His glory!!!
Maybe if it weren't for this hold up, we would be given a court date where his birth mom couldn't make it or other important papers wouldn't have had time to arrive....

Yes Lord I trust you, please strengthen us as we wait. May the blood work come at the perfect time and with the perfect results!!!

waiting to exhale....

These pictures aren't even recent but they describe how I feel the best...plus Tyler is just super cute in them!

Since receiving our referral on Tuesday, we have been in a whirlwind of phone calls with our agency, paperwork, and printing Micah's pictures so they can be all over the house!

I think about him and his precious birth mom (who gave him life and us the chance to love him and provide for him and most importantly share with him our love of Jesus) all the time!

I am picturing how much messier this house will be, how much more wet the bathroom floor will be at bath time and just how much louder it will be with a two year old plus a one year old by the time we are home! It will be crazy bliss!

We are almost ready to turn in everything to make our referral acceptance official and then we wait for news of a court date...then the court date...hopefully pass first time...wait for travel dates...then get on a plane and get our sweet Micah!! While I'm on cloud nine, we are really just holding our breath while the rest of this process unfolds....waiting to exhale :)

I can't thank God enough for allowing me and Cristie C. to go through this together...it has definitely made this whole thing even more wonderful!

Cristie~ I hope to be on the plane heading home with you and with our boys asleep in our arms looking at each other with huge smiles on our faces....still high! ;)

Our REFERRAL story...

Here is our day in pictures...below I explain it all........

Posing with Cristie after we laugh and cry over sharing this day together...

At Cristie's rushing out the door after our call came....Cristie you held that pose the whole time!

On the phone with our agency learning about our new son, are we excited or what!?

Daddy is in AWE!

Wishing I could kiss the real thing!!

WOW! So today the call ACTUALLY came!!!! WHAT A DAY!!!!

I will try to start from the beginning....

So many of you know that the family who was #1 lives here in town and me and her (Cristie) started chatting and giving each other support over this looooong wait until we saw our sweet son's faces.....WELL today we had planned for me and Tyler to go to her house and actually meet for the first time - imagine my surprise when she calls me at 1:30pm to say "we got our call!!" So I still went over at 3pm and got to jump up and down screaming and rejoicing at seeing the pictures of her precious son.

I knew then I was now #1!! I hoped that our call would come in the next few days........

When a friend of Cristie's came over to see her baby too, we went back to the computer to drool over his precious face and my phone rings....

Now remember we were also expecting to get a call from our agency with our monthly update so I look at Cristie and say "it's the agency!!! BUT it's probably just our update"

I
WAS
WRONG!!!!

Our case manager starts with small talk asking about our Christmas... and then lays it on me "Well I have good news!!"

Me: "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!"

This woman who I just met now sees me jumping up and down and screaming in her house like a wild monkey! It was amazing!

I tell our case worker that I am not far from home and my husband is there so I will call her right back .....I then scramble for my things and another one of Cristie's friends shows up and takes a few pictures for me and we are off to the house - only a few blocks away!!!!!

A friend of Matt's had stopped by to see him and so we left him to keep Tyler occupied while we took the phone call!

He is the most adorable little 9 month old and I can just tell he will fit in perfectly here! Him and Tyler will be so close!

We can't share his Ethiopian name which we are keeping as his middle name, but we will name him Micah! His initials will be M.T.W. just like his daddy's! :)

Family poured into our house to see our newest edition and later we got to go back to Cristie's so she could see our son.....God is amazing isn't he!?

Next we have to complete some referral paperwork which will take a few days...then we turn that in and our paperwork goes to Ethiopia. Then we wait to hear about a court hearing that will take place in Ethiopia and declare Micah officially ours....after that court date is when we wait to hear about the Embassy appointment where we get the clearance to leave the country with him and that is when we pick him up!!! Hopefully by March we will be holding him, but that may be pushing it!! I am praying we will get him before he turns one and Tyler turns two!!! April will be one big month of celebration!!!!

Now I am off to process this crazy, wonderful, amazing day!

Lamentations Ch 3 and mini-update

"Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions NEVER FAIL. They are new every morning; GREAT is your FAITHFULNESS. I say to myself, "The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him".
Lamentations 3: 22-24

Our pastor read a part of this on Sunday morning and oh what sweet words to my soul they are!
This wait until we see our son has been hard, and though each day I pray "please let today be the day we see his face," God isn't answering my prayer directly, but He is giving us the grace to endure the wait. And since I know God is love, then I know all that He does comes out of his love and so though this wait is agonizing at times, I choose to believe that it is for our best and only out of love. (He IS love so how can he NOT act out of love!?) So I am not consumed by the enemies attempts to cause me to doubt this whole process though he has tried many times to lead me to do so. I cling to this verse knowing God has compassion on me and knows what it is to wait for his Son to return to Him... and his compassion will never fail! His faithfulness is new every morning! It is the Lord who gives me my portion....He is everything I need and will always give me everything I need....so here I am with the grace to endure the wait...and I will wait for him.

The only news I really have on the adoption, is that the transition home Hannah's Hope where our future son will be until we can get to him has moved to the new location and they seemed settled in last week! I hope this means that if our son is not already there, then they are now ready and able to take him in and many other children waiting for their families. Between the holidays, the transition home's move and the back up from the court closure in the fall, things have been soooo slow, but I hope now everyone is reved up and ready to get more babies home!!! Praying that this week my new sweet friend Cristie, who is #1 and just a few blocks away recieves her phone call and then we are next! We also should be getting our monthly update from our case manager in a day or two...I will have to keep myself from thinking it is our referral call when I see her number come up on the phone!!

And for your enjoyment, a picture of my little cowboy.........

( I have been playing with my camera and finally got my first decent picture on the completely manual setting!)

James Chapter 1 -persevering

"2Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. 4Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 5If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. 6But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; 8he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does. "

Oh how I needed to read this Truth today (or I guess yesterday now)!
While this waiting may not seem like a trial to some....on some days it certainly can be. I have honestly not been thinking about it too much with the holidays and Tyler being a non-stop monkey, but these words today really made me see where I stand in God's eyes.
I shouldn't be pouting or disappointed or DOUBTING....God is in control and this time is helping my faith to develop perseverance so one day I will be complete before my God, and He's the reason we are doing this...so HE is what ultimately matters!"

God's word is amazing....this verse really came alive to me when we were facing a whole different kind of trial. When I was 35 weeks pregnant, my twin brother's wife was 22 weeks pregnant, and my other sister-in-law had just given birth to twin girls who were fighting great at their premature age....excitement was everywhere! Then my brother and his wife call and in a matter of 24 hours they went from thinking something was wrong, being ambulanced to U of L, given hope that the baby may make it, to having to give birth to their perfectly formed, but just too small 22 week old son...it was the most devastating, heart wrenching, faith testing thing myself or family has ever and hopefully will ever experience.
The next few days after I was left with my huge belly and bouncing baby inside me feeling so guilty for the life I still had growing inside....my brother and his wife had moved to a tiny town to help grow a church in the youth and children deptartmet and where living their lives for God...so in my warped mind they shouldn't have to go through trials because they were pleasing God... but God's word doesn't say "if you live for me you will have no trouble or worries"
It says
"WHEN you face trials...." not IF.
God knows we will face trials in this broken world, but His mercies are new every morning, and weeping may last for the night but joy comes in the morning!
My brother and his wife, a year and 2 weeks after loosing their son, gave birth to a healthy, happy, spunky, little girl who is most definitely a joy!

While this trial of waiting seems long and harder some days more than others....I know Joy will come in the morning...the perfect morning God has picked for us...and until then, I will keep diving into the Truth in hopes of one day being complete before my God...yeah for perseverance!

James Chapter 1