Prayer Does Stuff

Only a few days have passed since my last posting and our adoption situation has completely changed.  On Tuesday of this week (June 25) we were notified that we had passed court!  This means that according to DRC law, we are officially recognized as the parents of our kids (assuming we have also passed the 30-day appeal period as well).  Now we will move on to dealing with the US Government...hurray...

I believe that this was a reminder to me from God, that when you are in a situation that is draining you and you can't do anything to change it, you should be praying.  Not only should you be praying, you should be asking others to pray for you.  This is always something I have been bad at doing - to ask someone else to pray for you, you first have to be comfortable expressing your situation to them and asking for their help.

It amazes me that we can wait so long and then three days after people start praying for this specific piece of the process to be done, it is.  So, when you are in that place where you can't see the end of the journey because you have sunk so far down in the mud, remember (that as we used to say at camp) PRAYER DOES STUFF.

The Slump

I have hit it - the adoption slump.

I suppose I should first apologize to everyone following our story only through this blog as Erin and I have become somewhat lax in updating it lately.  To be fair, I should say that the reason this hasn't been updated lately is because we really haven't made much progress.

Since we received the referrals of our two new kids in early April, our in country lawyer has been doing most of the work to keep the adoption moving forward.  All the hearings and court documents were collected for both kiddos between when we got their referrals and May 9 - when we were officially submitted to court!  That was a good day, as it was the beginning of the court process to make the kids legally ours.  

We were hoping this would be a quick process - like 4-5 weeks (not uncommon).  It has been 6.5 and we are growing steadily more impatient.  It is very hard for us to sit in the "holding pattern" for this long and not start to feel some discouragement that no progress is being made, especially when we know that this wait will most likely be minuscule in comparison to waiting for the US government to complete their "investigation" of our case (3-6 months after they have approved our paperwork).

Please pray for our patience and our attitudes as this process continues to weigh down on us.  It is very hard to see the light at the end of this tunnel some times, and waiting that much longer to meet and hold our new kids is a heavy load.  Also, please pray for the workers at the US embassy in Kinshasa and the DRC government, that they may be ethical, thorough, and expedient in their work.

One more thing to pray for - please pray that we pass court before the 27th.  It is a birthday present that would make my wife's day special and memorable.

PS Fundraising Update

People ask me fairly often how our fundraising efforts are coming.  I would be remiss if I didn't thank one very generous family member who loaned us a large sum of money to cover an invoice which helped get our case into court.  I would also like to thank everyone else who has been supportive of our adoption financially.  However, there are still some rather large payments which will have to be made, and plenty of opportunity for anyone to help us out (direct donation, puzzle fundraiser, through a 31 party with Erin, etc...).  Please - if you know of anyone with a heart for adoption that would be interested in helping two more kids get to their forever families, pass this page or one of our fundraising cards to them.