As we wait...

In all the research and reading I have done about adoption, no one has ever said adoption is easy. The first few months of seemingly endless paperwork, fingerprinting, lines at embassies, waiting on hold for government officials, and trips to the Fed Ex office were definitely hard. I looked forward to all this being done so we could get to the "easier" part of getting the nursery ready while we waited for our lawyer to take care of the rest. And yet, all the experienced adoptive parents would say that the waiting is the hardest. I didn't really believe it at the outset, so happy was I to be done with the complicated paper trail. But now I know... they were right. It IS the wait that is the most difficult. The loss of control, the days on end of no news or updates, the realization that each day Joseph is getting older and older without us. Now that we've held him and sang over him and seen his smiles and trusting eyes... it is so hard to wait..

I woke up this morning feeling quite down. Guatemalan adoptions are no longer taking the 4 to 8 months average quoted to us when we first started on this adventure. Many events this year have impacted adoption and now the average is 6 to 12 months. As of just this month, the embassy is requiring a 2nd DNA test after PGN which will add several more weeks to the process. When we started the journey last November, we imagined a little dark haired baby spending the summer with us in Chicago. Now, It seems that things have gotten so difficult, so very difficult. Those thoughts filled me this morning and I started to feel quite down and much less hopeful. So, I was driven to my knees and then driven to search for wisdom from the Bible. It pretty much fell open to the book of Jeremiah, chapter 32. In this chapter God is telling Jeremiah to purchase a field in Israel at just the time when the Chaldeans are about to invade and take over the land. It seems like an almost impossible situation. Jeremiah prays in verse 17, "Ah, Lord God! You made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and Your outstretched arm! Nothing is too difficult for you!" God confirms this in verse 27, "Look, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh; is anything too difficult for me?" I truly believe that God brought these verses and thoughts to me today. I also truly believe that He quietly is urging me to pray and to ask for a miracle... Nothing is too difficult for God. Not the red tape, not the Guatemalan political unrest, not the extra DNA test, not the miles that separate us from Joseph, ... Nothing. So, I (in my more charismatic persona) am asking God in faith to get Joseph through the process. Soon.. Now...! I know God is able to do it. So I am asking. Please join Keith and me and PRAY that his adoption will be completed as soon as possible. Matthew 21:22, Philippians 4:6