PRAYING FOR INDIA SOUL

The phone call...the one no parent ever wants to receive...it came today and our hearts are turned to prayer.

 

Our daughter, she has a name. God has allowed us to care deeply for this tiny little orphaned girl on the other side of the world and He has even allowed us to give her a name. It's India Soul and we love her very, very much! Would you please join us in prayer for her life?

 

She is extremely ill, but her illness and vulnerability is not a surprise to God. After all, He ordained all the days He planned for her before one of them came to be and He loves her way more than we ever could!

 

We pray for peace in our hearts as we trust God's plans for her life. We ask the Lord for healing in India's tiny 8 pound body, yet we trust His will. We ask the Lord for the opportunity to raise this little one up to know and love Him and serve Him with her life here on earth, yet we thank Him if He should choose to call her home with Himself. We also ask for comfort for our whole family as we process the potential loss of a little someone we have all come to love very much already.

 

May God be glorified in and through India's life and story. May He be trusted by many in new ways as we depend on Him in this trial and pray. May His love and care and saving grace be on display in the life of little India, no matter His determined course for her.

 

God is with her now across the globe. He is with me here, her mommy on the other side of the world, helpless, but trusting Him who is able. He never leaves, never forsakes, always cares, is always in control, is always good, and He loves us!

 

"The soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul."

1 Samuel 18:1

"Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand."

Proverbs 19:21

QUOTE OF THE DAY

"I have a dream that...one day...little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers."

-Martin Luther King Jr., I Have A Dream, August 28, 1963

 

SETBACKS AND GRACE

This weekend we received exciting news of dates and time frames that would make any parent overjoyed in anticipation of a beloved union to come. And then...today, Monday morning, came the setback. Ah, the joys of the adoption journey. And yet...

GRATITUDE...as we thank a good and trustworthy God for His perfect timing and plans that far exceed ours.

PEACE...in knowing that this God we serve is purposeful, wise, and loving in all of His ways.

LOVE...swells for my new children even more as I'm challenged to wait for them longer than expected. (How is it possible to love these little people so much when I haven't even met them yet?!)

PATIENCE...that exists because of faith.

RELINQUISHMENT...of the reigns, knowing full well that God is always in control of all things.

TRUST...because of all of the above.

Today we rest in the perfect plans of a perfect God who has written His story better than we ever could. And GRACE upon GRACE flows down.

Thank you, Lord, for holding our children in the shelter of your wing. Thank you for loving them and providing for them in the ways that you've deemed best. Thank you for allowing us to be a part of your story. And, thank you for your grace and steadfast love, even in (especially in) the setbacks.

"For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace." 1 John 1:16

 

Come Weary Saints by Sovereign Grace Music

(awesome CD filled with God's words of comfort)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRODIE

I'm SO blessed to be best friends with you! HOW I LOVE YOU!!!

 



 

"Many waters cannot quench love."
Song of Solomon 8:7

I HAD A DREAM

 

Sometimes...I feel like the little girl I used to be (and still am in many ways).

Sometimes...I wonder how I blinked and became the grown up.

Sometimes...in my mind, I'm still that little girl way up in the tree with her dolls and stuffed
animals tied to her waist so she could climb high and perch together with all her "kids".

I had a dream.

When it came time to blow out a candle, I always had just one wish. I'd wish for a baby to be left on our
doorstep with a note saying that he or she was to be cared for by the youngest member of the household.
(Certainly, that was the most logical way to ensure the child was designated for me, the baby of my family.)

Believe it or not, that particular wish never came true, but in a way I have to laugh thinking
back on just how much of my childhood was preparation for what God had in store for me.

I had a dream. God had a plan.

Even though I'm a big grown up girl now, it's not uncommon for me to miss my mom and dad at times and especially in the fall since both of them joined Jesus in heaven in September. The looming autumn scents in the air, school supplies, and summer's end tend to till my heart's past pains. And, when I wish I could pick up a phone and say hello to the ones I love and miss, I'm thankful that I have my eternal Father God to talk to. I'll always have Him to talk to, to listen to.

When I was a little girl, I had a dream.

I dreamed that one day I would grow up and get to be The Mom. That's all I remember ever hoping to become. It's strange, the reality to be in the dream. I'm thankful...thankful to be trusted by God with these precious children...thankful to be a forever child of a good Father God...thankful for this day, today, from Him.

"Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.'”
James 4:14-15

We aren't promised tomorrow, but today we live according to God's will. I pray to give my little girls and boys the opportunity to dream and be little, all the while preparing them to be big. I pray for them to grow up loving Jesus. I pray to love them well and to grasp the brevity of this life, 'cause we live it differently when we do.

"Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow."
Psalm 144:4

It's kind of fun, actually, to realize that I'm just here...in my dream. And, one day I'll enter a new dream, the eternal dream to come.
It's written about in God's Word. It speaks of forever love in a perfect place and it becomes reality sooner than we think.

This life, it's a vapor, but I have a dream.

"Show me, O Lord, my life’s end
and the number of my days;
let me know how fleeting is my life.  
You have made my days a mere handbreadth;
the span of my years is as nothing before you.
Each man’s life is but a breath.
Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro:
He bustles about, but only in vain;
he heaps up wealth, not knowing who will get it.

But now, Lord, what do I look for?
My hope is in you."

Psalm 39:4-7