In just one week from knowing our request for Andrew was accepted, God has brought in half of the immediate money needed!!!
A friend had called Jen last Friday to order a loaf of bread and 2 dozen cookies from www.wickedgoodeats.etsy.com and then proceeded to give her a check for $100. Then over the weekend Aaron's mom managed to sell 4 of Aaron's CD's at their church for $400. This morning we woke up to a phone call letting us know a check for $1,000 was in the mail. God is good!! He called us to adopt which we knew we could never afford, but chose to obey anyway. Then He continually blows us away by His provision.
We are planning on putting a photo album together to bring with us for Andrew on our first trip so he will have it until we bring him home. We really wanted to write the family member names and how they're related in cyrillic so that his caretakers can read it to him while we're gone. We weren't sure how to go about that and asked for help on a yahoo group we're a part of. We have blessed by a man and his wife (strangers to us) who have offered to translate the words and names for us from English to Bulgarian in the cyrillic letters. What a blessing!!!!
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
A lot has happened since our last post. We were sent information on one child over a month ago and asked for more information about him. We had some questions regarding what his needs would require of us. On March 11, our agency "accidentally" sent us information on another little boy (thinking it was the boy we inquired about). This new little boy seemed to better fit what we were looking for, so that evening we asked our caseworker to request him for us.
By Monday morning we had officially requested him with notarized papers. By Tuesday we got word that our agency in Bulgaria received our request and had submitted it for us. We were told they might discuss it in Friday's meeting. We didn't hear anything and thought we'd have to wait until the following Friday. Best case scenario would be that Tuesday when the council met again, but we definitely weren't holding our breath for this. In the meantime, God had given us 2 scriptures to hold on to and put together.
Psalm 46:10 "Be still and know that I am God..." for Proverbs 21:30 "there is...no plan that can succeed against the Lord."
He gave us peace that He would bring our son to us and if this little boy was our son, then no plan could get in the way of it happening.
So, Monday morning we asked our caseworker when they thought we would get word. We were out for a good part of the day, so when we got home around 5:45 P.M. we checked email from our caseworker. We opened it figuring it was in response to our email, but instead it was an email informing us that the Intercountry Adoption Council had accepted our request for this little boy on Friday. Praise God!!!!!
We can't give anymore information other than he is in our age range and was on the waiting child list. We will be calling him Andrew and will keep part of his original name as his middle name. We were not intending on adopting a child with special needs, but we started praying that if God wanted us to, that He would make clear to us what we could handle. When we read this boy's report we felt peace about his need.
So now we wait for our formal invitation to travel.
We are still in need of around $3,000 in order to travel for our first trip over to meet him (which could be in the next month or so). About 4 months later we can bring him home, which will require approximately $10,000 more. These amounts not only include travel expenses, but facilitator fees, interpreter fees, admin. fees, orphanage donation, etc.
Though it looks like there is so much more to raise, we are encouraged by the fact that God has already provided $20,000 to date. At the very beginning of this journey we determined that if God called us to adopt, then He would provide every penny. At every step of the way, we have had exactly what we needed when we needed it. So our faith in unwavering as we know He will finish what He started.
So, in the meantime, we continue to do what we can to raise the funds necessary to bring him home. We have opened a storefront on Just Love Coffee selling Fair Trade coffee. $5 of every bag sold will go towards bringing Andrew home. Go to http://www.justlovecoffee.com/littlebrother.
Just a reminder, we are still selling t-shirts at http://www.adoptionbug.com/littlebrother. We bought the ones written in Bulgarian for our family and absolutely love them. Above is a picture of our kids wearing them.
We have original worship CD's still available for sale and all proceeds from these will go towards bringing Andrew home. Just click on the "Add to Cart" button on the side bar to order.
In all your encouragement, support, and prayers, you are "looking after the orphans" (James 1:27). Thank you all for coming alongside of us in this journey.
By Monday morning we had officially requested him with notarized papers. By Tuesday we got word that our agency in Bulgaria received our request and had submitted it for us. We were told they might discuss it in Friday's meeting. We didn't hear anything and thought we'd have to wait until the following Friday. Best case scenario would be that Tuesday when the council met again, but we definitely weren't holding our breath for this. In the meantime, God had given us 2 scriptures to hold on to and put together.
Psalm 46:10 "Be still and know that I am God..." for Proverbs 21:30 "there is...no plan that can succeed against the Lord."
He gave us peace that He would bring our son to us and if this little boy was our son, then no plan could get in the way of it happening.
So, Monday morning we asked our caseworker when they thought we would get word. We were out for a good part of the day, so when we got home around 5:45 P.M. we checked email from our caseworker. We opened it figuring it was in response to our email, but instead it was an email informing us that the Intercountry Adoption Council had accepted our request for this little boy on Friday. Praise God!!!!!
We can't give anymore information other than he is in our age range and was on the waiting child list. We will be calling him Andrew and will keep part of his original name as his middle name. We were not intending on adopting a child with special needs, but we started praying that if God wanted us to, that He would make clear to us what we could handle. When we read this boy's report we felt peace about his need.
So now we wait for our formal invitation to travel.
We are still in need of around $3,000 in order to travel for our first trip over to meet him (which could be in the next month or so). About 4 months later we can bring him home, which will require approximately $10,000 more. These amounts not only include travel expenses, but facilitator fees, interpreter fees, admin. fees, orphanage donation, etc.
Though it looks like there is so much more to raise, we are encouraged by the fact that God has already provided $20,000 to date. At the very beginning of this journey we determined that if God called us to adopt, then He would provide every penny. At every step of the way, we have had exactly what we needed when we needed it. So our faith in unwavering as we know He will finish what He started.
So, in the meantime, we continue to do what we can to raise the funds necessary to bring him home. We have opened a storefront on Just Love Coffee selling Fair Trade coffee. $5 of every bag sold will go towards bringing Andrew home. Go to http://www.justlovecoffee.com/littlebrother.
Just a reminder, we are still selling t-shirts at http://www.adoptionbug.com/littlebrother. We bought the ones written in Bulgarian for our family and absolutely love them. Above is a picture of our kids wearing them.
We have original worship CD's still available for sale and all proceeds from these will go towards bringing Andrew home. Just click on the "Add to Cart" button on the side bar to order.
In all your encouragement, support, and prayers, you are "looking after the orphans" (James 1:27). Thank you all for coming alongside of us in this journey.
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