"Minus One"

First of all, I just want to say thank you to all of you who have been following our story and praying for us, as well as those of you who have contributed financially.  We love and appreciate each of you, and we are so grateful to have you as part of our story!

Next, I feel the need to share a little more of our back story to let you all see a little deeper into our hearts.  As many of you know, I have wanted to be wife and a mother pretty much since I was able to say those words. ;)  My other desire for my life has been for God to use it, however, wherever...whenever.  I have felt for a long time that adoption would be part of how He would accomplish this.  When I met Ron, he had felt a similar calling, and I believe that our similar hearts for orphans was one of the many things that drew us to each other.  We had agreed before we ever married, that adoption for us was not a question of "if" we would, but of "when" we would.  We thought the "when" would be after we had a biological child or two, but then came that scary, heart wrenching road block...infertility.  How could I possibly not be able to have children?  I, who was born to be a mother.  I, who had had all of my six children named by the time I was 13!  How could this possibly be?  For years I was absolutely paralyzed by this inconceivable reality.  I put on my biggest, most convincing smile as  went to baby shower after baby shower of not only friends my age, but ones much younger.  Eventually, it was children I had babysat who were having babies.  I would smile, and comment on the cuteness of the numerous babies, as I was genuinely happy for all of my friends, family and acquaintances, but when I would get alone... I would cry my heart out and try to understand the why in my circumstances.  I  was so desperate to see what God's purpose could possibly be in this.  After years of wrestling inside of myself with this, I finally got it.  There is a reason for this...or at least one that helps me to find some peace in this situation.  Adoption...it was always more of a plan B for us.   It was something we always planned on doing, but we had a plan about where it would fit into our lives.  We wanted to be obedient, but on our terms.  To God, this was not our plan B, but instead a very important part of His plan A our lives.  Once we finally figured this out, that was the end of our infertility discussions with doctors and the end of putting so much pressure ourselves to make something happen that was never meant to be. 

There are so many children in this world without someone to love and protect them; over 143 million orphans, to be exact.  There are babies born on a daily basis who are exposed to drugs and poverty or are born with disabilities.  They are labeled "unwanted" or "undesirable" before they even have the chance to show their worth.  They have no one to dream for them, or fight for them. They have no voice.  When I think of these children, I think of myself and so many of us who have such ugliness in our hearts and were completely lost and could be considered basically worthless.  We would have remained this way had God not stepped in.  He gave us unconditional love when we were utterly unlovable.  He saw potential in each of us and chose to invest in us so that we could have abundant life and eternal life.  How could we possibly live the love of God any better than opening our hearts and our home to the least of these.  What a humbling responsibility and calling...and this is exactly how we see it, our calling.  For every healthy Caucasian baby placed for adoption, there are 400 waiting couples.  That is definitely not the case for a baby exposed to drugs or even of an ethnicity considered to be a minority.  Those are the ones  that we feel called to bring into our lives, and by doing this we will be able to change that daunting number of world-wide orphans.  It will now be 143 million "minus one." 

Each of you by supporting us whether prayerfully or financially are helping us to make that number "minus one."  This is a phrase that you'll all be seeing a lot of as we head into our fundraising phase of this process.  We want each of you to realize that what you are being a part of is more than just growing a family; you are helping give hope and God's love to a child who otherwise might go through life feeling unloved or unwanted.  What a beautiful part of our child's life you already are. 

We will be kicking off several fundraisers over the next couple of weeks so stay tuned.  Some up coming things to look for include "minus one" t-shirts, handmade "minus one" refrigerator magnets,  and a huge benefit yard sale ( please contact me or Ron if you have items you would like to donate) just to name a few.

Once again, thank you to each of you who have been following our story.  We greatly appreciate each of you.

Also, just to give you a quick update...we have applied to several other agencies this week.  We are excited to see which doors God will swing wide open for us!  Love to you all! Thanks for reading...I know this was a long one. ;)