Our Adoption Announcement

Dear friends and family,

We wanted to share some very important news with you…WE ARE PREGNANT…paper pregnant that is! :)  Through months of the Lord’s leading and a great amount of prayer and discernment, we have begun the process of adopting a child internationally. Last week we submitted our first application and paperwork to our agency, of what we are told will be minimal compared to the months ahead, thus the term “paper pregnant”.  We received news today that we were approved! After much prayer, we have told the agency our application is for a boy or girl under the age of three.We are estimating that the process will take 12 months to complete, but ultimately we are trusting in the Lord’s timing and provision as we move forward. 

We know what you might be thinking, “Can they not have biological children?” – the answer is, we have no idea because we have not tried.  God has given us both a passion for adoption and to move forward with the adoption of our child at this time, before having biological children, so we are following His lead.  We are honored God has chosen us for this task to be parents and excited about the journey that lies ahead.  We trust that His plan for our family is far better than anything we could plan ourselves and we are blessed beyond belief with the life He continues to pour out before us. 

You also may be thinking “why adoption?”  We believe that Christ has so graciously chosen to adopt us into His kingdom – in John 14:18 Jesus says to His disciples at The Last Supper, “I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you.”  We believe Christ has adopted us and will complete that adoption when He takes us to Heaven one day.  His adoption of us has very much influenced our passion to give an orphan a forever family.  We also believe He calls us to care for orphans, and in our case has called for our care to be adoption - James 1:27 says “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”  Over the past few months God has so graciously confirmed that this is His will for our family in too many ways to count and we are confident He has ordained every step of this journey. 

If you feel led, we would be honored for you to join us in praying for this journey and our child.  Here are a few of the things the Lord has laid on our hearts:

• May every step of this process bring glory to God alone – that every breath that is taken in this process would be led by and prompted by Him.
• The international adoption process can be cumbersome, but our prayer is that God would prepare the hearts of our future judge and both US and international officials that handle our adoption.
• Preparation for parenthood, likely of a toddler!  Our parents have both greatly exceeded the call of Godly parents, which we are so grateful for, and hope we can be half of what they have been to us.
• International adoption is very costly – prayers for God to provide these finances in His timing.
• Our child – it is likely that our child is conceived, if not already born.  We are praying for his/her safety, food and clean water, health, someone who loves Jesus to love on him/her, and that God would place him/her in the perfect place for our agency to know them.
• Above all, and most importantly, that God’s perfect Will would be done and we would be obedient to all He calls us to do.

We are grateful for each and every one of you.  Thank you for being such wonderful family and friends.

In Christ’s Love,
The R Family