One October afternoon in 2012, Blaire and I were at our
favorite neighborhood park- Nothing unusual. Blaire makes friends with everyone
at the park! She always has. And at the time, she was only 18 months. On that
particular day, there was a little Asian girl who quickly befriended Blaire.
The girls ran all over the jungle gym holding hands, and I heard our new friend
calling Blaire her sister. Another mom also overheard this, looked at me and
asked, “Are they sisters?”
This question changed everything.
This question was the seed God used to plant a desire for
adoption in my heart. I smiled and said, “No, they’re not really sisters,” all
the while thinking to myself, Wouldn’t
that be so cool if they were? Wouldn’t that be a beautiful picture of the
gospel to bring two girls- two girls who clearly don’t LOOK like sisters, but
who are sisters, to the park? That was
the beginning of our adoption journey. After
that mom asked me Are they sisters, I
could not get adoption out of my mind.
18 mo Blaire at our favorite park
At the time, David and I were trying to get pregnant with
another child. Our second pregnancy ended up being an ectopic pregnancy- by the
grace of God, a doctor discovered this, but we obviously lost our baby after
just 6 weeks. We were a little discouraged because we weren’t getting pregnant
as quickly as we had the first two times. I was starting to wonder if the rest of our
family would grow through adoption. That Christmas, we were visiting my sister
in Greeley, CO. Her pastor preached about adoption. That seed God planted in
October just continued to grow.
In February 2013, we found out we were once again expecting!
(That little baby is now a toddling energetic little boy- Brooks.) However, as
soon I saw those two pink lines, I told David, “I still want to adopt.” I was just excited about adopting as I was
carrying another baby biologically. So far, God hadn’t planted a desire to
adopt in David’s mind. I was okay with that- I knew that if God really wanted
us to adopt, He would have to to give both of us the desire to adopt.
Fast forward a couple months to August. A dear friend
convinced David to read, “Orphanology: Awakening to Gospel-Centered Adoption
and Orphan Care” by Tony Merida and Rick Morton. After reading just the first chapter, his
heart was totally changed about adoption. He immediately opened a savings
account for an adoption fund and started rearranging our budget so we could
adopt!
Though it took about 10 months for that adoption seed to
finally sprout, God kept watering it, and now we are acting in obedience to Him
as we try to adopt.
My hope is that this blog will be a helpful way to keep you
all up to date about our adoption process. In addition, I hope our entire
adoption will glorify God as I share it with you.
In my next blogs, I’ll explain why we chose India, and I’ll
give an update on where we’re at in our adoption process.
Thanks for reading. And thank you so much for all your
prayers and support!
Blessings,
Melissa
