Worth Fighting For

The realities of adoption:

We are fighting the good fight that God has set before us.  We don't even know who our new daughter and son are yet, how old they are, or what they look like, but we are fighting for them and honored to do so. Do you know who does know how old they are, where they are, and what they look like?  Our God does, He sees them, and He asked us to fight for them along with Him.

The helpless put their trust in you. You defend the orphans. LORD, you know the hopes of the helpless. Surely you will hear their cries and comfort them. You will bring justice to the orphans and the oppressed, so mere people can no longer terrify them.  Psalms 10:14,17-18

We will fight with vigor to the end, and honestly, there is no end.  Not even when our kids come home are we going to stop there.  Adopting children is a life long mission.  People need to know and understand that we are called to care and love- especially to the least of these.

1 Timothy 6:12  "Fight the good fight for the true faith. Hold tightly to the eternal life to which God has called you, which you have confessed so well before many witnesses."

We fight for the lives of our adopted children when we...
(listed easiest to most difficult)
*Take three solid months to gather paper work, e-mail contacts, schedule appointments, download, upload, and mail documents.
*Spend hours on the phone with doctors begging to get the right blood work right up faxed at the right time in order to meet a deadline.
*Drag our kids out of their routines to meet the needs of the appointments, spend time away from them to make the endless phone calls, and e-mails.
*Work extra odds and ends jobs to raise money for our adoption
*Organize and execute fundraisers to the nth degree
*Answer questions and take critics comments with as much grace as we can muster, in order to get a word in to educate about adoption and God's heart for the orphans.
*Share our personal lives, our hearts, and information hoping that others will too see that this isn't just our fight, it's God's fight. These are His children.
*Praying continually that God is guiding us, making paths for us, protecting our new children, helping their family, holding their hands if no one is loving them.
*Scream at the top of our lungs (or at least we feel like we are) that children are dying every second of every day because someone isn't fighting the good fight and helping them!
*Risking friendships by taking the stand that we do, what God has called us to do, and actually carrying it through...and then realizing what friendships weren't truly friendships at all.
*Thinking constantly about what our adopted children are doing, and wondering if they are safe, hurt, hungry? Is someone caring for them...or did no one fight that fight and support that missionary, that orphanage, that village?


"Adoption has it's ups and downs" so it is true and the list above, the fighting...those are hard times, they are the times where we just continue to push forward.  Every day we are one day closer to meeting our children so we diligently continue to do what we can.  If we decide to 'take a break from that' then that's one more day/week that our children will be in the orphanage without their forever family- so there is no 'break.'
I think of our friends who are stages ahead of us and have been waiting and waiting for 'the call' of their child referral.  I think of our friends who are waiting and waiting for court papers to go through.... adoption is hard, but it will be oh so worth it!

Now, about the good fight- it is a good fight and we will do all of the above and MORE for the love we already have for the children.  God recruited us and we signed up with an all hearts YES!

Learn to do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend the cause of orphans. Fight for the rights of widows.

Isaiah 1:17

Here are some of the blessings- the "ups":
#1 The Lord is watching out for our new children.  He is on our side and will fight with us.  The children will have a new life, a forever family, unconditional love, hope for a future, knowledge of Jesus, an education, freedoms, medicines, sisters, brothers, grandmas....

*We are humbly obeying a call on our lives and learning so much about our faith and our God.
*People we've never met offer to help because they believe in the good fight and want to be a part of it with us.
*Friends message us and tell us they are praying for us.
*New friends and families who are going through similar journeys are encouraging us.
*A friend of a friend offers their precious time and talents to create a fundraiser for us.
*A friend of a friend meets a friend through a blog that gives us a wealth of answers to questions we've had.
*A friend from 9 years ago calls to say that everyday they cry for us in prayer over our adoption.
*God creates ways to financially provide for us.
*A business offers to do a fundraiser for us.
*Nearly 3,000 people from around the world have visited our blog site and we pray they learn more about adoption and Christ's love.
*Friends financially support us monthly and join with us in prayer.
*Connections are made to people who live in the city where we will meet our children.
*Our parents love to discuss the adoption with us, support us, and encourage us.
*Our family encourages us and tenderly ask questions only to better understand, not to judge.
*Case worker and home study agency are working diligently for us and keeping in great contact.
*Those closest to us remind us of scriptures and God's promises when we get discouraged.
*When a door closes another one opens.

Isaiah 58:7,8,9 "...share your bread with the hungry

and bring the homeless poor into your house;

when you see the naked, to cover him,

and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?

Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,

and your healing shall spring up speedily;

your righteousness shall go before you;

the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.

Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;

you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’

Do you notice the physical, mental, and emotional involvement that a family goes through during an adoption?  Please try to be understanding and reconstruct your thinking about adoption.  It is not about signing the bottom line of a paper and you get handed a baby to coo over.  It's not that simple, not that easy, and for the safety of the children, of course, it shouldn't be.  They deserve, more than any, someone who is going to fight for them.

We are sharing these things with you not to complain or out of self pity at all.  We are more than happy to fight for our children.  It gives us joy, purpose, builds our faith even stronger, and gets us one step closer to hugging our children! What a thought- hugging our children.

We share on our blog to build efforts for others to understand some things that adoptive families go through during their journey to their child(ren).  We share to open up your eyes and hearts to the raw emotions of the ups and downs of adopting.  The entire experience has been eye opening to us and we have learned, and continue to learn, a massive amount of knowledge about orphan care, poverty, adoption, and God's heart for the orphans and widows.

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed. Yes, speak up for the poor and helpless, and see that they get justice.

Proverbs 31:8-9

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for following our adoption journey, for learning along with us, for praying, and for financial help in bringing our little ones home! Thank you! This will be an awesome adventure together!