The normal course of adoption is to choose a country and an agency and to move forward with the requirements of that country in mind. We did not feel that God had shown us the country but we moved forward anyway with the information that we did have—God was calling us to adopt, from somewhere. We knew we did not have any money to adopt, but knew God would provide so we moved forward where we could. We opened a bank account and deposited our coins from our piggy bank (really), roughly $26. We asked God to fill the rest. After completing our home study, we still did not know where in the world our children would be. We knew we wanted to do international adoption but were not sure whether to turn toward Central America or Africa. Europe appeared more costly and we were open to having a mixed race family. As we explored the opportunities before us, Africa and Ethiopia, specifically, rose to the top of our list.
In choosing Ethiopia, God fused together so many bits and pieces of us. Ideas that had resided in our hearts for years and that we had expected to be revealed in other contexts suddenly became clear indicators of why God was directing us toward adoption and Ethiopia. One example is my husband’s interest in international law that almost drove him to law school yet instead the dream came to fruition in our immediate family!
With our country decision came the next adoption payment and every subsequent month, another payment was due. Our account grew monthly to accommodate each pending payment. In a couple of cases, the money arrived in just the right amount on the very last day. We never had more than just the next payment but we always had what we needed. So many people, including Promise686 (a ministry born out of our church) and its grant, had a place in God’s financial plan. Our account had just enough money to fund our trip to Ethiopia by the time all the paperwork came together for us to leave.
We got the call on January 31, 2008 that there was a two week old baby girl who was ready to be adopted. We then had to wait for our court date and on March 28th, 2008, our court date did not pass because of some missing documents. Of course disappointed, we waited a few more weeks to have another court date. On this day, April 8, 2008, we were waiting for the call that she was legally ours, but another call came first. (See Tab Second Unknown)
Later that day, we got the call and Sydney became ours. We traveled to get her April 30th and held her in our arms May 2nd.
