Progress

We received our fingerprinting appointment from USCIS for December 2nd. It was much quicker than I anticipated! I'm very hopeful we will be able to get our first waitlist numbers by Christmas.

I told the Ethiopia dossier case worker on the phone last time that I have had my first official moment of impatience. However, the Lord has given us more grace every day in these endeavors to add to our family, and I believe that He will continue to send that grace on in to our family as long as we continue to seek him and let the Holy Spirit work in our lives. I read this today: "A man can no more take in a supply of grace for the future than he can eat enough for the next six months, or take sufficient air into his lungs at hone time to sustain life for a week. We must draw upon God's boundless store of grace from day to day as we need it."--D. L. Moody.

This journey is already so different from our first adoption. First of all, never underestimate the time and energy that must be devoted to a toddler. :) When it was just Justin and me, I would sit at home on my days off and daydream about what being a mother would be like. Now I daydream about being able to sit. :) Just joking. I love chasing my little 14-month-old around. But time just FLIES nowadays. I am curious to see how it changes once we get our number that will be SO much higher than where we started last time.

I also sense God giving me peace about the possibility of just having two kids. Though I've ALWAYS dreamed of having a family like the one I grew up in (six kids), that may not be God's plan. And since we made the decision that we would be a one-income family (with that one income being a youth pastor's salary)...well, folks, adoption is expensive. :) We will have to do some sort of fundraising to complete our second adoption fund. Plus (I know this is a huge news flash) raising kids is expensive. :) All that to say...when we think of how God has ALWAYS provided (in many ways...friends, resources, jobs, homes) we are encouraged to stand firm on the promise given in Psalm 37...

Trust in the LORD, and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Delight yourself in the LORD; and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD, trust also in Him, and He will do it.

I TRUST in the Lord, I DO good, I cultivate FAITHFULNESS, I DELIGHT myself in the Lord...and He will give me the desires of my heart. And I believe that also means that, as I do those things, He will mold the desires of my heart to the desires of HIS heart. Which are always good and pure and right. So what that *my* early plans for a family were not what God's plans are? Our little Sadie is such a tremendous blessing to us...one of the truest, deepest reminders that He makes all things beautiful in His time. And so we wait and we trust and we believe that "He is able to make all grace abound to you..."