WE ARE COMING, BOYS!!!!

WOOHOOOOO!!!!! We finally have tickets purchased!!!! 

We leave for DC December 28th, spend the night, and head to ET December 29th!!!!  And guess what detail God included in all of this travel preparation!?!?!?!?!?  He placed us in the EXACT TWO SEATS ~ one row behind ~ my sweet adoption friend, Kimberly Kulp, and her hubby!!!!  Can you believe it!?!?!?!?  Who says God doesn't pay attention to detail!!!!!  Kimberly and I met 11 months ago in Georgia at the first Created for Care retreat!!!!  And now......we will be traveling together to ET!!!!!  GOD IS SO GOOD!!!!

We are hoping Daddy, Kaleab and I all travel home together, but if we have not yet received embassy clearance when Daddy has to come home, Mama is staying in ET until we are cleared!!!!  Would LOVE a miracle where I could just stay until Big Brother cleared too!  Can't wait to see how God works out the remaining details!!!!!

Please pray for expediency and efficiency with embassy as well as PASSING COURT for Big Brother on January 3rd!!!  What a fabulous way to start our year as a family!!!!!

Not sure how I will make it through ANOTHER 3 weeks of waiting, but knowing we will be WITH OUR BOYS December 30th will somehow get me through!!!!   Thank You, Jesus!!!!

AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!! 

♥ ♥ ♥ 

WE ARE COMING BOYS!!!!! WE ARE COMING!!!!  

You're Late Again, Lord!

Okay, so I do PROMISE to return to my recap of our time in Ethiopia and Germany ~ sorry for the unexpected interruption of our extended stay in our "waiting room."  However, before returning to the recap, I want to share with you how I am finding peace through your prayers...........

If you have been following my blog very long, you can recall the lessons God has had for me regarding continuing to BELIEVE in His promises for me and my family; as well as having EXPECTANCY, rather than expectation.  Well, He is using this time to put to use these tools He previously added to my armor.

Initially, upon hearing that we had to wait another ~4 months to bring our precious babe home, my mind began to spin in negativity.  I began to focus on all that time we were going to be missing out on.  I worried that K's pure joy and peace might get tainted, spending more time in orphanage life.  I struggled to understand the WHY behind all of this.  I felt forgotten and abandoned by God.  I listened for God, but didn't hear anything, thus, further convincing me that He had forgotten our family.

I know in my head that those are all LIES.  I just needed time to reconnect the TRUTH from my head to my heart.  I have recently relinquished the need to understand WHY Baby K has to live in ET longer, when his mommy and daddy ACHE to bring him HOME.  And, I believe, that was the beginning of my progress forward.  "Letting go and letting God."

As Karon Goodman puts it, in her book, "You're Late Again, Lord!"...."the only way out of the pain is straight through it, with the Lord right by your side."  Literally, as soon as I stopped fighting the extended wait, and began accepting it as reality, God began to show me how I can wait purposefully.  By drawing myself closer and deeper into Him.  Ah, yes, another lesson He had planted seeds in my heart about, a few months back.  It is all coming together.....

He is showing me, through this book, that "our relationship with Him suffers when it is based on me giving to God only those things that I thought I could trust Him with and keeping the rest for myself."  You see, I quickly snatched up my son and his homecoming when I heard that it would be a longer wait.  I lost trust in God and tired to "figure things out" on my own.  Doing this only brought upon me a grave sense of hopelessness.  There was absolutely positively nothing Jeff or I could do to prevent this delay.  The Lord needed me to replace Baby K back into the palm of His loving hands.  Which I was once again able to do.  With God's help.

God is showing me that, although He is not offering me a way around this hurt, He desires to show me a way through it.  Bringing us to a better place ~ a higher ground ~ on the other side of it all.  He wants to join Jeff and me in our "waiting room," and He is providing us with instruction that comes with a promise:  “Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”  (Philippians 1:6 NIV)

Once I allowed Him to remove the ugly lies filling my heart, and again welcomed His presence and lessons into our waiting room, He immediately wanted to address the vast array of emotions my heart was harboring: elation in meeting Baby K; gratefulness for the gift of our amazing son; a yearning to hold him in our arms again.......mixed in with feelings of frustration, anger, hurt, and helplessness toward the delay.  Toward God Himself, as He revealed to me.

He used friends, and many of your sweet personal emails/phone calls to help me realize that it was okay to be angry at God.  He is a big enough God to handle it.  Heck, He already knows my feelings, He just wanted me to admit them and bring them to Him, rather than carry them within.  He wanted to help heal me of them!  Can you believe it?!?  I carry a grudge toward Him, and He wants to help heal me!  Steadfast love, indeed!


I was reminded of the Psalms in all of this.  How David often started in negative feelings but by end of his writing, he was praising our Lord.  God. does. that!  He does that with our negative feelings toward Him!  That is why He wants us to bring such feelings to Him!  So that He can help us work through them!!!  So that He can bring us to a place of trusting Him again!  Astounding!

It's okay to feel hurt toward, or angry with, God.  It's what we do with these feelings that matter.  I needed to give my feelings toward God.....to God!  I don’t have to understand Why.  I just NEED. TO. FORGIVE. GOD!!!  Which is exactly what happened when I relinquished my feelings to Him.  He showed me that I  needed to "forgive" Him for letting me down.  For letting my heart hurt so deeply.  Instead of making me feel guilty for these feelings, He helped me release them to Him in the form of forgiveness.  Does that make sense?  Even though He never did abandon or forsake me, He wanted me to go through a form of "forgiving" Him......when, really, I am the one who should be asking for forgiveness for carrying such doubt and fear toward HIM!  A-m-a-z-i-n-g!!!

God knew.  He knew that I needed to give Him my negative feelings so that He could remove them at the roots.  In so doing, He is nurturing me back into my BELIEF and EXPECTANCY!!!

He is showing me that I do not have to carry guilt for my forms of doubt, fear and unbelief.  “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”  (Hebrews 4:16  NIV) p72

He is showing me that, instead, I can still approach Him confidently.  I can BELIEVE that God is FOR us not against us.  That He did NOT abandon or forget me and my family.  I can BELIEVE that He is right here with us.  Loving us.  Caring for us.  Protecting all three of us.
     “Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.”  (1 John 5:14 NKJV).

While waiting, we can believe and expect Him to follow through on everything.  He is the constant we can always count on.  As Karon states in her book, He wants me to look ahead instead of back.  He is waiting for me to expect what He has already guaranteed.  He wants us to BELIEVE.

“So the Lord said, “If you have faith as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be pulled up by the roots and be planted in the sea’ and it would obey you.“ (Luke 17:6 NKJV).

The Lord wants us to expect this waiting time to reveal to us a purpose far greater than anything we ever imagined.  He wants us to draw closer to Him in this.  Which we are.  I was tempted to run from Him, initially, but when I asked for His help, He gently placed His hand on my shoulder and quietly turned me around, toward Him.  And now, I am running straight into His loving arms to sustain me!

I am trusting that His ways are higher than our ways.  I am trusting that He is still in control of this adoption, and that He WILL be bringing our son HOME to us.  I am feeling Him stir an excitement of expectancy in me again.   THANK YOU, GOD!!!

In Karon's wise words, "Your expectations will sustain and lead you in the right direction.  Do not be afraid to expect too much from your Lord.  He will use whatever you give Him.......Give Him everything and it will come back blessed."

“He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully."  (2 Corinthians 9:6  NKJV)

Once again, I give to you, Lord, our son.  This adoption.  Our family.  I trust you to bring us all together.  I trust you to bring good out of all of this waiting.  I trust you to complete what you have started.  I trust you to protect Baby K and shower Him with love.  I trust you to knock our socks off with continued blessings.  I thank you, Lord, for helping to bring me back into this sweet place of belief, expectancy and trust in You.           AMEN.

Our God is Greater

WORDS OF MY HEART TODAY.

(Pause my blog playlist at bottom of blog before pressing play)


We have seen the enemy try to thwart God's plan of bringing His children into their Forever Families.

The most recent attempt being the threat of MOWA decreasing their workload to such a level that it would decrease Ethiopian adoptions by 90% a year! ~ leaving children in orphanages up to one full year longer!

We all PRAYED and watched God move HUGELY over this issue and there are now many new employees in this agency and they are ROCKIN' it!  Many of our AWAA families are passing court on the first court date!

Then we have witnessed a TON of movement of children getting matched with their families!  There was even another baby girl referral last Thursday, making the total referrals SEVEN last Thursday alone!  Amazing to think of the details God orchestrates to bring lives from Ethiopia together with lives here in the United States.  Only Him!

Another PRAISE for today........a precious AWAA family had been waiting for a very KEY paper to be signed by one particular gentleman from southern Ethiopia ~ required for their dauhter's adoption to be final.....and after EXTENSIVE WAITING!!!!!.......and persistent attention from AWAA!!!.........this paper was SIGNED TODAY!

Filled with PRAISE for God and ALL that He does on our behalf ~ and on behalf of His precious children ~ in Ethiopia and all other countries, including our own!  He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world! 1 John 4:4.


I am clinging to this verse amidst all the ups and downs of this rollercoaster called adoption.

Amidst my praise, I beckon you ~
Lord, you know what the Mullis and Henderson families need tonight.  May you show your mighty POWER and remove all obstacles for these families.  TONIGHT!  As we slumber.  May we awaken to evidence of you shaking things up for the positive, on behalf of our AWAA friends!

Then, today, we heard of potential further delays!  Go to this link http://adoption.state.gov/country_information/country_specific_alerts_notices.php alert_notice_type=notices&alert_notice_file=ethiopia_7  to read more about it!  (I thought this was all resolved!?!?)  We are on our knees, once again!  Please take control of this, Lord!

Lastly, we THANK YOU that we are in the #1 spot, but we still don't know when it is that we will meet our baby boy or babies.  Praying our wait "at the top" is short and that we are OFF THE WAITLIST very soon!  {big sigh}

Wouldn't want this adoption to be in the hands of any other than Our God!

"If our God is for us, then who could ever stop us!

If our God is with us, then what can stand against!?!?

Our God is Greater.  Higher than any other.  
Awesome in Power.

Our God!"

Blessings or Burdens?

(First, Scroll to bottom of blog and hit "Pause" button.
Then return to this video and hit the "Play" button.
Worth listening to this ~ all the way to the end!)


Katie Davis says it so well on her blog (click here).
"I live with these human eyes, and with these human eyes of mine I label. I label one thing as good and one thing as bad. I label moments as blessing or burden. And I forget that all this labeling, it is not my right, not my place, not mine to do. To declare what is a gift in my life and what is a curse is to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, to sit in the garden full of abundance and beauty and choose the forbidden. The knowledge of good and evil, that was never intended for me. Could I, like Jja Ja Maria just quit my labeling and say, "Whatever God wants. Whatever HE wants!".....

....."And if every good and perfect gift is from above, and a Good and Beautiful God can create only good and beauty then these moments that I choose to label as loss and suffering, they are really good and beautiful, perfect gifts?".....

......"Suffering, pain, loss, shame – all these things I have blamed on a broken world, Satan even. But can’t a broken world and even Satan only give what God allows? Suffering, pain loss and shame are only these things because I label them as such. Because I, a sinner, choose to eat from the tree, choose to turn away from nail-scarred hands and ignore the grace and miss the gift. He is beautiful and everything He creates is beautiful and if I choose to label it suffering I am choosing to miss the beauty that is freely offered me."

Read her entire post HERE.  It speaks well of where I am today.  Trying to focus on life's Blessings rather than Burdens.

What if our trials in this life are your blessings in disguise, Lord?  Help me no longer try to control things so that they fit within my timeline.  My idea of "right."  Help me NOT doubt you, your Word, nor your Promises, Lord.

I know you hear my plea....if I BELIEVE.  I DO  BELIEVE, Lord.  Please help me in my unbelief or doubt.  I believe YOU ARE STILL IN CONTROL.

I STILL CHOOSE YOU!

SIX MONTHS DTE!

Well, I can't really say that we thought we would be here.  But we are.  So many families were getting referrals before the end of the projected wait time, that we had hopes of it not taking the full estimated 6 months.


Then the wait for infant boys got extended to 5-8 months.


GUESS WHAT!?!?!?  WE ARE HAPPY TO BE DTE SIX MONTHS!  


This means that we are IN the journey!  This means that we are over halfway to our little babe(s)!


My positive energy and collection of faith has been refueled!  We feel blessed to be on this journey to Ethiopia.  This precious journey to create our family!  We are privileged to be here!  We feel so blessed!


Therefore, WE CELEBRATE 6 MONTHS DTE!  


Our monthly celebratory "DTE Date Night," however, will have to wait until hubby gets home from his annual guys ski trip (Wednesday).  I have a special dinner planned, thanks to a dear friend who is a great fisherman!  {hint! hint!}


Please continue to join us in celebrating six months of waiting!  Lord, may you bring us to our little one(s) very, very SOON!!!


p.s....just networked my blog with FB!  Click to follow on FB, if you'd like (on right of blog below followers)

THE REFERRAL DROUGHT HAS ENDED!

THE FLOOD GATES ARE OPENING!   

FIVE referrals in two days!

Can you give me a good ol' WOO HOO!!????!!!!????

YES!  This big number represents where we are.........

#3 for an infant boy!

AND 

#3 for unrelated children!

We are also now number SEVEN for siblings!

It is SO refreshing, motivating and EXCITING to see MOVEMENT!

Children are FINALLY getting matched with their FOREVER FAMILIES!  Go, GOD!

It has felt like such a long, dry drought!

May the FLOOD GATES be flung WIDE OPEN for all agencies!!!!!

THE WAITING ROOM

Don't you LOVE it when God meets you right.where.you.are..........???????...........


Okay, so I would be lying if I said the projected increased waiting did not devastate my momma heart.  I would not be truthful if I lead you to believe that no doubt or unbelief ever entered my heart when I read the email notifying us of this lengthened wait period.  A lot of "yucky talk" came out of my mouth at first.  Words of doubt.  Unbelief (or at least questioning of God's desire for good in my life).


Thankfully, I have a wonderful husband who pointed out the "yucky talk" that I was saying.  Thankfully, we have a Heavenly Father that understands when we are trying SO HARD to cling to Him, His plan and His timing ~ when it seems so different from our own.


Thankfully, God met me.  Right. Where. I. Was.  In a heap of tears.  Full of doubt.  Full of angst at the thought of waiting possibly TWO MORE MONTHS before laying eyes on our little babe(s).  He helped chase away the "yucky talk" and replaced it with His truth.  Thus, my last post.  


This morning, I found myself better able to breathe.  Better able to picture us waiting that long if we have to.  I could better see and feel God's presence.  Well, God didn't stop there.  This morning, before heading out to church, I quickly checked in on my emails.  And I found a sweet post in our Yahoo group, from Allison.

SUCH GOOD STUFF THAT I HAD TO SHARE IT WITH ALL OF YOU!  

Afterall, don't we ALL find ourselves waiting on God at some point in our lives?  For many of us, the waiting period is now.  May her encouraging words that summarize a book called, "You're Late Again, Lord! The Impatient Woman's Guide to God's Timing", by Karon Phillips Goodman bless and lighten your heart.  It sure did lighten mine, while challenging me to consider how I was going to respond to this lengthened time in our "waiting room!"

*We can renew our spirit and strength while we wait. Isaiah 40:31 - Those who WAIT on the Lord SHALL renew their strength.

*Moving closer to God every day is something you can do in the wait time. "You don't have to wait patiently when you learn to wait purposefully."

*The waiting time can be productive and dynamic. This "waiting room" is here so I can rediscover what I've lost and learn what I need to do. It is there so I can renew my strength and my spirit and move closer to God. 

*"You can't wait purposefully and control the rest of the world at the same time." (I love that!)

*Waiting is not about what is happening on the outside, it is about what is happening on the inside. 

*God has a plan, a blessed syllabus for your life, and it's always charted from the inside out. 

*Each wait should get us closer to God and grow us so we see God better. 

*One of the reasons we are so hopelessly annoyed by the time we spend waiting is because the events are often completely out of our control. We are forced to sideline our plans until someone else completes his. Then we try to seek more control and we can't so we grow more frustrated. The key is surrendering into God's arms and letting Him comfort me from the inside out. 

*GOD'S sufficiency strengthens our spirit. 

*Develop the faith to turn to God FIRST, not last. 

*God wants you to come closer, but you can't do that if you're fighting Him and arguing with Him; if you can't give up the control you think you need. 

-------
GOD blessed me through a few other incidents today as well, which I will save for my next post.  SO MUCH in one day!  THANK YOU, LORD!  However, I want to leave you with this.  The first hour of my day.  May it speak to each of you in your own individual way.  May it help you find God in your "waiting room."  May it challenge you to consider how you will spend extra time in your "waiting room!"  Thank you, Alison, for joining my in the "waiting room" and blessing my day!


Please share with me if you hear God pose a specific way in which you can wait purposefully.............
Have a blessed week, everyone!