We are still here.
It has been 8 months since my last post on this blog but not a day or hour goes by that our adoption is not on our hearts and minds. We knew that the international adoption process would include a difficult time of waiting. We also knew that the international adoption process could involve many unexpected and difficult things. We had hoped that out adoption process would be smooth and trouble free and the process quick but this has not been the case. We have been stuck in this season of waiting for much longer than we thought and the state of international adoption in Ethiopia has been unstable and far more complicated than we ever thought it would be. I have thought about updating this blog for months but really didn't know what to say. We are waiting. Nothing is happening.
Last week Dan talked with our representative from our agency. The conversation was honest but discouraging. It left us feeling even more out of control and asking God "what now?" "Anything?" "Keep waiting?" "Is there something different?"
Our representative basically said this:
The state of international adoptions in Ethiopia is not good. The people in political office currently are NOT "pro international adoption"and are/have been working to make adopting children harder and slower than it was previously.
I have to believe that part of the motivation for this is of good intention- to make the process safer for children. To ensure that children are not carelessly being put up for adoption. That people are not using children for financial gain and that children being adopted are actual legitimate orphans. However we are also learning that the motives behind slowing down adoptions and making them more difficult may not always be about the kids but more about there own political bias.
After a number of gatherings in Ethiopia in the past year those in political power concluded they country relies on the funds coming in from other countries and agencies matching families with orphaned children from Ethiopia. Some of the money that we pay to our agency goes directly to the orphanages that our agency works with. That money helps feed, clothe, support all of the children living in the orphanage. Many/ most of whom will never be adopted. Because the number of orphans is so high in Ethiopia the country does indeed rely on money coming in from those agencies to help care for the children in these orphanages. So that may be the biggest reason that some in political office do not close the doors completely to international adoption in Ethiopia.
Right now they are simply creating policy (i.e.. hoops to jump through and paperwork to process) that makes the process significantly more difficult and significantly slower. It is a bigger and more complicated process for all levels involved. So we are seeing that slow down now and have been for over a year now. Very few cases processed. Very few children matched with families. Not just with our agency but across the board.
Our representative was very honest with Dan on the phone last week. Many agencies are pulling out of Ethiopia because they simply cannot afford to stay. If they do not have have children to match with their waiting families those waiting families start to leave the program. When families leave the program it becomes more difficult to stay financially afloat. When the agencies cannot make it financially they will stop their Ethiopian adoption programs.
In our time in the program our agency has had to close the doors on it's transition home in Ethiopia. This was a place where children who had been matched with a family came while waiting to come home. This transition home employed many Ethiopian people who had to lose their jobs when the home closed. But the agency simply couldn't afford to keep it open.
Our representative said that many agencies have pulled out of Ethiopia already and that those left are just hanging on as long as they can. Our agency is currently one of them. However it is hard to tell how long they will be able to "hang on" and stay afloat financially.
Dan's conversation with our representative brought me to my knees. I am deeply grateful for her honesty and transparency. What she had to say was just so far from what we hoped to hear. And this news brings so many more unanswered questions to our table. This news leaves me feeling even more powerless than I was already feeling and in the first couple of days left me questioning.
"What in the world is this supposed to mean for us?"
"Did we hear God right?"
"Are we mistaken?"
"Should we even be doing this?"
"Why? Why? Why?"
"What now?"
As I sought God and brought these questions to him I truly wanted to make sure we were indeed in line with his will. If we had been wrong, if we had done something out of his will, I just wanted to know and be given direction as to where we should actually move from here.
I truly ache for these children to come home. But is that just something in me? Is that something selfish and not what God has for our family? Maybe I listened to my own desires and not to Him. I brought these things honestly before him. Asking for him to give us direction. Asking for confirmation of this call. Or leading us elsewhere.
And this is what I "heard":
"Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Commit your way to the Lord;
trust in him and he will do this:
He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn,
the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.
Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when men succeed in their ways,
when they carry out their wicked schemes.
Wait for the Lord and keep his way. "
Psalm 37: 4-7, 34
God's truth spoke into the confusion. His clear voice into the muddled chaos. He reminded me of all that he did when initially showing us we were to adopt and by miraculously providing for us each step of the way. Every page I turned in the Bible seemed to say: wait. Be strong, take heart, and wait on him.
- Commit our ways to him.
- Trust in him.
- Be still
- Wait patiently for him.
- Keep his way.
- He will: give us the desires of our hearts and make the justice of our cause shine like the sun.
I believe that Satan wants the world to turn a blind eye to the poor, the weak, the fatherless. I believe it was his voice whispering to give up. Satan's voice whispering it's too hard and you must have heard wrong. And that our turning aside from the small role we believe God has called us to play in his work on behalf of the oppressed and fatherless would be actually be wrong.
God has continued to remind me of what he has already done to make clear his call on our lives in regards to adoption. He is continuing to confirm this each day I come to his word. He even brought another believer into my life (standing on the sidelines during our kids soccer practice). I had no clue this person was a Christian and no clue that both of her children were adopted. But she is and they were and there in the middle of the soccer fields she shared her story and she spoke encouraging, life giving words into our situation:
It is hard, but HE is faithful. It is unknown and uncertain but HE knows it all. And in the end is is all WORTH IT.
And God in his wisdom took us through those questions and answers through the past couple of weeks so that we would be a bit more prepared for what is happening tomorrow.
Yesterday an email was sent by our agency to all of the families in the Ethiopian program announcing a conference call to held tomorrow- Friday to discuss "the current state of adoption and what that means for our families."
It doesn't sound good. I don't know exactly what the call will entail. It may be a repeat of Dan's conversation with our representative or it may be that they are closing the program.
Some days I just want to scream. Some days I want to cry. Some days I just feel a panicked anxiety over the "hows" the "whens" the "whys?" But today God has given a peace.
Because he is still good. He is still in control. He will fulfill his purposes and keep all of his promises.
We are asking for your prayers.
- For the call tomorrow. For us to hear the news with discernment. For us to ask the right questions. For us to hear God's voice.
- For us to be given what we need to "wait on him".
- For clear direction.
- For perseverance.
- For increased faith and trust in His purpose and timing.
- For some movement- anything bringing us closer to bringing our children home.
- For hope.
I read these words this morning:
"We do not want you to be uninformed brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia.
We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life.
Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death.
But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.
He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us.
On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us, as you help us by your prayers.
Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many."
2 Corinthians 1:8-11
We are not facing the same kind of danger that Paul was referencing here in these verses. But we can relate to him in that what we are facing feels, at times, like more than we can endure. We have felt hopeless and have felt despair. But like Paul we are believing that these times and these troubles are happening that we might not rely on ourselves but on God- who raises the dead.
We are setting our hope on him.
We are asking (like Paul asked the Corinthians) that you continue to pray for us and for our children.
And we are looking toward the day ahead that we get to see God's gracious favor granted in response.
