Friday, April 29, 2016

This Hope is an Anchor for My Soul

***Update: as of Wednesday 4/27/16 we are officially "open" and Catholic Charities will begin showing our lifebook to prospective birth parents. In the adoption world we are "paper pregnant" at this point. We are very excited to be in this waiting period. Don't mind me if I jump every time my phone rings for the next while :). I am so excited about all of the unknowns in this process (which is so unlike me!) from gender to ethnicity to what the birth mom is like and the level of openness of the adoption. We could get a call for a match early in pregnancy or after the baby is born. We can't wait to see how our story will unfold and see all of these plans that God had in place long before the dream of adoption ever entered our hearts. The next step for us is to choose an attorney. CC has their own attorney that deals with the birth mom/dad and baby side of things. Our attorney will just be there to complete the finalization of the adoption from our end. Other than that we will be patiently ;) waiting to hear we are matched!

This past Sunday our preacher taught on Hebrews 6:19, "we have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure". First he discussed the common application of Jesus being our hope when the storms and waves of life are crashing around us but when we are anchored in Him we aren't thrown into the rocks, we can stand secure. But then he also discussed the idea that we need an anchor through the good times as well. In calm and peaceful waters it is easy for a boat to drift, without even realizing it, and before you know it you're crashing into the rocks and trying to figure out what happened. We need Him as our anchor through the good and the bad of this life. My prayer for our family is that we continue to stay anchored to Him through the highs of this journey as well as through the lows that may come.

Our next fundraiser is a yard sale coming up next week (May 6 &7). We have received an outpouring of donations for the sale. I am forever grateful to each and every one of you who have donated, prayed, helped sort items, watched Gentry, and on and on in order to make this possible. Thank you for living out James 1:27. We are all called to "look after orphans" in some way and I'm so grateful to each of you that are a piece of this puzzle!


A few pages from our lifebook which has been about a year in the making!