We are so thrilled to introduce you to our soon-to-be son. We aren't allowed to give his name publicly yet, but God knows it! Many of you know that we have spent years working with kids in difficult circumstances. We've been working to fight poverty and trafficking, and have gotten so many kids sponsored (feeling like you want to do more? See waiting children with Compassion International here). Next to telling people about Jesus, there is nothing I feel more called to. Over the years, we've interacted with many orphans, and God has just placed on our hearts the desire to do more. There are millions of orphans, and we can't be family to them all, but we can be to someone. We started asking the Lord if He had someone for us, and as we felt led to pursue it, we prayed more and more. We started out looking for a younger, healthy sibling pair in Africa, and if it's any indication that God will take you where He wants you, it's that we are now pursuing an older, single boy with a serious heart condition in China! One of these days I'm going to write the blog post about how that happened... Our soon-to-be son is eight, loves school and legos, is apparently neat, friendly and happy (this is according to the people at the agency who have met him) and needs life-saving heart surgery. Having been through special needs in the past with our son, Toby, I can tell you that it was hard to say yes to this particular road, but we've been asking God for someone who really needed us, and God always knows what He's doing. We happen to be 20 minutes from one of the best pediatric heart hospitals in the nation, and have already had so much help from the medical community that it's humbling. The short version of our prayer request is that it may be too late for him to have the surgery, as he should have had it as a toddler, and we won't know until he gets here if it's even possible. We'd love for you to be praying with us, and praying for his heart and his protection and peace, and for our family as we make this transition which is going to be, in the words of my teenage daughter, "pretty epic." We appreciate you all so much! |