3 families on urgent missions to rescue orphans

I never had any idea about how precious ADOPTION is...
I didn't realize how important, how life changing, how great it is needed, or how close to God's heart it is.

Having married my dear husband after recently becoming christians, and having 2 little ones so far in our family, I had no idea what it was all about when my husband told me he wanted to adopt one day...
so blessed was he at the thought that GOd had adopted us (sinners) into His family to be His children, when we received Jesus Christ as our Savior, that he already had a desire to one day welcome a child with out a family into ours.

It seems like an eternity ago to me...so much has changed in our lives, and my heart has changed...I understand--at least I'm starting to. It happened through many different ways, including meeting and learning about other adopting families, hearing more about God's love for the orphan and His commands for us to care for orphans, and learnng about wonderful ministries to orphans, including Reeces Rainbow.

I am continually amazed by the testimonies of adopting families...to see GOD our Loving and Good Heavenly Father at work, the Father to the fatherless. Our family can not take any credit for our 3 adoptions...HE changed and led our hearts to adopt 3 special needs children that noone had wanted, abandoned in the hospital and never taken home. He gave us the money, opened doors and helped us through the process, and He is still showing us our need for Him--our insufficiency and His sufficiency-- as well as the blessing of each life that He creates and how they will blossom if loved.

I wanted to share about 3 amazing families who are laboring to bring home precious orphans. Please go read their story for yourselves...you will not regret it and you will be blessed to see the heart of God in action. Pray for these families...pray these children home, and if possible, give to their fundraisers and spread the word for them. Each one has an urgent need to get their precious ones home quickly.
Our adopted children did not have serious medical needs and they were young enough that they could be adopted (though we labored to get them ASAP before they'd be sent to an institution where sometimes adoption isn't possible or they may not live long). These kids are in much more difficult situations and need God's swift deliverance.

The Rogers family is returning to Eastern Europe where they brought Claire and Malachi home from this past year. They are seeking to adopt 2 older children with Down Syndrome..."Bernadette" (age 15) and Mason (age 10) as God has given them a heart of love to welcome them into their family before Bernadette ages out in November and can not longer be adopted. Erika said, "how could I let her never know the love of a mommy and daddy?" Their 7 children are so excited to bring them home--it is a precious thing. Having just finished adopting 2 children and a move in the near future, they are looking to God to provide the ransom for these children. Their blog is www.arainbowfamily.blogspot.com

Please read this heart-wrenching story about Princess Lyla...an orphan with Down Syndrome. Her family fell in love with her and were led to adopt other orphans when they were told she was too sick to be adopted. After many turns and twists in the story, they are now laboring to adopt their princess after all but time is of the essence. Their blog is:
http://thestarsaligned.blogspot.com/2012/03/love-multiplied-giveaway.html

The third family I wanted to tell you about is the Salem family. They adopted 2 beautiful little girls with Down Syndrome shortly before we adopted Lily and Joshua, and we've been blessed to see their transformation since coming home. God has worked again in their hearts to surrender all to Him, and go to rescue a 14 year-old girl Faith (with CP) who has lived neglected and unloved in a terrible institution for 14 years...amazingly, she only weighs 14 pounds. Amazing that she is even alive. Please go read their story too and pray she is adopted quickly so she can get the serious medical attention and loving care that she deserves. Their blog is: www.nogreaterjoymom.com.

I hope you are blessed by their stories as much as we are. Even greater blessing is being a part of their story by coming along side and praying and giving. Adoptions are not cheap but God is able to provide...and often, He uses people like you and me.

Out of the lips of babes

I hope that each of you had a blessed "Easter"...better named "Resurrection Day" as we celebrate and remember the day our Lord Jesus Christ arose.

We had a special day together as a family going to church, singing hymns at home together, searching for eggs just for fun, and we like to watch "Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ." Only got through 1/2 of it as its a long movie...but a great one.

I hope this week to have some more quiet moments though to think about God's wondrous love for each of us, that He would send His beloved Son Jesus into the world to die in our place so that we might live eternally...if we believe and trust in Him. In our busy household I've been lacking quiet moments to ponder His love and spend time with HIm. Our family is working on implementing a schedule to better manage our day and seeking to work into it what we feel is really important...time with the Lord being one!

As we were singing hymns I'm always blessed by the richness of the words. I didn't grow up learning lots of them as John and I became christians as young adults so we are always learning new ones, though some are now familiar and are favorites. I was thinking of putting a couple on my post and had trouble deciding which ones. :)

Then I started thinking about my young children's favorite songs when we worship together.
Sean, our 6 year-old adopted son with Down Syndrome, has one favorite that he always picks if we ask him...which also has been the favorite of Elsie our 5 year-old for a few years...

"Christ Arose!"

The first verse says:
"Low in the grave He lay--Jesus my Savior! Waiting the coming day--Jesus my Lord!
Up from the grave He arose! With a mighty triumph o'er His foes. He arose a victor from the dark domain, and He lives forever with His saints to reign. He arose! He arose! Hallelujah! Christ arose!"
Imagine lots of young children loudly singing with gusto and standing up with arms in the air singing "Up from the grave He arose!..." :)

Lily, our 4 year-old we adopted who also has DS, loves a song we recently learned with hand motions...of which she knows all of them (usually does them a few seconds before we do).

"He made the stars to shine...twinkle twinkle!
He made the rolling seas...splish splash!
He made the mountains high...so high!
And He made me...thumpety thumpety thumpety thump!
And this is why I love Him,
Because He bled and died...
The Lord of all creation,
became the crucified."

Now they may really like those songs because of the fun hand motions, the tune, how exciting it sounds, or because we sing them alot... but there are also other "fun" songs we sing that they like (itsy bitsy spider, old macdonald, etc) and if I asked them what they wanted to sing, Sean and Elsie I'm sure would say "He arose!" Sean can even say it now (and not just sign it).

I can't explain what a blessing that is to my heart...and how it teaches me too.
The Bible says that out of the lips of infants God has ordained praise. They may not yet totally understand all the words and its deep meaning...but they are praising God and delighting in doing so.

May we too delight in giving Him praise for He alone is worthy.
Hoping we all may take time to ponder His amazing grace and wondrous love shown to us on the cross, trust fully in His grace and power, and praise Him with our songs and with our lives.

EEG etc.

Joshua had an EEG this morning...his daddy and his big sister Haylee took him. Poor guy had to be woken up early (which he hates) to get ready and to eat his breakfast. I wasn't sure how he'd tolerate it (as he doesn't like his head to be held because he likes to move it around alot) but sounds like he did pretty well... he even went to sleep for half of it. Even when they did the strobe light to see if it would elicit a seizure he stayed asleep! I wish I could load the sweet picture of him with his head bandaged up and a big smile on his face but my phone doesn't do that high tech stuff :) Hoping that we find out some helpful information from the results from the Neurologist soon. He wll need an MRI but we had to postpone it until he is cleared with a cardiologist.
Lily is scheduled for a sleep study initial appointment coming up too. We also have to get her fit for GLASSES...already posted about how challenging that will be (she is alays tring to knock off mine and John's glasses). By the way, I've been noticing CHUB on her arms, legs, and face....didn't think it would ever happen. Her hair now is longer than her big sister Elsie's which grows very slowly partly because she always has a pony tail in it :)

PS...our goat Heidi finally stopped maaing for her babies that died and seems to be eating well again. So glad :) The goat kids of our other goat (a La Mancha) are so cute and fun to watch running and leaping and jumping all around just for the joy and fun of it.