To answer your question....

Why are we adopting again? I know that many are asking that question because many have actually asked us .... WHICH I LOVE! I love having the chance to tell about God's heart and his story of redemption! Don't stop asking!

However, for the sake of time, I thought I would finally address the question here on the blog. And the reason I chose today, is because today is "Sanctity of Human Life Sunday". John Piper said something at one point about this issue that really resonated with my heart. I can't quote him exactly, because I can't find the quote. But the idea was this: To be pro-life is to be pro-adoption. Basically, supporting adoption is supporting life. For some reason, an orphan is an orphan because their mom or dad couldn't keep them, didn't want to keep them, or passed away. Whatever the reason they are an orphan, their mom chose life....and now she needs help honoring that choice. Sadly, the life an orphan lives isn't really much of a life. And for anyone who cares anything about social justice issues .... I read a marvelous quote today: "The right to life is the most basic of social justice issues."

So no, I'm not here to talk about abortion. I'm not here to talk about social justice issues. That one little paragraph was sufficient for that. I'm here to talk about why Aaron and I are heading down the path of adoption once again.

Well of course, the answer is because having four kids has grown boring. We need something to do with our time! Um. No. I must admit, I'm way more fearful this time than I was the first time we adopted. Five kids sounds insane to me. It sounds really, really hard. Every now and then I cry out to God telling him that he's got the wrong mom. I'm selfish. I'm tired. I'm not very nice, or patient, or loving, or fun, or any of those other things that moms are supposed to be. Yet He tells me I'm wrong because of who he is. He tells me that HE is enough for me. HE will equip me to be a mom of ... yes .... FIVE!

So long story long. Every agency has what's called a "Waiting Child List". Basically, it's a photo listing of children they have in their care who are waiting to be adopted, and not high on people's list for adopting. See, a lot of people adopt healthy infants. There's nothing wrong with this. We did this. (Okay, so, maybe minus the healthy part... but comparatively, even Malachi was healthy when looking at some of these waiting kids.) I would look at these lists, and shed a tear every now and then, or imagine if that child were mine ... but mostly I would say a prayer for the sweet little face that I was looking into. Until I saw two boys.

The agency we adopted Malachi from had up a picture of 2 brothers. Both had serious medical needs, and they were older children. (4 & 6 yrs old) Now, when I see children on these waiting child lists, I don't feel the need to adopt them. These two boys, however, did something vert different in my heart. The first time I laid eyes on them, I sent an email to Aaron with their picture attached. The subject line said, "PLEASE???". That's all I wrote. He never responded. Every few weeks, I would pull up that same list, and see those same eyes of those brothers staring at me through the screen. After several months of this, it got to the point where I was pulling up the list almost daily just longing to see their file categorized as "file under review". It never was. It still said "available". For almost a week, I cried and prayed over these boys daily. I couldn't help but wonder if God was leading us to adopt these boys. Surely he wasn't, but then .... maybe he was. So one day, I asked Aaron. I told him what I was feeling, and just asked him to pray about it. That began a process of us talking with friends who we trusted enough to be real with us about if we could handle this, talking with our social worker about if she would even approve us, and serious prayer. In the end, for many, many reasons - we did not have a peace about pursuing adopting these two boys. That said, we were lead to a peace about something else .... starting the adoption process again period.

Wait. What? See, those were actually Aaron's words. After praying about these boys, he felt like it was time to start the adoption process again. My response was not to be expected. "No!", was my response. I didn't want to "just adopt again". I wanted those boys. I thought we were being lead to those boys. Now that we knew that wasn't the case - adopting again just wasn't on the radar right now. God didn't let that sit well with me. After about a week, I finally understood that if I was willing to pursue adopting those two boys right now, why would I not be willing to pursue any child in need of a home....right now? So about a week later, we dove into selecting an agency. And here we are. Half way through the process. Un.Real.



Moving on.

We hit the ground running with this adoption. We've done this before, and knew what was expected of us, so we felt an urgency to do all we could do, knowing there was plenty of time to sit around doing nothing as we wait on governments. We have no question that God values adoption. We believe that He is for this, so nothing can stand against us. We believe that God is not going to leave us out on a limb when pursuing something so dear to his heart .... and that doesn't just mean bringing the child home - that means the ability to parent 5 children .... well. Parenting "well" is something Aaron takes very seriously. He values fatherhood more than any man I know. It's because of the fact that Aaron is my husband, the father of my children, that I can clearly see that God is providing. He provided Aaron as my children's earthly dad.  There's little else I need to be able to do this.

Anyway .... that's about it in a nutshell. Okay, maybe not a nutshell...

We are honored that God has guided us to this once again. We do not do this in our own strength, because we have little. We've seen the miracle of adoption before, and cannot believe that we get to see it again. Adoption, biological, whatever it may be .... God has chosen us to be a mom and a dad to some pretty amazing kids.

God chose life. I, as a woman, choose life. I value life. I value the life of my children, and the ones whose lives don't mean anything to anyone. I value it because God values it. God chose me, he values me .... so much that He chose to adopt me! To Him be the glory!