Pilgrimage

Adoption is an expensive endeavor (as was our adoption, I might add...it cost Jesus dearly) We have already put about $12,000 toward bringing William and Melissa home. This was given, by the grace of God, in the form of work for Richard, given during our slowest time of the year. When we called Mandy and Cathie to move forward with this, we did not have any money. The week before we had taken all we had saved for our "slow season" and paid off our debt. We were going into a season when there is traditionally no work (grass doesn't grow in the winter...even in Texas)with no saved money...but no consumer debt. Then, after two years, Richard finally says it's time to adopt. We did not have the money for our home study, but I scheduled it any way. I had to send Cathie $800 on Friday, Thursday we had just enough to get us through the week, but not the money for our hs. Friday, we received a check for $880.00. When I talked to Mandy about getting things started on their end, she told me it would cost $7290, of which we had none. Add to that doctor visits, vaccinations, passports, USCIS fees, and we were looking at nearly $10,000 needed to move forward. During our home visit with the sw, she told us we would have to install a fence around the swimming pool, before the children came home. Great I thought...another couple thousand dollars we don't have, and need now. [For those of you who don't know us, Richard has been working with a major home builder for over a year now...DRH] Around this time we received a couple of phone calls from our supervisors at DRH. They were trying to cut costs, so in doing so the construction trailers had to go. They wanted us to come and remove the porches, building materials, and fence. In doing these jobs we made enough money to cover what we needed to move forward...and collected enough fence from the jobs to fence around the pool. God is so good to us. He put it in our hearts to adopt, He opened closed doors in Uganda, He provided everything we needed: right when we needed it. He is indeed faithful.

Why then do I doubt? As I sit here I wonder how in the world are we ever going to have enough money to pull this off. Air fare alone is going to reach nearly $7000. In addition we need $9500 for various fees and such in Uganda, plus around $3000 to complete the adoption here in Texas. Any day now we could receive that last piece of precious paperwork from USCIS, and we have only a tiny fraction of the money we need saved. Nevertheless, His truth still stands, He is faithful. Is He not able to do all things? Is He not able to do exceedingly more than all we can ask or even imagine? Has He not already done the impossible, just two short months ago? In providing what is normally a full quarters worth of income for us in just one month?
Pray for me, that I would keep my eyes on Jesus, trusting fully in Him. Pray for our family as we wait upon the Lord. Pray for William and Melissa, that the Lord would prepare their hearts to receive us, just as His Spirit, prepares our hearts to receive Him. Pray for the Lord's provision, because with out Him, we can do nothing.

We had a Greek feast with four other families on Monday. The kids have been studying ancient Greece in school, as has my friend J. and her son. She had a great idea to have a feast with the kids, complete with Olympic games. I love to go to actvities that she plans. When J. plans a party, she goes all out. I love this about her. God has given her a gift for hospitality. She made signs, torches, gold medals and more. She also planned a wonderful meal of Greek foods for us all to sample.

Nope, that is not a Greek goddess, that is my friend J, all decked out in her Grecian best.

Most the children were willing to try all the strange food, except for the rice in grape leaves. The adults however, loved those.

After dinner, we began our Olypmic games. Couldn't have the games with out the passing of the torch. We had Javelin, Discus, Relay, and Chariot Racing.

N. only five years old, and an expert with the javelin. Check out Noah's form with the discus.
I didn't get any pictures of the chariot races, but rest assured they were every bit as exciting as the famous scene from Ben Hur. It was a great time for us all. Thanks J. for pulling it all together!