Our Orientation with AGCI

Even though we had done a 2 hour orientation with Bethany, we now needed to do an orientation with All God's Children Int. Being an agency located in Portland, Oregon we would spend an hour or so on the phone with Tiffany, our inquiry coordinator. We were so excited for this phone call because it meant the ball was rolling. As we went through a long list of items to discuss we were suddenly hit with the financial burden this adoption would bring. It's hard to understand how adoption costs can be so high, especially when that is one of the biggest obstacles to people pursuing adoption. Millions of orphans waiting for homes and it takes tens of thousands of dollars to make that happen. While I don't understand this, and I could get angry about it, this is the reality of it. So we just need to accept it. By the end of our orientation call with Tiffany we were pretty discouraged. We thought we would get off the phone with her, sign our contract, drive to the nearest notary, then to FedEx to overnight the paperwork. Our plan was the sooner the better! That was not how things went. I was reminded of the verse Proverbs 16:9 "In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps." That was only the beginning of the battle though. Scott and I spent most of that day praying, some separately, some together. It seemed impossible that this adoption would happen when we hung up the phone. We had to remind ourselves over and over again that we walk by faith and not by sight (2 Cor. 5:7) , that with God all things are possible (Matt 19:26), that God does not call the equipped, He equips the called. (1 Cor 1:26-31) He would provide for it and we needed to surrender our worries and put our trust in Him. All of this runs through the mind, but convincing the heart, well that's a bigger battle.

Later that evening I was checking email and a friend had emailed me about a passage of scripture in 1 Kings 17:8-16. You can read it for yourself, but the gist is that this widow only had enough flour and oil to make one more loaf of bread for her and her son, and through God's provision her jar of flour and her jug of oil never ran out, and they provided not only enough bread for her and her son, but also for Elijah. God replenished it day after day. These verses really spoke to my heart. So much so that I went to the garage, grabbed an empty mason jar, printed out a part of this passage, taped it to the jar and put it on our windowsill in the kitchen. We talked with the kids about it and then we shared that just like the Lord provided flour and oil and replenished the widow's jar we believed that the Lord would provide for us and replenish our finances every time we needed money for the adoption. It was exactly the encouragement Scott and I needed to continue to move forward when we felt like everything had come to a screeching halt. That is the beautiful thing about God's word, it is our sole source of encouragement! (2 Tim 3:16-17)