A Surprise Under the Christmas Tree

Two weeks ago, I sat down and wrote this post, "I started this blog to share my love for Christ and the joy of His call in our lives. Little did I know the spiritual journey I was embarking on. Many dark, empty days were looming in the mere moments following the first letter I typed. The first few entries I wrote were full of excitement and praise, and my feelings dripped with overwhelming love for my Savior. But as the months went by and the trials became more painful and difficult to wade through, my words became fewer and my entries further and further apart, and the praise was harder to find on my lips. I'm a work in progress...never perfect, never close. Numerous words of anger, bitter tears, and screaming my rage at God, turned to defiance, rebellion, and utter silence to the God I once completely claimed as my victory. It's almost December 1st. Two year and a half years after our adoption journey began and still we wait. Our hope for our baby girl, Aselah, ended in May. Our expectation for 5 year old Kalekidan, was ripped away in August. We are the top of the waiting list. The most accessible age group. Special Needs accepted. Silence. God, where is this child You promised? The one we said we would make our own according to Your word in James? I am at a fork in the road. Our paperwork is expiring and all needs to be updated. Our finances are dwindling. My patience is growing thin. Do we continue on the path we felt laid out by God, but where we see doors constantly closing? Or stop and wait on Him?" That was 2 weeks ago. I never posted it. Nick and I were struggling with what direction we would go and we prayed hard that God would show up and show us the way. The following Sunday, Pastor Tim was speaking over the Sovereignty of God. How He is in control over the good and the bad. It was such a powerful message and helped me realize that it's not necessarily going to be easy but it needs to be all for His glory. We felt convicted to continue to move forward. It was more of chasing the paper trail, making trips to Chicago and Springfield for re-fingerprinting and certifying paperwork. Its time consuming, unexciting work, but has to be done to keep your file up to date. I called our adoption agency on Thursday afternoon to update her on our document status and heard the same phrase, "We don't have any children yet." I wasn't surprised. I would have been surprised to hear different. I told her that was fine, and we would continue to wait. Friday morning I went online to look at the waiting children for our agency. I look quite often and have never found a situation that fits our own. But this morning was different... The first child listed was a 6 year old girl. Just being curious, I clicked on her picture. This smiling little girl waving at the camera captured my heart in an instant. She was beautiful and you could just feel the joy in her smile. I immediately texted Nick and told him to look at her profile. We called the agency to get more information about this little girl called TA. We discovered that she is a 6 year old girl who was orphaned at the age of 1, due to the death of her mother. She fit every requirement we had for our adoption. I was in love. Nick was in love. This precious girl was our daughter. On Friday afternoon, Nick and I accepted the referral of our fourth child. We are so excited to announce the addition of Kellerstrass baby #4, Tarekua...more details to come!