While this is the last installment of Lindsay and Jeff's story, something tells me this is just another chapter in their book. Watch and see how their story finishes by visiting their website at: http://www.gofundme.com/15o798 Donate and help bring their little boy home!~Kassie
I was just a little girl as I sat in the black leather rocking
chair staring at a tiny picture of a little Korean baby girl with “scare hair”
and cute fat cheeks that needed kissing so badly. This picture was not just a
picture of any baby though, this was my sister! We had adopted my brother from
Korea years earlier and now by this point I knew that having a new sibling was
going to be wonderful! As the months passed by we had only a few pictures to
remind us of who we were dreaming of and who we were working so hard to bring
home! So my pastime was to look at this tiny little picture and think about
what she would be like. I still vividly remember the day we brought her home to
finally be part of our forever family. She was laying out on the living room
floor this cute little 6 month old baby, and I was filled with love for her! As
time went on my relationships with my siblings grew and by the time I was able
to imagine my dream family I knew that I wanted to adopt children just as much
as I wanted to have children. When Jeff and I were engaged we both agreed that
adoption was one of the ways we would love to build our family through. At
several times in our marriage we have contemplated starting the adoption
process, but God had always closed the door for us. The first time was when we
lost our Samuel and were told not to have children and the second time we tried
to adopt was at the end of struggling to get pregnant with our second child
Judah. My older sister and I are close in age and are best friends, and I
wanted the same for our children. So as soon as I was done nursing Zion we
started trying to have a second child, but yet again we were greeted by many
disappointing negative pregnancy tests as well as some heartache from many
early pregnancy losses. I just could not understand why it always had to be so
hard to build our family. So I decided that this must be the time to adopt. I
was gung-ho my husband was not! Which was so frustrating to me since we both
had decided that adoption was what was right for our family before we had even
been married yet. I pushed and prodded and one time even challenged my husband
as to why he was “ dragging his feet on something we already knew we wanted” He
is a wonderful man and was patient and kind even in my frantic rush to build my
dream family with specifically spaced ages for all our children. He just
sweetly told me that he knew it was not the time for us, and that he knew God
had a child designed for us and He was willing to wait for THAT child. He told
me that he really felt like God didn’t want us to do anything until the end of
January. Which I am going to be honest, really just seemed annoying to me! Then
one day, early in January or friend called us and told us that she was praying
for us and she had a name that kept coming to mind about us, and she always was
seeing it with the name Zion. I asked her what it was, and she told me “ It is
Judah” when I looked up the name Judah it means “ this time I will praise the
Lord” the last son I had carried, I had not praised the Lord for, I had cried
and grieved and asked why over and over. It felt like this time he was giving
me a chance to do it right, and on the 17th of January I found out that I was
pregnant with our second child. The “ annoying request Jeff had made to wait on
God until the end of the month, was clear to me now! How could I have been so
foolish to try to bully the man I knew loves the Lord and the orphaned, into
doing a “ good thing” but in my timing and not God’s. I asked for my husbands
forgiveness which he quickly gave, and then made a decision to do 2 things this
time. The first thing was to never try to force adoption on my husband again
until God had shown both of us that the time was right, and second to “ this
time Praise the Lord”. on September 17th 2010 our sweet Judah Jameson Joseph
was born, laying the second layer to our precious “foundations of sapphire”.
now I had 2 beautiful children and felt so blessed, but when I held my children
and snuggled and kissed them I still wished that we could do something for
children who never had a momma hold and kiss them each day. So I decided that
every night my daughter and I would pick a child on the waiting child photo
listing and pray for them together. We loved it! My daughter connected with
some of the children so much and would pray for them through the day as well.
She even would say “ can we please pray for just one more mom?” I was amazed at
the insight my daughter who was only 4 at the time had for the needs of these
children. Some with disabilities she had never seen or heard of at such a young
age. The requests she made for them were so applicable to the needs a child in
their situation would have, it made me see how pure and beautiful a child’s
prayers are, and why God loves to hear their requests to Him. In our time praying
for orphaned children we began praying for specific children a lot. To the
point were I felt we should see if we could find out more about them so that we
knew how to pray for them in an even more personal way. One child my daughter
and I had received information on to pray for, was on my heart a lot, and I
longed to see him with his forever family. We receive newsletters from my
siblings adoption agency, and in one of the newsletters we received I was
surprised and excited to see my little sweet boy who Zion and I had been
praying for every night. He was pictured in a beautiful story of a man who went
back to Korea to find his birth family and instead found the lost family he was
searching for in a home for the disabled
orphans in Korea, that are in the care of Holt International. Zion and I read
the article together and rejoiced in the fact that this article my lead him
home to his forever family. About a week later, I walked into our bedroom after
tucking our daughter in and saw the picture of this sweet boy torn out of the
newsletter and set on the edge of the bed. I asked my husband who torn it out,
and he said “I did!” Then he went on to ask me if I had read the article, I
told him yes I had. Then he pointed to the picture of the child Zion and I had
been praying would find his family and said I think we need to pray for this
little boy to find his family. I was so excited that God had given him a
passion for the same child as Zion and I had, and he never even knew we were
praying for him! After sharing that we had been praying for him to find his
family already, Jeff replied “ Then maybe we need to pray that God will show us
if we are his family!” from that day on God had multiple ways of showing us
very clearly that we were indeed that family! We were blessed to be picked by
the committee at Holt to be this sweet child’s family in January of 2012. He is
a beautiful timid and kind child whose caretakers love! He is perfect to
us! He is loved by us, and he is so wanted by his forever family! He is 3 year
old child now, and I desperately want the days that we have lost with him to be
redeemed in our arms! When I see my little girl staring at a little picture of
a little Korean boy, dreaming of him coming home, I know in my heart, this is a
beautiful thing!
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