But I can say for certain that for at least 4 years now God has placed on my heart an overwhelming desire to adopt more children... perhaps just one or if Ben decides than 3 more!
Perhaps we will adopt out of the foster care system here in the US, perhaps by the time we can adopt Haiti will allow families with more than 4 biological children to adopt or perhaps we fill find our children in Ethiopia or some other far off land! The "where" isn't the thing that weighs on my mind nearly as heavily as the "when".
I fight guilty feelings all the time for women who yearn to have children and yet are barren... and here I am with 5 of my own precious ones. But, I know in my mind that there are millions of children going to bed tonight without a family of their own...
Some of these numbers are years old and one might assume that they have increased but here is a small sampling of the number of orphans in the world:
Romania: 19,000 orphans in 2010
Kenya: 35,000 orphans in 1999
Rwanda: 400,000 orphans and only 5,000 in orphanges
Nigeria: there were about seven millions orphans in 2003 and that 800,000 more orphans were added during that same year. Out of this total number, about 1.8 million are orphaned by HIV/AIDS. With the spread of HIV/AIDS, the number of orphans is expected to increase rapidly in the coming years to 8.2 million by 2010.
Togo: an estimated 280,000 orphans under 18 years of age in 2005, 88,000 of them orphaned by AIDS
Sierra Leone: 340,000 orphans in 2005 (only a small percentage go to school).
China: 50,000 orphans... with no signs of slowing down.
Now prepare yourself for this...
India: over 25 million orphans.
OVER 25 MILLION ORPHANS IN INDIA.
I am speechless. I had to look it up a in a few different places just to make sure.
Lord, I know I must wait for your perfect timing. And I will. But, please Father be with the millions upon millions of children who don't have a Mama or a Daddy. In light of these numbers adopting 1 or 2 or even 3 seems like so little, but I know to the child that it means the world. Please put it on the hearts of my friends and family to do what they can to impact the life of the fatherless...please open doors for them to adopt. Please help me to be patient. And thank you so much for Vani and Helen and for your perfect plans for their lives.
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| Vani, Reb and Ella! Love this picture so much!! |
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| Serenity and Helen... how precious is this!! :) |
Isaiah 60:1-5a (New Living Translation)
1 “Arise, Jerusalem! Let your light shine for all to see.
For the glory of the Lord rises to shine on you.
2 Darkness as black as night covers all the nations of the earth,
but the glory of the Lord rises and appears over you.
3 All nations will come to your light;
mighty kings will come to see your radiance.
4 “Look and see, for everyone is coming home!
Your sons are coming from distant lands;
your little daughters will be carried home.
5 Your eyes will shine,
and your heart will thrill with joy,
2 comments:
I, too, felt a tug on my heart toward adoption -back when I was at your age/stage of life. I was very disappointed that hubby wasn't onboard with it. Of course I couldn't move ahead without him. I waited and prayed for a very long time. In the past three years God has answered my prayer differently than how I would have expected. I am now involved with over 1,000 orphans in Uganda -helping to improve their lives through better nutrition and education, most specifically! This summer my hubby plans to go to Uganda with me, and I just know his heart will be touched in a big way -it already has been, just learning about the ministry through me. God's ways are not our ways, nor are our ways His ways. That's for sure! Be patient. He will open (and close) the doors for the best possible outcome -the one that will bring Him the most glory. Hugs and prayers!
I love all of your pictures of your Uganda trips! I keep telling Ben that we will end up adopting as many Turkey Bottoms as we can or that God is going to send us overseas to be in Orphanage work of some sort. But, we will see what God has in store for us and pray that we will give Him the glory in those opened and closed doors!
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