Why Adoption? Plan A or Plan B?

Simply, adoption has always been God's plan A for our family.

That's not to say that we pursued adoption from day 1, but to acknowledge that the Lord's plans for our lives are perfect.  We did 'try' for biological children without success.  Part of me always knew that adoption was going to be God's way of forming our forever family.  Because of this, we did not pursue any fertility treatments after our first year of this 'trying'.

For those of you who have been through this initial phase, you are familiar with all of the feelings that accompany these efforts.  Even though we immediately turned our hearts towards adoption, we still needed some time to solidify our relationship & heal before moving forward.

Admittedly, I was ready long before my husband to leap into the world of adoption.  He is much more methodical & introspective and God bless him for this.  I believe we are moving with the exact timing the Lord has for our family.

Through the preparation time, I have done a lot of research.  Of course, I hit the Internet pretty hard looking through numerous adoption agencies and all the specifics about the process.  In retrospect, nothing prepares you for the ups and downs of living through the process itself.

One source that has given me the resolve to continue on this daily walk is the word of God.  Have you ever looked up how many times the word 'orphan' is referenced in the Bible??  Wow.  In the beginning of this journey I wanted to search out the Biblical foundation for adoption and discovered that someone else had already done a great Bible study on this very topic.

Imagine . . . God had spoken to someone else on a topic that is so close to His heart!!!!  I'm chuckling at this point because of course He had.  Adoption is so close to His heart because our adoption into the Kingdom of God as His children was His plan.

Yet to all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.  John 1:12-13

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!  And that is what we are!  1 John 3:1 

These scriptures are only a glimmer of the Father's heart for adoption.  I'm sure I'll sprinkle in more as this journey continues, but if you are interested in searching this out for yourself I would encourage you to visit the Home for Good Foundation website @ www.hfgf.org.  The bible study is a free download and is sure to encourage and deepen your understanding of the Father's heart for you and the children of this world without a family.

Be prepared - it may also change your life for the good!

God bless you as you continue your own personal journey in life.  Thank you again for joining us in ours.



Welcome

Hello All!  Welcome to the Magner Family adoption journey!

I hope that this blog will serve to keep all of our family & friends up to date on our adoption status and enable everyone to engage with us as we journey to bring our children home.

The BIG update is that our dossier was sent to Haiti on September 22nd! Yeah God! The dossier is the finished product of over a year of our "paperwork pregnancy".  This is certainly cause for celebration.

We are now officially waiting for our referral.  This is when we will hear the details about our children for the first time.  Hang on to your chairs if you haven't heard - we may be adopting up to three children (all siblings)!   Yes, at the same time.

At this point, we do not know how long it may take to receive our referral.  You may hear the cries of rejoicing all over the world when we receive this news!!!! 

For now, I am busying myself with beginning to learn Haitian Creole.  I have always struggled with language learning, but think I'm doing pretty well.  I'm using Pimsleur audio system.  I am very impressed with my language acquisition at this point and I'm actually having fun.  I can now successfully ask myself , 'Are you an American?' and also tell myself, 'I understand Haitian Creole a little'.  Aren't you impressed?

I think Mocha, my beloved pooch, is learning along with me since I listen to the Cd's on the computer & walk around carrying on conversations with myself in Creole.  I wonder if dog commands are part of the "Basic Haitian Creole" first 10 lessons??

My goal for learning the language is to be able to understand the needs of our children both physically and emotionally and then be able to respond with the support they need from a parent.  I want to be able to understand their heart.  It makes me cry already to think of how much it is possible to love children I don't even know yet.  

Please join in prayer with us that our children would remain safe and healthy during this entire process. 

Thank you for joining us on this journey of faith and hope for the future!