Why China

Most people ask this question on their blogs because they have been asked why China and not a domestic adoption. We've already been down that road and know that the only true answer is because that is where God has our child.

This time we find ourselves being asked, "why China, what about Vietnam ... didn't you say that God was sending you to Vietnam this time." This could become a real source of discouragement to some about how we hear what we think the Lord is telling us to do or a direction to go. I pray that our story does not become one of those times for others and that by explaining ourselves, people will be encouraged to step out if faith where the Lord is calling them and be okay with that direction changing if that too if what the Lord is saying.

When we began to talk again about adoption (oh, before we left to get Claire) it was not an easy decision. It became even harder as we were in China with our precious little girl and she was beating us and herself us. It was kind of like during labor when the soon to be mother says, this will be the LAST! Talk of adoption came up again soon after we returned, James was willing to wait a while, but I felt a need to press forward. I never would have pushed or manipulated the situation, but I continued to investigate agencies and the China waiting child program. As doors began to close to us with China's new regulations, we began to look into another program. That was when we received information about James being deployed rather soon to Iraq.

James going to Iraq was going to delay our adoption by months. This just did not seem right to us. We could not know if we would be considered for a waiting child until we found that waiting child and we saw an agency that we liked also had a Vietnam program. We prayed and stepped forward.

I will be honest, I was really trying to wrap my mind around going to Vietnam, it was not coming easy. I could not picture what it would look like, I was not getting excited about the trip there. I was trying to figure out ways to stop by China on our way to Vietnam. James was getting a little frustrated by this extended travel and mission of mine. Not that he didn't want to go to China, but because it just did not seem possible financially or with the time it would take. We both agreed that we wanted to return to China at some point, but we were trusting what we had heard about getting our dossier ready for Vietnam.

As I wrote before, it was the day after our dossier was ready to go to Vietnam that we found Cade. He stole our hearts and we knew he was to be ours, we just were not sure how it could happen now that we were "paper ready" for Vietnam. But just as the Lord had made a clear path for our dossier to get ready for Vietnam, He had a clear path for us to switch to China. It ended up that if we had not done what we did for Vietnam, we would not have been ready to accept Cade's referral. It did cost us a few hundred dollars more that it would have if we were simply getting ready for China, but we at least had the opportunity.

I know that Cade would have ended up in our family, some how some way. After all, he is the child that the Lord designed to be a part of our family. The blessing is in the way He did it and the confirmation He provided. We are forever grateful for His purpose and plans in our lives and for bringing us to Cade.