Last night I was reading “Adopted for Life” by Russell Moore and I came to chapter five entitled, “Paperwork, Finances, and Other Threats to Personal Sanctification”. Great timing if you ask me…
As you see to the right, I dove in last night and decided to create a ChipIn donation widget. I have been struggling with this concept for the last few weeks. Pulling in both directions of, “I don’t want to ask for money…” and “God is going to provide for this adoption and his people will help provide.”
So, after posting the widget, I laid down last night and began to read. I got toward the end of the chapter when Russell begins to speak about how he and his wife didn’t have the money to adopt, but they knew that God would provide.
One day a youth minister from another state came to his office and told him that he and his wife inherited $10,000 and they wanted to give the money to him to offset some of the costs of the adoption. Russell attempted to not accept the offer and the young youth minister asked if they had received all the money they needed. Russell said, “No.” This was the youth minister’s response…
“Well, then, I’m sorry to be disrespectful, but this isn’t really about you. I mean, we aren’t in a place where we can adopt right now, but we want to be a part of adoption. We think God is calling us to this. And it seems to me as though maybe you’re too, I don’t know, prideful or something to receive this.” I blinked. He looked me in the eye and said, “Maybe you just need to repent of your pride and self-confidence and just let somebody bless you.”
Wow! I never looked at my fear of asking as prideful or self-confident. I’ve always looked at it as, “If I work hard for this, I deserve it.”
I deserve it? This isn’t about me, like the youth minister said, this is about God and advancing his Kingdom. Who am I to say, “I’m not going to put myself out there and let God work because I’ve never had to ask for anything before.”
I’m ready to allow God to work mightily through this adoption process. I’m ready to give all honor, praise, and glory to Him. I don’t want this to be about what I was able to do, how much money I was able to save. I want this to be about God using his people to do his work…how humbling.
Now, this isn’t to say that we aren’t going to do our part…that we aren’t going to pinch pennies and save extra money we receive. We are coming along side God and his people, ready to do all we can to fulfill his will for our lives.
So, will you come along side us and help us fulfill God’s will? I guarantee, if you decide to partner with us, that you will be blessed beyond belief.
If so, the ChipIn widget allows you to securely make a donation through our PayPal account. And with great confidence, I assure you that every penny will go towards advancing God’s Kingdom through adoption.
Lord, thank you in advance for what you are going to do through Your people. Lord, I pray that through this, a little child may come to know you…or even a “passer-by”. Lord, help us and the people behind us, to give you all honor, glory, and praise.
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During our adoption process my mother passed away and we had to dip into savings for the funeral. When we got back home my girlfriends organized a garage sale and we had a sale that spanned over two yards!! We made over a $1000 at that sale. Good luck!
also, friends and family made donations to our adoption agency in our names. It was a tax write off for them and they were able to help us even more!
Hi Christie,
You stopped by my blog and left a comment… I will certainly be praying for your future adoption. ET/China/adoption is near and dear to my heart. I don’t have any of my china adoption in my archives yet… hope to in my free time (with 5 kids that might be awhile)… anyhow, wanted to say hi. The adoption community is a close knit group…
Denise
http://www.faithinactionfamily.blogspot.com
christie, just jumping around your blog archives, and I’m excited to get “caught up” on you. This is a beautiful post. God’s mysterious ways: sometimes our task is to let someone else bless us. So cool, it’s not always about giving. Just like everything in life (as I’m learning over & over) if we can accomplish it on our own, we don’t need HIM. If we don’t need Him, we step out of relationship with Him. Blessings, Mandi
http://www.johnsonfamily-outoftheboat.blogspot.com