So far, it had been a great morning…..awesome time jogging early with the full moon bursting forth light and a great time of worship on the commute in to work. I cannot remember exactly how many people had asked me about the adoption that morning, but enough to make this day pretty cool. My response was “We are back in the waiting mode now.”
Coming out of a conference call that morning, I looked down at my BB and saw an email from GWCA that said she had received our TA (travel arrangements) to begin that phase of planning to travel to China…..and she noted that we might want to plan to leave the US on 9/9, and 9/16 at the latest! Nonetheless I was shocked and speechless. The thought of traveling to get our daughter in 2-3 weeks was breathtaking for me.
However some of that wind was taken out of our sails as I received a phone call from the NBC officer (at immigration) to let me know she had a problem with our home study. Our current home study did not match our I-600A application that we turned in back in April. In the I-600A, we applied for 2 children to adopt, as we wanted to be prepared that when we went to China, if there was a sibling, we wanted to have the opportunity to bring the sibling home as well. (That is a long shot, but better to be prepared.) However, our sweet social worker completed our home study after we were matched with WeiWei and changed the wording back to “approved for one child.”. With the immigration EVERYTHING has to match. So at that time, we knew that GWCA did not have everything to process our TA to make an appointment with the US Consulate in China.
After our social worker agreed to change the wording on the home study to match the I-600A, I forwarded the home study to the NBC officer for her review, and we hope to get final word that we are ok going forward.
Excited – frustrated – nervous…… that was our feeling tonight, knowing that we are so close, yet still so far from our daughter. However, earlier today, two verses gave us a “big picture” again of what is in store. Romans 8:28 is a huge promise of His plans:
“And we know that in all things, God works to the good of those that love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.”
My good friend Chris also reminded me of a verse he was working through on this same day, which is Proverbs 16:4:
“The LORD works out everything for His own ends.”
These verses do not inform us that everything will work out in our plans and to our good. But He will work things out to HIS OWN PURPOSE AND PLANS. His promise is not for our will to be done, but for His will to be done. And His will is for us to be more sanctified towards Him and seek His presence daily……not for our plans to always work out. Difficult…..but reassuring…..and ALWAYS an ultimate reward to know our Father better.
We will see what tomorrow brings as our officer gets the emailed version of the home study.
Soli Deo Gloria!
Mark
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