orphans

Between Advents: Come Lord Jesus

Posted on by kimnjed

Advent.

He is coming.

We wait expectantly.

Come Lord Jesus.

As it is in Heaven, let your Kingdom come to Earth.



Tis the season of Advent.  Tis the season of expectant waiting.  “Advent” comes from the Latin word adventus, meaning “coming”.  Advent is the season of Christ’s coming.  The world, swollen with expectation and anticipation, eagerly awaited His first coming. 

Now we celebrate that indescribable blessing of Jesus’ coming as a baby.  We hold our loved ones near, we smile more, we give thoughtful gifts of love, we eat too much sugar, we decorate with lights and tinsel, we celebrate how He saved our lives.  Tis the season of reflecting on how that tiny baby changed the course of the universe- how that tiny baby changed my life.  I am nothing without Him.  

As Jed likes to say, “We are in between Advents”.  The Jews waited for His first coming, and now we eagerly await the second Advent- His second and FINAL coming.  

Jesus came as a baby to make wrongs thing right.  He brought the Kingdom of Heaven to earth.  Even now we see glimpses of His Kingdom on earth.  We see broken bodies healed when we pray, we see loving grandparents passing down a legacy of love and faith to their children, we see friends crossing the ocean to adopt children with special needs- leaving their comfort for the sake of One.  

But, all is not well with our world.  We are standing between Advents- “the now and the not yet”.  We see glimpses of His Kingdom come, but His Kingdom is not fully come.  

Orphans waste away in cribs- their childhoods lost- discarded because of a diagnosis.
Innocent children’s lives are taken in one day- childhoods lost- because of the depravity of man.   
Sickness runs rampant, wars rage…Oh dear Jesus, please come.  
We wait for You.  

This past week we recorded a couple of Christmas songs.
These songs were sung in celebration of His first coming, and in desperate longing for His return.  We cry out, Come Lord Jesus!  Make wrong things right!  We long for you. 

The songs are available for you to download on our church’s website.  We would kindly request that in lieu of purchasing the songs you would please donate to our dear friends, Curtis and Sara Eriksen.  They are in Ukraine right now adopting their newest son David.  Their obedience is a small glimpse of God’s Kingdom coming to earth- wrong things made right.  

Thank you Jesus that you came.  Thank you that You still see.  Thank you that You care.  Thank you for keeping your promise that YOU ARE COMING AGAIN.  All will be made right. 

We wait for you Emmanuel…come quickly!

Click here to listen and donate.  We hope you enjoy the songs!  Merry Christmas and God’s richest blessings be on you and yours.  🙂

End of an Era

Posted on by kimnjed

Along this journey to Ukraine there are many things we have had to let go, or will have to let go.   This month we are letting go of something very important, and along with that comes the end of an era.  We are letting go of our foster care license.  Of course we know we can’t still be state-certified foster parents while living in Ukraine, and we haven’t been open to taking any kiddos since we made the decision to move our family to Ukraine, but…we still held on to our certification.  We were still foster parents. 



We ran into our certifier (our fabulous assigned “go-to” person at DHS) at the store a week or so ago.  She mentioned that she has been following our story through our blog and is excited about what God is doing in and through our fam.  Hi Judi! 🙂  She asked if she should just go ahead and close out our file, and we had to tell her yes.  If we were to stay certified we would have to have DHS come out and check out Luke’s house, Luke would have to be fingerprinted and all that jazz.  That would all be okay, except for a promise we made to ourselves when we first started fostering.  

Back in 2006, when our foster parenting journey began, we promised ourselves if we took a child into our home we would keep them in our home, no matter what, unless someone else decided they should move.  We wouldn’t give up on a child when the going got tough.  That was tested a time or two, but with God’s help we kept our word.  If we were to take a child at this time I’m not sure we would be able to keep our word.  When you receive a child from DHS you never know how long they will stay with you.  Seth was supposed to be a “short placement”, and here he is, 2 1/2 years later, our son for life.  🙂  We plan to move in a year, so we just know we can’t take any more foster kiddos at this time.  

Foster Baby #1- always extra special to us

So, I guess this is so long to an era.  Our foster parenting era has been life-changing, to put it mildly.  I’ve said it before and and I’ll say it again, foster parenting is one of the best and definitely the most difficult thing we’ve ever done in our lives. (Yet!)

 It shaped our family, it grew us as people, it taught us reliance on the Lord instead of our own strength (still learning that!), it built our faith, it gave us a son.

Yes, there are problems with the foster care system.  Yes, it is tiring.  Yes, it is putting yourself out there, knowing your heart will be broken.  Yes, it is infuriating.  Yes, it is worth it.  

 

Because if you can look past the broken system and see the broken lives that God has given us, the church, to care for, it’s a no-brainer. 

The children are worth it.  They are worth fighting for.  
The parents are worth it.  They are worth loving and believing in.  



 
The system is broken and it fails people every day.  That is a problem.  But the bigger problem is that God has given the responsibility of caring for these lives to His Bride, the church, and we have passed them off to the state.  People will fail.  BUT God’s love never fails, and no matter who they are and what they’ve done or have failed to do- no one is beyond hope.  No one is beyond His grasp.  The state can’t fix these lives and these broken situations, but God can.  He can mend, heal, lift up, restore- and He asks us to be His hands and feet.  


We have come to the end of our fostering journey (for now!).  As we exit stage left, I would just ask you to prayerfully consider your part in caring for the orphans in your town.  How can you be His hands and feet to the broken lives around you?  

Could you foster?
Could you give respite for a weary foster parent in the thick of it?
Could you bring a meal to a foster family?
Could you donate clothes or gently used children’s gear to your local Child Welfare office?
Could you pray?

Our torch is being set down, will you take it up?  
Trust me, if we can do it, broken and human as we are, you can do it too! 

Just be prepared to never be the same.  🙂


You can read more about our story of foster care here:

Foster Care Ponderings: Part 1, Our Story

Foster Care Ponderings: Part 2, Our Story

Foster Care Ponderings: Part 3, Biological Parents

Faithful

Posted on by kimnjed

God is so faithful.  Really, really blowin-my-mind faithful.  

On Thursday I wrote a post asking for more help with getting my man Heath funded because he has a matching $450 grant that ends September 1st.  We just got back from camping and I ran to the computer right away to check on our progress.  Forget about showering, draining coolers, sorting laundry…I gotta check on my boy!  


Low and behold…Heath has already exceeded his matching grant by $214!!!!!!! 
SHUT THE FRONT DOOR!!!!!!

I was shocked and awed.  God’s faithfulness to one 11-year old half a world away is almost too good to be true. 
Honestly, I shouldn’t be surprised at God’s faithfulness and provision for Heath.  I really shouldn’t.  But you see, God’s got me on this crazy journey of learning to trust Him to meet needs and not looking to my own abilities or gifts to meet the needs myself.  He just keeps surprising me!
Jed and I set aside August as our month dedicated to seeking God’s face about our next steps toward Ukraine.  We knew God wanted us to keep taking steps, but we were feeling a bit aimless.  We are expecting God to speak this month and He’s pulling through!  (Imagine that!)  😉  We each decided to fast something this month and I knew God was asking me to step out of the facebook world for the month of August as a “fast”.  Why facebook?  Don’t people usually fast food?  Well, God knew I had something to learn, so that’s what He asked of me.  
When us Northwest gals started promoting our push for Heath we used facebook as a big resource for getting the word out.  Social media rocks for things like that.  Unfortunately, we didn’t get the response we were hoping for.  There was very little interest in our September fundraiser for our boy.  I was pretty disappointed.  Actually, I knew in that moment I was a little too disappointed.  I took it personally.  Hmmm….what’s wrong with that picture?  I’ll tell you what was wrong!  I was promoting it in my own strength, trusting in my ability to ‘catch people’s attention’.  A good response to Heath was a good response to me.  
EEEEEEWWWWWW!!!!!  Blech!  Gag. Yuck.
That is just icky.  Yep, it’s God who is providing for Heath- not Kim.  It is God who gets all the glory- not Kim.  I knew God was asking me to step aside from facebook so that He could show me who’s boss.  There are plenty of people who are getting the word out for Heath on their blogs and facebooks and God is using it all for His glory.  This isn’t an anti-facebook post because great things have come from advocacy on facebook, and once my fast is up I hope to return to advocacy using that forum.  God just knew my heart, and He knew I needed to see Him show His power in a way where I couldn’t claim any of the victory for myself.  I really love how He works.
Seeing Heath’s grant grow and grow makes my heart want to burst.  Since I can’t get the word out on facebook I have done so much more face-to-face promoting of my boy.  It has been sweet- and necessary.  Seeing people’s eyes light up when they hear about what God is doing is priceless.  More and more eyes are being opened to the plight of these children we love so much and that is also priceless.
This heart issue that God and I are working out is a biggie.  It will be huge when we start to raise support for our family.  I need to learn these lessons now.  I need to remember that Jed and I are not the breadwinners for our family- Jesus is, and He can do a much better job of it than we could hope to do.
So, thank you every single one of you who gave.  Thank you to every one of you who passed the word.  Our work isn’t done yet, but things are definitely moving right along.  September 15th is coming up and I can’t wait to see what GOD does.  🙂
To God be all the glory for the great things He has done!!! 

The Why

Posted on by kimnjed

So many ideas, so many dreams.
Our brains are spinning with the possibilities.
It’s difficult to dissect a dream into steps.  
We just want to be there.
While we work as fast as we can behind the scenes to get there, I pray that God in His great love and mercy watches over the children we love so much.  
If all of our ramblings haven’t quite clicked with you yet;
if you don’t yet understand why we are moving across the world,
please watch this documentary and see the need and the faces that have turned our world upside down. 
These children are real and they are beautiful.
Jesus has called us to be His hands and feet to them.
This is why.

WAHOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Posted on by kimnjed

Remember this face?
 Not too long ago I put out a plea for dear sweet Porter.  
Many, many people responded that they would pray.
Many, many people passed the word and passed on his face in hopes that his mommy would see.
Well, guess what?
SHE SAW!!!!!
PORTER’S MOMMY AND DADDY FOUND HIM!!!!
Praise God, Porter is not lost, he is found.  His mommy and daddy are doing everything they can to get to him as quickly as possible.
Want to hear something else that makes this even more awesome (if that’s even possible)?
Porter’s Mommy and Daddy live approximately 8 minutes from our house.
They are practically our neighbors.
I got to visit with his mommy over coffee yesterday and hear her weep with joy about how she feels like she won the lottery, the goodness of God overwhelming her.
Porter’s mommy and daddy love Jesus.
We get to see him come out of darkness into light.
We get to be a hands-on part of his rescue.
Will you join us?
GOD IS TOO STINKIN’ GOOD.  
 I can’t handle it!!!!!!
I can’t wait to introduce them to you, very very soon.
Thank you for sharing, thank you for praying.  It was not in vain.
Oh how He loves the orphan!