To Be Found Faithful

Over the past few months, the Lord has taught me and Courtney a lot about waiting well. Many times I wait, but I do not wait well. I wait impatiently. I wait hesitantly. I wait anxiously. That is not what we are called to. We are called to wait well. We are to wait with anticipation, with patience, and with an unending trust in God. And we do this because we wait on nothing in this world… we wait on the Lord.

Scripture is full of stories of those who waited. Abraham and Sarah waited for 25 years before they saw the promise fulfilled. The Israelites had to wander through the desert for 40 years before they made their way to the Promised Land. Simeon waited his entire life waiting for the promised Messiah to come.

Waiting well is hard. I want the Lord to move, because I know He can. I want Him to show Himself, because He has before. I want Him to do it and do it now, because I think that is what is best for everyone involved. However, He alone is God. His will is perfect and therefore, so is His timing.

We do not want to be like Abraham and Sarah and make our own plan when God doesn’t seem to be moving fast enough. We do not want to be like the Israelites and grumble and complain as the Lord leads us through the desert. We want to be found like Simeon, living out our calling until the promise is fulfilled. We want to be found faithful.

And so we claim Psalm 33:20-22, “Our soul waits for the Lord; He is our help and our shield. For our heart is glad in Him, because we trust in His holy name. Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you.”

As the last few months have been full of waiting, this week is no different. Wednesday and Thursday, April 17 & 18, the Russ*an government has agreed to have high, expert-level meetings with the US State Department on the topic of American families who were already in the process of adoption before January 1, 2013. This weekend has been a war of the “lists” for Russ*a and the US. On Friday the US released their list of 18 names on the Magnitsky List (that started all of this madness in December) and then on Saturday, Russ*a released their own list in retaliation. These actions have made tensions between the US and Russ*a even stronger as we head into the week of conversations.

So we ask to join us in prayer. Pray that these meetings will actually happen and that they are fruitful. Pray that both governments are willing to listen and realize that orphans are not a pawn in their political games. Most importantly, more than anything else, pray that God’s will be done in and through this discussions.

Pray also for the people of Russ*a, that the Lord would reveal Himself and send His messengers to that field. While we earnestly wait for the day that Josiah gets to call Tennessee home, there is a day we wait for with even greater anticipation, and that is the day that Josiah calls Jesus his Savior. Whether that is here or in Russ*a, it will be a day we will celebrate.

We are grateful for you. For your willingness to pray for us and for our son. For the way that you love us. For the way that you are not only praying for Josiah, but praying for orphans around the world. For the way that you are being the body of Christ to us as we wait on the Lord. And so now, let us wait together, knowing that our God can do immeasurably more that all we ask or imagine.

“I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning.”

Josh and Courtney

When the evening comes

Almost every time Josh or I write, I feel like we say this but we are truly grateful for everyone who has called, texted, emailed, and just loved on us. Your support an encouragement means the world to us. I told a friend the other day that I love how many people are praying for Josiah. He is probably getting more prayers each day than he would if he were already home. It does this mama's heart good to know how loved my baby boy is.

I wish that we had more of an update, but not a lot has changed in the current situation. However, we are grateful for the continued conversations that are happening both in the US and in Russ*a. As I told a friend last night, the talk means that there is still hope. We do want to ask for your prayers as tomorrow (Friday) there will be a time of discussion in the Russ*an legislature to discuss the future of adoption and the children left in these orphanages. This will be taking place as we sleep tonight with the time difference. Please be praying for open and compassionate hearts and a willingness to make a courageous decision for these leaders.

So many of you have asked how we are doing. And we are doing ok. It is a moment by moment, day by day process. There are days that we do ok and days that I cry almost all day. I am grateful that the Lord knows the cries of my heart because most of my prayers are simply "Lord please."

When I was in college, I spent a summer teaching English overseas. My fellow college students/amateur teachers and I got the change to work with a missionary family that radically changed my view of faith. This family had lost their two year old daughter to a freak illness and had to return to the country to collect their belongings. Once they got to the city, they felt the Lord telling them to stay and so their prayer was that if the Lord would give them the strength to stay for today, they would stay for tomorrow. It had been two years of praying daily for strength when I met them, and the Lord was doing powerful things through their ministry.

Our prayer for the past few weeks has been for the faith to trust God for today. It is hard to imagine a future without Josiah, but my prayer is that God would give me the strength I need for today. We serve a good and faithful God, who has been so present the past few months to provide exactly what we need. We continue to pray for the Lord to move mountains and for the strength to wait on his timing.

I have prayed the words to Matt Redman's song over and over and so I want to share them with you all now:

The sun comes up, it's a new day dawning

It's time to sing Your song again

Whatever may pass, and whatever lies before me

Let me be singing when the evening comes

Bless the Lord, O my soul

O my soul

Worship His holy name

Sing like never before

O my soul

I'll worship Your holy name

Laid Bare

This is our current update. However, if you should read God is.. before you read this blog post. 

Five years ago, my world was laid bare. It was demolished, cleared, leveled and ready to be rebuilt. Because five years and fifteen days ago, my world looked like this: 

My car in front of my dorm room, where my roommates and I were when the tornado hit. 

I was in the Jelks building the night of the tornado. 

Some of you know the story of the tornado, but many of you now following our adoption journey may not. I was a sophomore in college when a EF-4 tornado hit our campus and destroyed many of the residential buildings where students' lived, including my own. The Lord's hand was truly on our campus that night as every single life was spared to the amazement of many.

Surviving the February 5th tornado and the weeks and months that followed were some of the most challenging in my life, that is until two months ago. Like the tornado, I wish I could explain why things have happened with this adoption. I have wondered if we missed where the Lord was leading us. I have questioned if we did something wrong. I have begged God for a reason why this has happened and pleaded for a miracle. 

And I dont have an answer as to why. But this I know: the same God who was faithful in a physical storm five years ago is faithful in the midst of this current storm. Two weeks ago we had a five year Service of Remembrance and one of my former classmates spoke. Danny referenced John 9:3 in which the disciples asked Jesus who had sinned to make a man blind and Jesus responded, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him." 

I pray that the works of God will be displayed through our journey. In so many ways this adoption journey has paralleled the tornado. In the fifteen days after the tornado, heavy equipment was brought in and the bulldozers cleared away the rubble. The land was leveled and flattened and then the rebuilding began. Five years ago, so many people watched the Lord work. It was evident that we were experiencing something that only the Lord could do. It was nothing that any student, faculty member, or administrator could do in his or her own strength. 

I don't know what the Lord is going to do in the future, but I feel that my heart has been laid bare. The past few weeks have stripped me. My desire to have a child and my plans to bring Josiah home have been stripped away. We are broken and humbled by what the Lord has done and is doing. I have no idea what the Lord will do in the future--whether we will bring Josiah home or whether the Lord has another plan for other children or whether He has a plan for something that I cannot even imagine. But I know that my God knows.

I have clung to Josh Wilson's song Carry Me over the past few weeks and one line of the chorus says: 

"Carry me, carry me, carry me now
From my sinking sand to Your solid ground"

For us and many others in our community, our ground has become a sinking sand. Life in this sinful world is hard and painful and is easily rocked. It doesn't make sense to our human minds. But our God is solid, constant, faithful, and good. 

God is...

This is a blog post that I wrote in January, but I have struggled to post. But here it is and it is the back story to where we are today. 

God is sovereign. God is faithful. God is good.

We knew this adoption journey was going to be a roller coaster. We knew it is was going to be hard and painful. But I don't think we ever expected this. The past month has been full of ups and downs. We have gotten good news and devastating news, great news and just ok news and for the most part it is different each day. 

On Tuesday, the Russ*an Supreme Court made their ruling on the adoption ban and they are allowing all of the families with a court decree to bring their children home (we are not one of these families). We give thanks to God for His mighty works of allowing families that have court decrees the opportunity to bring their children home. This is a major answer to prayer as some 50 families are now starting to exit the country with their child in hand. We know that this is truly the hand of the Lord at work!  

After our conversations with the State Department Tuesday and our agency Wednesday and even more news reports coming out of Russ*a today, we are less hopeful than ever that we will be able to bring Josiah home. The Russ*an government continues to attack adoption and places these children, our children, in the middle of a political battle that has been raging between the two countries since before we were born. At this point, they are not making any movement to the middle to allow those of us who have met our children and signed paperwork to be able to complete their process. With the ruling from the Russ*an Supreme Court, with no discussion of families like ours, it is almost certain that our process has now ended, for now.

 God is sovereign. God is faithful. God is good.

I say these three sentences over and over again throughout the day. I so wish that we had a reason for why this is happening. I wish I could see the big picture and understand how this act of spiritual warfare and the suffering we are experiencing right now will play out in the end in this world. But what we do know is that one day this world will pass away, and the trials and tribulations of this life were a process of our sanctification and the big picture is that we will be made whole in Christ for eternity. We acknowledge that we don’t understand and rest in the fact that “my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” We are not guaranteed to know what His plans are or why He allows things to happen. What we are guaranteed to know is that He is sovereign God and in an every changing world, He is the only consistent piece. So we trust in that peace and assurance that these circumstances do not change what we know to be the character of our God. 

I have thought often about this journey that the Lord has brought us on and even read back through a lot of these blog posts. Last year, I wrote about trusting God with our desires. I wrote about taking a leap of faith in buying a crib right after we received Josiah's referral. I have seen the way our God has spoken to us through the Bible stories we have read so many times. Throughout scripture God is constant. Whether we like the result or not, God is the same God. 

God is sovereign. God is faithful. God is good.

So where do we go from here? We do not know. We are still fighting for Josiah. Josiah is still our son, and will always be our son. We still long for him to be home. We beg and plead with the Lord to make it so. We are trying to heal. We are asking the Lord to give us wisdom and discernment. We are praying that He will make level the paths of our feet so that we will know the direction He is leading. We are asking for Him to give us direction as to the next step to take. There are still a lot of conversations that are being had. Both our President and Vice President will be traveling to Russ*a soon and our new Secretary of State, John Kerry, is work on relations between the two countries. However, I am realizing more and more that this fight is bigger than us. 2 Chronicles 20 tells us, "God, are you not the God who is in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. Power and might are in your hand and no one can withstand you...For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do but our eyes are on you....This is what the LORD says to you; 'Do not be afraid or discouraged because of this vast army. For the battle is not yours, but God's." 

Without giving up, we are taking time to pray and rest in the Lord. I believe that our God is constant, unchanging, and so I have to continue to believe that our Savior cares about the orphans, for Josiah. He has not given up on them. He is fighting for them. He is for them. "What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?" He works all things for our good. He does not forsake his children. 

 God is sovereign. God is faithful. God is good.

I have used this verse before, but I am continuing to cling to it:  "And Moses said to the people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.” Exodus 14:13-14  

 God is sovereign. God is faithful. God is good.

Our Prayer

In about an hour, the Russ*an government will open and to be honest, things are not looking very hopeful. We are truly praying for a miracle tonight.

My heart is crying out to the Lord, begging for him to work in ways that I cannot imagine through people that I do not know and probably never will. We are praying for him to do what is impossible in our minds but simple for the God that we serve.

Here are a few verses that we have been praying:

"We wait in hope for the Lord: he is our help and our shield." Psalms 33:20

"The Lord will fight for you; you only need to be still." Exodus 14:14

"So do not fear, for I am with you...I with strengthen you and help you..." Isaiah 41:10

"Israel, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love and with him is full redemption." Psalms 130:7

"The kings heart is like channels of water in the hand of the Lord; He turns it wherever He wishes." Proverbs 21:1

A year ago, the Lord began this redemption story. It is HIS story. Lord, we pray tonight asking you to continue the work that you began. And even if the work that you are doing doesn't allow us to bring Josiah home, give us the faith of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to be able to say, " If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty's hand. But even if he does not...we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold that you have set up." Daniel 3:17-18

May we see God's Glory in Russ*a tonight...

Josh and Courtney 

Comfort

Today is Christmas in Russ*a and it is currently Christmas morning for our sweet little boy. My heart hurts that we are not able to celebrate with him--to have presents for him to open--and see his excitement as he does. 

This week has been another challenging one filled with lots of questions and very little--ok really, no--answers. We are waiting until the Russ*an government reopens after their holidays and are praying for an answer that would allow us to bring Josiah home. 

I have cried out to our Lord so many times this week, begging for a miracle, for understanding, for peace. I have prayed for belief and confidence to trust in the Lord when I am weak. I can honestly say that I am emotionally, physically, and spiritually exhausted. 

Saturday morning, I woke up at 3am unable to sleep. I moved to the couch and began begging God for an answer. My heart longs to bring Josiah home. I want to hear him laugh. I want to watch him play with the train Nana and Pop gave him for Christmas and ride in his Clarke's golf cart with his cousins. But the hardest thing for me to come to terms with has been that we may never have to opportunity to see him come to a saving faith in Jesus Christ. I have been praying for his salvation from the time we first saw his picture, and while I know that Christ alone can save him, I may never get the opportunity to tell him about Jesus. 

I sat on the couch and just begged God for his salvation. I prayed, asking even if I never get to physically hold him again to please allow him to believe in the God who created him. I walked up stairs, heading to Josiah's room, but I stopped at the bottom of our stairs. There we have a photograph framed with one of my favorite verses written underneath. I walk by the picture every day, but for some reason the words stood out that morning:

The Lord your God is in your midst,

    a mighty one who will save;
he will rejoice over you with gladness; 
he will quiet you by his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing.

Zephaniah 3:17

I have always loved the fact that the Lord quiets us by his love, but in that moment, I honestly felt that the Lord was in my midst. As I set on the steps and read that verse over and over, I truly began to believe that the Lord could save. I am praying the Lord will physically save Josiah, but also that He will spiritually save him. Even if Josiah never gets to come home, our God can save him. It doesn't matter how dark the place that Josiah lives, our God is mighty to save. It doesn't matter if Josiah isn't hearing the Christmas story read on this Christmas morning, our God is mighty to save. Josiah may never do any of things that I would do to teach him the story of the gospel, but our God is mighty to save. 

As I truly began to trust my Savior with the salvation of my child, my confidence began to grow. There is no greater miracle than salvation. If Christ can save me, there is nothing He cannot do. 

At the beginning of this week, I started reading a book called The Red Sea Rules by Robert Morgan. It looks at the Israelites journey through the Red Sea and contains some amazing truth and comfort for dealing with hard times. I really just want to post the whole book here, but that is illegal so I will leave you with a few verses that Morgan uses in his writing and have comforted me this week. Please join us in praying them over the next three days. 

 "And Moses said to the people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.” Exodus 14:13-14 

"Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." Ephesians 3:20-21

Courtney Leigh

My Heart

This post is about to be very real and honest and so I am giving everyone a fair warning!

"For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven...a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance..." Ecclesiastes 3: 1, 4. 

This has been one of the hardest days of my entire life. For those of you who know me personally, you know that I don't cry--like even in situations where I should. But today, I woke up crying and have pretty much ugly cried most of the day today. Our hearts are truly broken today, but our hearts are also rejoicing as tomorrow my little brother is getting married. Most of today, I have flipped back and forth between a time to weep and a time to laugh. I love Hunter and I love Mary Beth and I am so thankful for their marriage and what the Lord is doing in their lives. I am also thankful for a family who will grieve with us even while celebrating.

We are also so thankful for all of the support from our friends and family. Thank you for your calls, your messages, and your willingness to fight for Josiah on our behalf. You will never know the ways that you have touched our hearts today. Your willingness to stop what you are doing and help us fight for a little boy you have never met has brought us to tears.

I wish that I could tell you good news tonight, but we honestly don't know much. We are still waiting to find out what will happen to the families like us who are in process of adopting. We have talked with members of our government and are grateful for the work that they are doing on our behalf. Russ*a is currently in their holiday and so government offices will close tomorrow for the next two weeks and so it may be a few weeks before we know the specific details.

So many of you have asked how we are doing. And I can honestly say that the Lord has been so very faithful to us. We knew that this journey was not an easy one, but we have never been more sure that this is the journey that the Lord has called us to. The call to adopt is deeply rooted in the Gospel and over the past few months has wrapped itself around the very fibers of who we are.

This journey has changed me. It has shown me more about the character of our Father than anything before. Tonight, my brother reminded me of the story of Abraham and Isaac. God had promised Abraham a son and yet then ask Abraham to sacrifice Isaac on an alter. I am seeing a glimpse of the faith that it took for Abraham to travel with his beloved son to a mountain top and build an alter. I am pretty confident that he was begging God to let him return home with his son, and yet he continue ahead. Oh how I wish I had Abraham's faith, a faith to believe that "God will provide" even when our human brains cannot comprehend.

Tonight, I am longing to hold a little boy who is halfway around the world and just waking up from a nap. A little boy with a stubborn streak just like his daddy's and a dimple that has him wrapped around his mama's finger. So I am choosing to believe that God will provide. This seems impossible to me, yet throughout Scripture our God does the impossible. So we pray to the God who created Josiah and who loves him more that we ever could. We pray, asking for His will to be done and choosing to believe that our God can work through our broken hearts and unbelief.

Josiah, I pray that you know much your daddy and I love you. One day I pray that we will tell you of the stories of the people who prayed and called and fought to get you home. While my desire is for you to be in my arms soon, I know that I may not get to hold you, but I also know that the God who made you, loves you. And I pray that you will know and understand His love for you, both now and through salvation in the future. We love you, little man, to Russ*a and back (it seems farther than the moon!).

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope." Romans 15:13

Courtney Leigh