HERE SHE IS!!!!

We are a little numb right now to say the least! She was very unhappy when we got her, but after 45 minutes and 2 suckers and then her thumb she fell asleep. We found out that she has been in a foster home all this time. She has been sleeping with the foster mom and has been thriving well. She cannot see very well at all, but we are still praying for God to heal her. She is fine with either Dexter or I, but really she just wants to lay on the bed and be left alone. She is very content right now talking to herself and being by herself. It is so funny, if we go to the bed and try and talk with her or touch her she lets us know she doesn't like it :):):):) We are letting her do whatever she wants because she has had so many changes in her 23 months. I really can't put into words how I am feeling right now. Maybe after some time I will be able to.

Time to Pack!

We are praising Jesus for confirmed travel plans and a confirmed appointment with the US Embassy in Guangzhou, China.
We are officially leaving Atlanta on Friday January 29th at 8:00 am. We will travel approximately 26 hours and arrive in Kunming City, China on Saturday January 30th at 11:15 pm. They are 13 hours ahead of us so we are going to have our days and nights mixed up for a while. We are so excited and anticipating an incredible "adventure". Our visas should be here today or tomorrow and our official travel approval papers are in the mail to us also. These are the final 2 documents we need to travel.
This has been a week of praying without ceasing, and the Lord has been faithful to respond in His time. Sometimes his timing doesn't seem right to us, but He knows the plans He has for us, plans to prosper and not harm us. We must rest in His plan, for He is our hope.
As we prepare to leave many things are coming to mind of what He has done for us. So many people have walked with us, prayed with us, helped us financially and helped us with fund raisers. To all of you, we saw His vision fulfilled, a vision of COMMUNITY. We will never be the same. We have encountered Him in a new way and are changed forever. So now it's time to pack. How do you pack for 6 people for 14 days? I keep asking myself that question and am quite perplexed. I guess I'm just going to have to roll up my sleeves and get busy.
Many of you have asked how our fundraising is going. I wasn't really going to share anymore about that, but I woke up this morning and the Lord showed me specifically what He wanted me to share. Please know this is very personal and it's very difficult to be this transparent. However, the Lord is teaching me a lot about the power of testimony and sometimes that requires vulnverability. Wednesday morning it was time to make our last payment for all the things leading up to actually traveling. I basically emptied out our accounts, leaving enough in there to keep each one of them open. I was so scared and really down about it. In the midst of this I was constantly praising Him for all He has provided through fund raising and gifts from individuals. We have been truly blessed. But to be honest with you, it's a bit unnerving when you empty out your bank accounts. In addition, we have to bring $10,000 cash with us for adoption expenses in China and travel expenses. Well that afternoon, Dexter brought in the mail and there was a card from someone I met at the Pike Road Arts and Crafts fair. I remember talking with this girl, but don't know them personally. It turns out, she and her husband are at the beginning of their adoption journey. She read this blog and was encouraged and sent us a check for $50. The Lord used someone I don't even know to bless us and remind us that HE IS IN CONTROL. Well, yesterday morning, 24 hours later, some sweet friends gathered with me for a baby and blessing shower. We received so many great things we needed for her including $475 cash. Some of this money was given to someone to use for their medical expenses and the Lord told them to give it to us! Wow, can you see this beautiful picture He is painting of His children following Him. I was overwhelmed by His provision once again. However, the sweetest part of the shower was all the blessings that were spoken and written for Maggie Mae. Two blessings in particular really spoke to my heart because of where we are with the finances. The first was, "The Kingdom of heaven is described by Jesus as a merchant seeking pearls. Once a pearl of great value is found, the merchant sells everything he owns to buy this pearl. The kingdom of heaven is more valuable than anything else we can have. We must be willing to give up everything to obtain it." Did you know, Maggie means "pearl"? The other blessing was a letter written to Maggie Mae and part of it said, "Your mom and dad have shown us all a beautiful picture of Christ in their love for you. They, like the Good Shepherd, have left all they have to find you. They have sacrificed and worked, prayed and wept, dreamed and planned for the day you would become their daughter. What a beautiful picture of the Father's deep, sacrificial love for His children." You see, when I read things like this it does not make me feel all great about myself and what I am doing. It reminds me of my nothingness, and in my nothingness, He is GREAT!
So what next? Well, we will continue to trust in Him, but we are going to have to take out a loan for the remaining $10,000 due to the fact that we leave in 7 days and these things take time to process. Do we believe God can still provide the rest? Definitely we do, and we will not stop praying for that. We are going to have one last fund raiser Tuesday night from 5pm-8pm at our house. We have some people who buy gold and silver coming to our house. You get to come and sell your unwanted gold or silver for cash. At the end of the night, they will give us 15% of whatever they bought since this is a fundraiser. This does not come out of your money, but is paid to us from the gold buyer. I have already sold all my jewelry and got $914 which helped a lot last week. Please tell all your friends about this and email me at pwatts@wildblue.net for more details.
Well, I am still proclaiming this one verse given to me by a dear friend in Florida at the beginning of this whole process, "I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt. Open wide your mouth, and I will fill it." Psalm 81:10 Not only is my mouth open wide, but my arms are open wide to my God in heaven who loves me and has called me according to His will and purpose. May His unfailing, unconditional love rest upon my daughter as she sleeps in her crib. May her heart be filled with anticipation of what is about to happen.
9 DAYS UNTIL GOTCHA DAY!!!!!!

COUNTING DOWN THE DAYS!!!!!

We received Travel Approval Tuesday and expect to receive an appointment date with the US Embassy in China tomorrow. We have a tentative travel date of January 29th that will be confirmed hopefully tomorrow. God has been moving mountains and making Himself known in mighty ways this week. We have entered His courts with prayers and petitions and left with thanksgiving and praise. So many times I have just sat on the side lines and said "God is in control and all things will happen in His timing." While this is definitely a true statement, I still have to get on the field and get in the game. Something compelled me Monday night to pray without ceasing for Him to intervene and get that Travel Approval to AGCI on Tuesday. If it didn't, we would have to wait until the end of February to travel. I praised, paced, sang, danced, and wore out a path on the hardwood floor for hours. It was an incredible time. He heard my cry and answered my prayer within hours. Standing before His throne and making my requests known has a whole new meaning to me now. He wants me to come. He wants me to be specific. He wants me to not let up until I hear Him. So many of you prayed with us, and we pray you are forever changed by His response to your prayers.
As we approach our travel date, a lot has to happen. We will try to keep you all posted. We are testing out uploading videos which should be a part of this post. Our desire is to video as much as we can in China and keep you all posted with pictures and video. We are praying now for favor on the rates of our airline tickets. Tomorrow is 14 days out and fares are going up. Please pray for 5 incredibly good fares. Also I have begun to pray for the planes, the pilots, the mechanics, the other passengers. We want God to use us even as we travel. Thank you once again for all who have helped us and prayed with us. SHE'S REALLY COMING HOME!!!!!

Counting Down The Weeks!

We received our Letter of Confirmation from China! We were expecting this to arrive at the end of January, but we were so surprised to receive it yesterday! We found out about it 10 minutes before Tony (our oldest) walked across the stage at his college graduation. What a surreal moment for Dexter and I. A few weeks ago I had the thought pass through my mind while cleaning the house that wouldn't it be neat if God surprised us for Christmas with news from China. He knows my thoughts and blessed us with the most incredible gift. So now we sign the letter and overnight it to the agency on Monday. They will send it back to China, and we will have Travel approval within 3-4 weeks. We should be leaving around the 1st of February!!!! I really cannot put into words all that we are feeling. It has been a yearning in my heart for years, confirmed by the Lord a few years ago, a pursuit down 3 different roads, and now it's only a few weeks until Maggie Mae gets to come home to her family. What an incredible gift from the Lord. Once again, His timing is incredible. This last week has been full of Him speaking words of Life, setting me free from chains, and providing for our needs. His ways are higher and I love being reminded of that.
We were planning on doing a few more fund raising events when we thought we were traveling at the end of March. For now we are going to try and have one more yard sale with all the things we still have left. We are still in need of about $9,000. We are by no means worried about this because we have been overwhelmed by His provision through the community this year. We know He will complete what He has started. Please continue to pray for Maggie Mae's health. We have not gotten any updates and probably will not before travel. Our prayer still remains that God will be glorified through her life, whether that is through healing her eyes or through the way she embraces life with a visual impairment. We definitely believe in the miracle of healing and know God can heal her, and we will continue to pray for His will for her life. Have a blessed Christmas season remembering the still, quiet way He came into this world.
Let Earth Receive Her King!

Logged in and counting down!!!!

As of September 27th, we are officially logged into to CCAA in China. What that means is they have our stuff and let the paper route begin. It should take 3-4 months for our papers to get approved and a Letter Seeking Confirmation sent to us. When we sign and return that letter, we will be traveling within 8 weeks. So for now we are looking at Feb. or March for travel!!!!!
We had a great day out picking up trash in Macon County. We are so thankful to all that came out and helped that day. The Pancake Breakfast was a huge success thanks to the Magdon family. In addition, the Pike Road Arts and Crafts Festival was fun and we shared our story for about 7 hours, literally. Spiritually and financially, it was more than Dexter and I could have ever imagined. God's story is an incredible one and people need to hear what He is doing now, not just what He has done in the past. He is the same today as yesterday and will be the same tomorrow. He is the only constant thing we have. Speaking of constant, we are experiencing a constant flow of support for the rest of our fees and travels. We are now officially all going to China thanks to a generous family member who is going to pay for our trip. This is a huge blessing for our children to meet their sister with us and get to experience this culture first hand. It will be awesome having our children with us!!!
So for now, we wait and continue to seek God on how He wants us to raise the remaining $10, 845. So far to date, He has provided over $12,000 through fundraisers and individual donations!!!!!
Many have asked if the other agency in Florida has returned our money. We have not heard anything from them other than promises they are not keeping. However, the Lord revealed something to me the other day that has brought a renewed perspective on this. I have been walking by faith throughout this process believing He will provide; however, that promise of the $11,000 from Florida was like an insurance policy in my back pocket. The other day, after having a meltdown over their dishonesty and avoidance of us, I sensed in my spirit the Lord telling me to let it go, and rely totally on Him. You see I thought I was relying solely on Him, but somewhere I believed the lie that "if God doesn't come through then you always have the money they owe you." Well there is no IF with God. He has a perfect plan that is His, and He will see to it that His plan prevails. So once again, God is teaching me so much about following Him recklessly and abandoned from the ways of this world.
I close with this scripture that I have been meditating on and cannot seem to move from it. It happens in the throne room of God and I can't imagine being anywhere else, "Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come." Revelation 4:8

ENDURANCE TRAINING

About a year ago I decided to start running. I went to the local bookstore and bought a book to guide me in my training. The whole concept of the book is to build your endurance by following a Walk/Run program. I was pumped, motivated, ready to conquer this thing I have always wanted to accomplish, the 5K. To many this is not a big goal, but to me, it was huge. I began to run in a neighborhood, but found that not very convenient, since I have to drive to get to one. So my creative husband decided to get on the tractor and cut me a running path around our 16 acres. It was perfect. I just went out the back door and got to run on our land which I love. Everything was going great in my 13 week training program up until I got to week 3. As I was running one day, I stepped into a rut from the tractor and did something to my knee. I pressed on that day, rested the next day, and got back out there the next day. After about 10 minutes I knew I could go no farther. I really felt defeated. I rested the knee for a few weeks and tried again back in the neighborhood. All was going well for a little while until I got Pneumonia. By this time I am thinking maybe this is not for me. Once I got out of the routine of training it was over. About 7 weeks ago, I decided I would just start working out a little each day to get back into the routine. About 4 weeks into it I decided to pick up that 13 week Walk/Run training program and got on the treadmill. Much to my dismay, the old knee did not like it. I wasn't sure if I needed to go see a doctor about it since the only time it bothered me was when I ran. So I stopped running again. This past weekend our family went to Stone Mountain, GA. It was absolutely beautiful and we had a blast. We took the tram up the mountain and had every intention on taking it back down. Well, me and the kids started following a trail from the top and realized it was the trail to the bottom. So we waited for Dad to catch up, he was lost in "photography land", and set out for the bottom. About half way down my knee started to hurt. Immediately, I got discouraged because whatever was wrong with my knee was keeping me from doing the things I enjoy most with my family. I pondered many thoughts on the way down. What should I do? Should I make an appt. to see a doctor? Should I just stop being active? When we reached the bottom and got on flat land, I was fine. By the evening I forgot about it.
So why do I tell you this long tale? Well yesterday I had an appt. with the chiropractor about my neck. I have been in therapy for months trying to change the curve of my neck. However, this doctor looks at the body as a whole. I began to tell her about my knee history, and she proceeded to check my hip. Now I know I said the problem was with my knee, but she proceeded to work on my hip. You see, my right hip was out of alignment causing strain on my knee. Sometimes we get so focused on where we think the problem is that we never see what is causing it. From my perspective something was wrong with my knee and I needed to fix it or just stop doing the things I love. But, from the perspective of someone who knows how the body was created to work, the problem was not originating in my knee. This was a huge example of the Kingdom of God. In His Kingdom, He has a perspective that we do not have. We see things on the surface and want to fix them. He sees the root that entangles us and wants to free us. The enemy loves to distract us with a "knee ache", but God wants us to focus on Him and see things from His eyes.
Walking through this adoption process has been and incredible journey. We walk some and run some and have gotten a little injured along the way. We have seen Him move and provide in ways we could not have imagined. It's not about His "view from above". It's about His view from within us as He walks through us. "...those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint." Isaiah 40:31
A quick update on the process: Our paperwork went to China September 15th. We are told there is about a 6 month wait to travel once they receive your paperwork. So we are looking at March, 2010 to travel. Fundraising is going well. Yard sales have been great. This Saturday Oct. 17th we are picking up trash on a 2 mile stretch of road in Macon County for $1,000. Have you ever thought there was value in trash. Well for us there is! Also on Saturday November 7th we have our Applebees Pancake breakfast and the Pike Road Arts and Crafts Booth. We still have not heard anything from the other agency in Florida except they are planning on returning some of our money, but that has not happened, so we are not counting on it. We are confident of one thing. God has and will continue to provide to bring our daughter home. He has put on the hearts of many to make eternal investments in her life.
As for me, my pray right now is this, that my family will live in a peaceful dwelling place, in a secure home, in an undisturbed place of rest (Isaiah 32:18).