Africa, here we come!

Great news! After a very long and emotion-filled three years (not counting the two or three years it took me to come around to the idea of adopting), we have finally received the news we and so many others have been praying would arrive.

Last Tuesday, we received a very vague email informing us that we had been 'matched with a child' and that we needed to be prepared to leave for Rwanda on October 13th. ...and that's about it.

No name. No picture...

Just the great news that we had been matched and that we needed to begin to prepare to leave for Africa-in just 3 weeks!

After some signing, scanning and sending and them some more signing, scanning and sending, this Tuesday I got a call from Susan around 10 am or so. She was calling from work and from the sound of her voice I could tell something was up. She went on to tell me she had-sitting open in front of her-an email with an attached name and picture of our Rwandan daughter, but wouldn't open it until I got there. This was huge!

It wasn't until around noon that I arrived at the school where my wife is a counselor. As I arrived, we could barely contain the excitement as we begin to one at a time, open the many documents that were attached to the message; documents confirming (in French) that our referral was a healthy female, born in March of 2006 and free of disease.

At last, we arrived to the document entitled "referral photo." Although I offered that she open the long awaited picture, Susan insisted that I be the one to open the attachment. By the way, in the adoption world, this is the moment that is akin to parents seeing an ultrasound of their unborn baby (except for that in this case, the child is five, looking at you and wearing clothes, of course).

I clicked.

In the coming moments, we were overwhelmed to see the beautiful face of our daughter, the face that until this moment we could only try to imagine, looking with what we can only assume is how she looks when she is incredibly nervous, at a camera, wearing a little orange dress with floral patterns on it along with little red sandals with a heart across the toes.

We have a name. We have an age. 
We have seen the face of the girl that is about to become our daughter.

Needless to say, it's been pretty difficult to work or play or think of anything else except for when we can go meet her and bring her home. As it turns out, we are tentatively scheduled to leave for Africa on October 13th for about 21-25 days. As much as we would love to take our boys with us, due to financial and logistical limitations, they will be double-teamed by two sets of loving grandparents along with a crew of other friends and neighbors.

Over the coming days and weeks, please keep our family in your prayers. As excited as we are to share this information, we also know that we aren't out of the woods just yet.

• Pray not only that God would deliver us and the other families we will travel with safely to our destinations, but that the many siblings that will be left behind will have hearts full of love for their incoming brothers and sisters. 

• Pray that the children, many of whom are very fragile, both emotionally and physically, will be kept free of sickness and that the doctors would have the wisdom to address their needs accurately. 

• Pray for the many people who are diligently behind the scenes working on our behalf; lawyers, social workers, nuns, travel agents, etc.

• Pray that the mountain of details that have yet to been completed will take place and that there will be no hitches as we appear in court and take legal custody of our children. 

And finally, as you pray, thank God for His faithfulness and for the reminder that as we are adopting this helpless little child, that we, too, have been adopted into His "forever family" through Christ. If you haven't read Romans 8 in a while (or ever), you should check it out. It's an astonishingly warm passage that reminds us our relational position to God through Jesus Christ. Thank you for your prayers.

From now until who-knows-when, Susan and I are going to be using this blog as a general pipeline to deliver updates over the coming days, weeks and months. My hope is that this blog will also serve as a day-to-day travel log (as long as we have internet access) for our many good friends, family, and other adoptive families who would like to know what we're up to as we are out of the country and as we begin to make adjustments upon our return. So, be sure to subscribe/bookmark this address to keep up with updates by going to the top left corner of this blog and clicking on 'Subscribe Here,' then on 'Posts' ...and I assure you, there will be many updates that will be heading this way over the next few days/weeks!

Thank you for your many prayers. We love you all. God is faithful!