Into Wine

{During the miracle where Jesus turned the water into wine, there was a moment where Jesus’ mother told the servants, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’ Those words grab hold of my heart. Because I realize, for the first time, those are the words that always come just before a miracle. Do whatever He tells you. When we say “I will do” our whole future will change. I will do whatever you tell me. Say those words and watch for water to turn into wine.}

As I’m driving down I-540 on my way to work this morning, I hear Keri from my favorite Christian radio station (KLRC duh) read an excerpt from my favorite blogger/writer/encourager: Holley Gerth. Random tidbit: The daily calendar I have on my desk has Bible verses and quips and quotes of encouragement from her. I love them. They always seem to speak directly to me. And this blog post that Keri read this morning was no different. That little blip above is her blog post condensed: the part that spoke to directly to my dear heart. Don't worry, I’ll add the link for the full post below.

I cried when I heard it because a few weeks ago, He told me to do something that made absolutely NO sense whatsoever - just like I’m sure those servants were a bit befuddled with the instructions given to them. He told me to send off our Dossier and USCIS paperwork. If any of you follow my blog or Facebook, you know about this. We were nowhere near where we need to be financially to finish this second step, still aren't. So I did what any normal woman in charge of finances would do: I. FREAKED. OUT. No really, I did. I picture you sitting there thinking ‘Sandia!? No way? She’s always so cool and composed!’ (That’s totally a joke BTW) But alas, it is true – and it was ugly. I wanted to step off into the unknown with Him. I mean, isn’t that what we’ve been doing the last 2 years??

But this was different – this involved a (in my mind) ridiculous amount of money that we hadn’t saved up yet. KC and I are very practical people – especially when it comes to finances. But He told me ‘Have faith. You don’t see it, but you need to do it’. So I did. And I was stressed to the max for 2 days until my wise old husband gave me the best advice. He told me to not think about the adoption, the finances, and not to do ANYTHING adoption related (research, checking our adoption portal or the waiting child list, etc) for a while. I obeyed because I knew I was getting overwhelmed. I even had to ask for prayer from you all about it. And you know what? It has been great. Not that I don’t pray for her, or still think about it, but I’m not allowing it to consume my entire day. I'm not allowing it to block my vision of His greater plan.

So when Keri read that this morning, I cried; then I laughed while I was crying. I’m not crazy, honest – but it’s because the last few days God has just been revealing to me that He will tell me “secrets about things to come” - Jeremiah 33:3. He’s been preparing my heart continually to just. trust. Him.

Do whatever He tells you

Not “Do whatever you want”

Not “Do what you feel.”

Not “Do what makes you happy.”

Do whatever He tells you.

That’s what invites the impossible into the everyday.

That’s what can alter everything for all of us.

I will do whatever you tell me.

Say those words and watch for water to turn into wine.

So I am. I’m doing what He’s telling me. No matter how crazy. No matter how “out there”. No matter how “outside the box”. No matter how “impossible”. I'm going to do it.

There’s a quote from Audrey Hepburn that I like. KC laughed when I told him about it. (Boys.) You may very well laugh too, but it makes it easier for ME to see. She said “Nothing is impossible; the word itself says ‘I’m possible!” I can’t help but smile reading it. So laugh if you will, but it makes me see the word in a whole new positive light. I can now look at a situation and see it with encouragement: ‘With God, I’m possible’.

Here I am. Saying those words. Watching and waiting for my water to turn into wine. Not just any wine, but the best He has.

Click here for the original Holley Gerth blog post

P.S. We received our state sealed home study in the mail on Monday! It had to be state sealed in Tennessee because that's the state where our agency signed/notarized it. But the rest of our paperwork is in Little Rock being worked on. Please continue to help us pray about this endeavor.



Six Impossible Things

Today I was still kinda somewhat worrying about sending off our USCIS paperwork and Dossier like God told us to. We will have a large payment due once we get to those steps - and we still have a ways to go. So I'm trying to be obedient, but the practical side of me is screaming "ARE YOU CRAZY?! You can't do this part yet!"

But after talking with KC and telling him that I'm praying like crazy that God would calm my spirit (because, quite frankly, I'm freaking out! Hence the intense pray session), he tells me to instead pray that God would show me verses of His provision and verses that show how He takes care of us. And that I need to linger on those verses instead of my own worry. So I decide I'm going to do just that. I whip out my trusty-dusty iPhone and pull up eBible. And I say "Okay God - show me". Well, that didn’t work so well. I think the verse was about lineage or something. Haha. So I took a deep breath, and prayed that God would lead me to the best verse. {I'd like to add at this point, that I'm weird. God very rarely gives me verses that would have spoken "perfectly" to most. He always has another way of talking to me that is unconventional to the masses.}

I pull up Ephesians. Then, Ephesians 6. Then, Ephesians 6:14. Well, the first word of the verse is at the very bottom of the page, so I have to swipe to the left to see the rest of it. So this is what I see in that first verse highlighted in blue: Stand. Then as I swipe to the next page, my eyes catch on verse 16 (not even the rest of 14) and I read "hold up the shield of faith to stop the fiery arrows of the devil". As I mull that over for literally 2 seconds, I see this scene in my head:

(Courtesy of Alice in Wonderland - most specifically, the version

of the mastermind known as Tim Burton. See her lovely shield? I

want one like that.)

That is one of my favorite scenes in the movie. And I knew that God was giving that specifically to me. The movie buff/Tim Burton fanatic. That nothing is impossible. That all I have to do is have faith; faith that will shield those "fiery arrows". What are those "fiery arrows" you ask? Doubt, confusion, uncertainty, "questioning God's character" - that's for those of you at Freedom Ministries. As I'm thinking all of this, my eyes are tearing up. Then I hear this line from a song on the radio "We wave our white flag. We surrender - all to You…" And suddenly I'm crying as I realize yet again:

A. God loves me SO much that He tells me things in a way that I will understand

B. God loves me SO much that even though I fail Him time and time again, He still takes care of me

C. God loves me SO much that He gives me reassurance through Tim Burton movie clips

D. God loves me SO much that He wants me to see that He is FOR ME

E. God loves ME so much…

Even though it's out of my character to do something that I don't feel like we are financially prepared for (anyways, who is ever completely financially prepared for adoption?  Lol), I'm sending out our paperwork. I'm trusting in Him to do the "impossible"; I'm asking Him to work a miracle.



Over 10 months in...

I wish I would've posted something on the 23rd as that was our 10month mark, but I'll be sure to do so on September 23rd as that was the day we officially began ALL of our paperwork. We got our signed and officially approved home study on Thursday! *begin the cheering and woohoo'ing* And today we mailed off our very first grant application. Please intercede on our behalf as Lifesong International receives our grant information in the coming days. Things have been slow in the work department for KC. And as many of you know, that is what we are using to fund our adoption. We've had a few fundraisers that have done well, but most of our funds come from his earnings.

We could really use God's provision as we are embarking on this last leg of our journey. We have a lot more due in the next 4-8 weeks than I had originally thought - blame that on my excitement haha! I just thought that our next 2 amounts due were split pretty evenly and they're not. A bigger amount is due this time with a bit smaller amount once we receive and accept a referral. I'm confident that God will provide in one way or another. Whether someone gives us a ridiculously large check or KC is bombarded with tons of eligible applicants - I'll be glad for either one!

We'll be sending off our USCIS paperwork in the next day or so. Just trying to get everything sorted out and organized! Then, we'll send our Dossier off to Little Rock to be state sealed. It's SO crazy to think that our paper chase is coming to an end! It's bittersweet: on the one hand, the paperwork kept us distracted; but on the other hand, it will be nice to enjoy life for a bit without worrying about deadlines. Lord knows we'll have plenty to keep us occupied in the upcoming months: Caedmon starting Kindergarten, Oliver starting pre-school for the first time, both of the boys are signed up for soccer, and a few other church related classes KC and I are hoping to commit to. I'm praying that will keep us occupied enough so we aren't thinking about our referral 100% of the time…. maybe only 80% of the time instead. ;)

Again, just keep our family in your prayers. Pray that God will continue to be glorified in our lives - because all of this, we could have never done on our own. HE deserves all the glory.

Home study and Dossier

Well I just spoke with our social worker Miss A, and she said that we should be receiving a copy of our signed and approved home study in the next day or so. PTL! Miss A also told us that we should be good to send our Dossier down to Little Rock to be State Sealed and made all official like. Talk about exciting! I didn't think we were to do that until we got our USCIS approval back - like 4-6 weeks!

So, I'm going to upload everything to the portal one more time tomorrow to be approved. Once we get the ok, we'll be able to send it down. As soon as we get our signed home study in the mail, we will send it off with our USCIS Orphan Petition. And that's it guys - that will be about 98% of our paper work that we have to complete. No more paper work! That should be its own little party! haha!

Now, that's all the good news. ;) The bad news is our second big payment will be due when we submit our Dossier to be state sealed; and we're not quite there yet. But I'm not worrying about it. I know God will provide at the perfect time. We do have one more fundraiser going on with Ordinary Hero. When KC and I found this fundraising site, we thought we'd just sign up and get a little bit extra to help with expenses. Then, I get an email 2 weeks ago explaining about the July grant contest. I had no idea that they did things like that! So, if you have a chance, please swing by and check it out. That grant money would really help as we are THAT much closer to bringing Effie home. Head over to www.ordinaryherostore.org and be sure to select Sandra Collins under the affiliate name when you check out. :)

This part is happening a lot faster than we expected! We (sadly) thought it would still be a month or two before we were at this point. Now that we're already here, we're SUPER stoked, but at the same time wondering how it's going to happen. God has already done tremendous things for our family, so I know that He'll pull us through this one. It may be at the absolute last minute, but I know He'll do it.

It's weird to be in this place of peace. Not worrying and tearing my hair out trying to come up with money at each and every turn. I can seriously say, that I'm not worrying. It'll happen. One way or another, it will happen.

Please say a prayer for us as we will also be sending out a few grant applications. We could only apply for a handful, but that is better than nothing. Please continue to keep us in your prayers and we prepare to start perhaps the hardest part of this process: the waitlist. At least during the madness of the paper chase we had something to keep us occupied. Once you're on the waitlist, there's not much you can do but, well, wait. But I know the wait is well worth it. As far as the timeline goes, I've mentioned it before, but it's completely up in the air. Right now, we're told the wait could be up to 11 months. So we could have almost one year of waiting ahead of us. It won't be easy. So please, keep our family in your prayers.

I'll continue to keep you all updated even in the hiatus that is to come. My resolution was to post at least once a month - I'll be sure to stick with that. :)

-Sandia