The Chinese symbol for Faith

Biblical Inspiration

Just wanted to share some great verses the Lord has been bringing to our minds...
Hosea 14:3 -"...for in You the orphan finds mercy".
Psalm 68:6 - "God sets the lonely in families".
James 1:27 - "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this; to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

Many Thanks!

WOW! We are truly blessed by the amount of feedback and encouragement we have received in the last two days!!! Thank you very much. Today we will be mailing off our first grant application to God's Grace Adoption Ministry (GGAM). They normally don't fund until placement, but because we have worked closely with them in the past (we received a grant for Cruz's adoption and Chad was actually on their board) they may be willing to work with us earlier.

We will be posting a list of prayer requests soon... pretty much the progressive checklist of what we need to accomplish in the pursuit of this adoption :) It will give you a better idea of the steps we will have laid out before us. The immediate 2 prayer requests are:
1 - That God will provide the $550.00 for our Bethany application soon
2 - That the Lord will also provide the $2500.00 for the home study following the application.

We are also in the process of securing a date for our benefit dinner, so stay tuned. God has already provided a location!!! A big "THANK YOU "to the Erwin's for their generosity in letting us use the Almond Pavilion free of charge for our dinner!

Thanks for journeying with us!

love,

Chad & Rica

Adopting Faith

THE BEGINNING:

We started off our marriage with the typical "5 year plan," waiting to have children after being married 5 years. When we hit the five year mark, we ran smack into the middle of the unexpected wall of infertility. Sparing you the details... after four years of trudging thru the valley of infertility, we realized God wanted to grow our family through adoption. We learned much about adoption and openly embraced this as God's means of growing the Allen family. Our original thought was to adopt a girl from China, but the price tag spooked us. Of course we realized very quickly that was because God had already divinely orchestrated Cruz and Isabelle to be our first 2 children... and we praise Him for the precious gifts they are! :) Now, after having on and off conversations about becoming a three child family for the last year, we feel God is calling us to adopt again and come back to the seed He planted in our hearts years ago, to pursue a little girl from China.

THE JOURNEY:

In times that are so uncertain and that would seem unwise to initiate such a financial endeavor, we feel we have clearly heard the Lord's call to step out in faith and pursue adopting a little girl from China. It could take about 2 years and cost around $25,000 (none of which we have). This is truly a journey of faith and complete dependence on the Lord's provision. We invite you to journey with us! We would be incredibly grateful for your prayers, encouragement, support and even financial contribution if you feel so led.

BETHANY:

We are currently approved by Bethany Christian Services for pursuing an international adoption and have been assigned a social worker. We have our application filled out and are waiting on God to provide the $550.00 application fee in order to submit it. Following the application, Bethany will set up a home study to the tune of $2500.00.

GRANTS:

There are several agencies and ministries that offer grants for adoptions. As you can imagine, we are lining up some applications and beginning some of the paperwork, but many of them won't look at us until we have our home study done. These ministries were a huge help in funding Cruz and Isabelle's adoptions.

WHY CHINA?

There are adoption needs all over the world, but God has clearly placed China on our hearts. The one child rule in effect has led China to have over half a million orphans! Many of those orphans are girls. Often the family desires to have their one child be a boy so he can carry on the family name, be more industrious and take care of the mom and dad when they age later in life. Therefore, many newborn girls are born and then abandoned and eventually end up in the already overloaded orphanages. Once those girls are released from the orphanages as a teenager, they often find themselves trapped in a life of prostitution. It may only be one child among thousands, but we would be honored to raise one of those little girls in our home, learning the ways of the Lord and experiencing the blessings of a loving Christ-centered family. Plus, those little girls are so darned cute!!!

FROM HERE:

From here we are doing our best to fill out the necessary paperwork, prepare a benefit dinner in April (stay posted for the date) and trust God for every footstep and every dollar. As you journey with us, you can check this blog spot for our upcoming steps in the process, prayer requests and answered prayers. We are humbled and honored that you would take enough interest in our family to partner with us in prayer and be part of our journey. Blessings!

Love,

Chad & Rica