Adoption Fundraising: Stories of God's Faithfulness

I am always encouraged when I hear of the ways the Lord blesses families through fundraising.  When we were going through the adoption process, it was so reassuring for me to see God providing for other families.  I'm so thankful to Emily for sharing today about the way the Lord provided for their adoption in His perfect timing! 

Hello! My name is Emily. I am a mom of 4, a wife to Owen and lover of Jesus. I have had the joy of reading Leah's blog and following her Instagram while she and her hubby welcomed their sweet little Haven Grace into their family. Isn't God's work amazing? Just about 6 months prior to Leah, we added to our family through the miracle of adoption. God worked mightily in our lives and hearts throughout our home study, wait time, fund raising and finally our placement. 

Leah asked the adoption community for some insight on how God has worked in adoption funding...boy do we have a story! But before I get there, I want to say that we were in the same boat as most folks--the category that sounds like this: "We'd love to adopt, but it is so expensive! We just can't afford it." I totally get it. And you know what? God totally gets it! Even as I secretly dream of another adoption, that is my very first fear--so I am declaring this to myself! Adoption is expensive. But as we learned in our journey, God's plan is perfect. He did not put the dream of adoption in our hearts just on a whim, but for specific purpose. Philippians 1:6 says, "I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns". If you know the Lord is leading you to adoption, He will work it out! 

A little background, my husband Owen and I had been married for 8 1/2 years and we had been blessed to have 3 children. They are Clara born in 2007, Judah born in 2009 and Wesley born in 2011. We knew that physically it was not a good idea for me to have another baby although we were both certain that our family was not complete. We were like many Americans at that time (just over 3 years ago) living in a home that was purchased at the top of the market and had no other financial options--we had 980 square feet for 5 people. We felt trapped in our finances with no way in sight to live differently. We are your average working American family (financially speaking). God knew this. He had a plan and a rescue. An awesome one! Our in laws invited us to live at their vacant home in our city--God had moved them out of state for work. We were thrilled to have more space and quickly began saving for a new house...so we thought. About 4 months into our new living arrangements, Owen and I really started to talk about adoption. I felt it for NOW and he felt it for LATER. I made an information-seeking appointment at our local adoption agency and Owen walked out of that meeting asking where we could sign up. Our home fund quickly became an adoption fund. 

Fast forward through our home study period, home schooling, being placed in the match books, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and a half marathon and we had a good amount saved for our adoption. We felt very ready for a new baby in our family. But, it was not time yet. God was still working in His miraculous ways to move and show His faithfulness to our family and teach us to trust in His goodness! In late January of 2013 long time friends from our small group spoke into our lives. They asked us how things were going saving for our adoption and a house. They knew us well enough to know (even though we were unwilling to admit it at the time) that it would be very difficult to accomplish both of these financial goals on our own. They encouraged us to let our faith & family community come along side us. FUNDRAISING? What? We didn't really need that, you know, we are hard working people who can provide for ourselves--with their encouragement we did in fact agree that we might need a little help. I was willing to do something simple, with minimal paperwork (I know adoptive families understand the paperwork burnout!) Our agency recommended that we work with a funding agency called Life Song for the Orphan. I contacted them and began our funding journey. 

A dear friend in a passing comment said, "I bet God is going to do something amazing! I bet your final bill is going to be like $13.00." I laughed and said that I could only hope. 

In February I received our package of information and got ready to start fundraising. We were just going to send out a letter to friends and family and ask for prayer & financial support. Life Song recommends that we send this letter out to 200+ people...our scope is just not that big! We made our list and were stretching it at 80 folks. Yikes. I was filled with doubt. Maybe out of fear and certainly out of pride, we asked people to help us with half of the adoption costs. We sent our letters and I kept the funding process out of my mind for 6 weeks until our "deadline". Just six weeks after our letters were sent, I contacted Life Song to check in and see how our fundraising had gone. The sweet accountant said, "It appears that things went really well for you. You have raised over the amount that you requested in your letter." Did you catch that? We had raised over the amount that we had requested. I asked her how many people had contributed, and she said, "seven." Certainly she meant seventy---I clarified. No. Just seven people had contributed 75% of our adoption cost. We were dumbfounded. In awe of God's mercy and goodness. And of course because I was a mama in waiting, I was convinced that our "CALL" would come the next day. or the next. 

The next part of our story is rather personal, and involves people that I love so much. I need to share it because it was a HUGE part of our fundraising--not necessarily financially but spiritually. In May I received a phone call from a family member who I will protect in this telling. I could tell instantly that this was not going to be like our regular conversations. There was strong emotion in their voice--the kind that is scary. They said "I need to confess something to you", and proceeded to tell me that they had been angry at Owen and I for asking for money for our adoption. They thought that if we wanted another child we should be responsible for it and all the associated costs. They said that they had been upset since they received our letter and just did not know how to manage this in our relationship. I was very surprised, a little hurt and confused. As the conversation continued though I realized that God was moving and working in such big ways. This family member confessed to me that during their quiet time that morning, "God sent a lightening bolt in their house and changed their hearts". Everyone they came running to find each other during the morning devotions and confessed that they were looking at their money and finances in a godless way. They were convicted on the spot and wanted to give to our adoption fund. We do not compel people to give to adoptions. It is not our job to convince people to give, that is the Holy Spirits job! They said that this moment was continuing to revolutionize how they think about money! WOW. A baby who hadn't even been born was being used as an instrument to change hearts towards Christ. Even in ways that we were unaware God was working through this process 

We continued on through the summer and my heart & mind became weary from waiting. It's something I know many adoptive families go through. We also learned that our agency was raising their fees significantly in November of 2013. This was a huge stress to me! Although our fundraising was 90% complete, a large increase was going to be a challenge. 

As the summer drew to a close, we knew our time living at our in laws (after 2 years) was also coming to a close. We (and by we I mean I) began looking at homes in our desired area. I found "the one" and through a series of miraculous events we closed on our new home 10 days early. I told our Realtor that the only reason God would be moving like that is because our baby was coming soon. Little did I know how true those words were! 

 

On August 28 we received a call from our adoption agency asking if they could present our file to birthmom. This was 2 days before our scheduled move. We said YES! The next day, LifeSong for the Orphan called me and said that they had re-reviewed our file and they had decided to give us a matching grant--that we neither applied or asked for. This put our adoption fund at 99%! The next week we entered into a match and just 15 days later we welcomed our beautiful daughter Julia into our family. It was a whirlwind for sure, but a perfectly planned one. God makes no mistakes! He was asking us to trust Him completely because only He knew how to orchestrate this miracle! 

As is custom with our agency, a few weeks after placement and papers are signed, the adoptive family goes to the agency for a time to be prayed over and to pay the final bill. Our final bill was $11.00. Every penny, every need, every detail the Lord had worked out in his perfect timing. Do you know that our entire adoption was funded by 12 donors and 1 grant? That's amazing! In all the ways I wanted to doubt, control, manipulate the situation, God was sitting back and telling me to trust Him and asking me to WATCH THIS! 

**If you would like to read some of the other miraculous things on our adoption journey, I casually blog atwww.maurermasterpiece.blogspot.com 

Interested in receiving more information about fundraising and access to resources to help you fund your adoption? Then working with an adoption consultant might be a good fit for your family.  Email me at leah@christianadoptionconsultants.com.