Henry-the-8th

Five years ago, we opened our home to a sibling group of four little ones and ever since, you can imagine the comments and jokes we receive for having so many children.  One of them we get a lot is that we need to have an 8th because then we'd have a "Henry XIII" or the "Eight is Enough" reference..."NEVER!" was often what went screaming through my head as people would joke with us about that 8th child.  Well, I guess the joke's on us! 

Henry-the-8th!

Last February, a friend in my Bible study was sharing about a little boy that she & her husband were going to try & adopt from Uganda.  The next week, she shared that there was a chance that he was too old for them.  By Ugandan law, you have to be 21 years older than the child you adopt & they are in their mid twenties & he may be as old as 12.  All that week, I found myself thinking continually about this little boy and almost hoping that he would turn out to be too old for them.  This made NO SENSE to me!  What in the WORLD was I thinking?!  

Sure enough, my friend shared in the coming week or two that they were not going to be able to adopt him, but she was struggling as to why the Lord would bring this boy into their lives & hearts only to then "take him away" so-to-speak.  That night, I couldn't sleep.  I prayed for him.  I thought about what it would be like to be able to be this little boy's mother.  I thought about what it would mean to our oldest son to have a brother his age.  I couldn't stop thinking....

FINALLY, after wrestling with these thoughts for a month, I opened up to David about what I had been thinking.   I figured he'd tell me I was insane and then we'd be able to get on with our lives.  Instead, David said, "You know, it's strange, but I've been feeling like we have had another son out there somewhere."  WHAAAT??!!!  His reply shocked me.  This was NOT the man I married saying these words!  

Since that conversation, we prayed about him for a while to the point where the best answer we had was, "Well, I know it's NOT a 'no!'"  After another month or so, I got a call in my office at church from my friend who first shared about this boy with me.  She was in tears and said, "I don't know why, but I feel like the Lord wanted me to call and ask you & David to pray about adopting him!"   The tears started flowing.  I knew why the Lord had her call me.  Because we needed that little confirmation in our hearts that what we were thinking was truly of HIM and not just something we had come up with in our own human reasoning.

From then on, we decided to move ahead until we felt the Lord tell us to stop.  So far...He has only confirmed, "GO!"  SO, here we are...in the process of adopting "Henry-the-8th" somewhat out of the blue!  I can tell you that while I realize that by all human standards, this makes no sense, the Lord has made His will very clear to us and we are moving ahead with excitement and great anticipation.  Our children could not be any more excited!  

Here he is talking to me on the phone the day he found out we were going to adopt him.

We told our oldest son, Alexander, first.  He was our first miracle baby and remembers well what life was like before foster care and adoption.  I'll never forget the times he would pray that the Lord would fill our home with children who needed a family.  He has truly sacrificed much for each of the kids who have gone through our home.  The damage to his possessions are like a scrapbook full of memories of which child did what to which toy.  In spite of the sacrifice, when we told him, he was so excited that he would have a brother who would be his age.  He set to work immediately cleaning and preparing his room for this new brother.  Every picture he hung on the wall so that his brother would be able to enjoy it from his bed too.  He even made sure to leave some empty places to make room for his new brother's things.  I could not be more proud of my son and the incredible heart he has for others.

His response puts me in the mind of how the Son has felt all these thousands of years eagerly working to prepare our place in Heaven.  Getting our mansions ready, setting a place at the table for us, preparing all the most amazing splendor He can come up with...All for us!  Just knowing how eager we all are for the arrival of "Henry-the-8th" makes me wonder how much more eager the Father and all of heaven are for our arrival.  "What a day, glorious day that will be!"

By the way...I can't tell this story without telling you that my friend who initially told us about our boy actually got to be the one to meet him, take him gifts & a picture book from us, and tell him that he has a family waiting for him in America.  Jade Metz has a blog too & she blogged her perspective of this story back in November.  What an incredible moment that was for her!  

I love this picture of Jade almost as much as I do of him!
What a privilege for her to be the one who got to tell  him about his new family!

Here he is "meeting" us through Jade & pictures