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Darin grew
up in Solsberry, Indiana, and I grew up in Ross, Ohio. Darin moved to Cincinnati to attend
Cincinnati Christian University, and later became the worship and programming
minister at Bridgetown Church of Christ.
We were introduced there one Sunday, but Darin does not really remember
meeting me. My sister and her husband
invited me to dinner one night, and later told me that Darin would be there, as
well. I was hesitant to join them for
dinner that evening, but decided to go anyway.
Long story short, their plan to set us up worked and we fell in love!
While we
were dating we shared about our dream of having a family that didn’t quite look
like the “average” American family. We
dreamt of having biological children, as well as adopting children from another
country. And while our original picture
of adoption has changed over the last 10 years, our desire has only grown.
Darin is now
the Worship and Outreach Minister at White Oak Christian Church’s Ross Township
Campus. I am in my eighth year as a
middle school special education teacher.
We have been married for nine years and have two biological sons,
Jonathan (5 years), and Owen (22 months).
We moved to Ross a little over a year ago after God called Darin to his
new position with White Oak.
We had
planned on beginning our adoption journey in 2012. Then our church began a building campaign,
and we delayed our dreams of adopting to follow God’s leading to give
sacrificially for His kingdom here on earth.
In order to give the way in which God was calling us to, Darin and I
both knew that we had to delay our adoption.
This was not an easy, pain-free decision, but then again, sacrifice isn’t
supposed to be easy. In order to truly
feel the sacrifice, it is supposed to hurt.
Many tears were shed, and I remember even questioning God, and being
humbled by His response when asking, “Why?”
His response was simply that He might be glorified. (You can read more about what led us to this
sacrifice on my blog by following the link http://amakajoys.blogspot.com/2012/05/stork-part-ii.html.)
During the
early months of the building campaign we conceived our second son, which we
truly believe was God’s way of showing us that He honored our sacrifice. Even though God called us away from our
former church to our current church in the midst of the campaign, we felt God
calling us to fulfill our commitment to Him by completing the campaign along
with the rest of the congregation.
Throughout
our journey so far, we have learned much about what it means to give
sacrificially and to trust in God’s ultimate plan for our lives. Although our original time-frame for adopting
was not fulfilled, our adoption is happening in God’s timing, and we are
overjoyed. We have chosen to adopt our
child (or children, if we get matched to a sibling pair) from Uganda, “the
pearl of Africa”, because God put this country on our hearts a long time
ago. Our application has been approved
and we have completed the orientation phase.
We have chosen our home study agency, which will begin soon. The current time-frame for our adoption is 1
½ - 2 years.
Please keep
our family in your prayers as we continue this amazing journey of sacrifice and
love without borders. You are welcome to
follow our blog at www.amakajoys.blogspot.com to stay up to date on our adoption
journey and our daily lives. Thank you
for being a part of this journey with us!
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All of the profit from the February Give Scarves will go directly to the Hudson family and their adoption costs. Thank you for your generosity! This month's Give Scarf is...
If you are interested in sharing your story & being featured for the Give Scarf, email me at everydaypitpat@gmail.com :)
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