Let's back up a few months. We did a financial favor for someone who was in a bind. They vowed to pay us back immediately. As part of our belief that God desires us to be generous and servant-minded, we helped out without a second thought. That favor came back to bite us. After more phone conversations and emails than I can count and repeatedly unfulfilled promises to pay us back, we have yet to receive a dime. This caused a problem. Not only did it max out a credit card we needed to use to pay for airplane tickets to Uganda to pick up Maggie, it started to eat at us. We realized that our selfless act of service had turned into a selfish game of payback. We hated that. In the midst of knowing that we couldn't afford plane tickets because of this one particular issue, we knew that God hated our attitudes. We decided to totally give it up and take it as a loss. We wrote the person, explained that, although we still wanted to be payed back, we were done playing the game and our integrity and right attitudes were more important than the money. Essentially, we released that completely to God and that burden of bitterness was taken away. We had no idea how we were going to buy airline tickets. We took things into our own hands and started exploring every possible way to buy the tickets. To no avail.
Back to the present. We currently have all our tickets booked, all our stateside fees payed and only a small amount left to pay our Ugandan lawyer. It's very humbling when God shows up in the midst of what we say we have control of. Things are working out. Since moving here, we have always said that God will provide. Considering our circumstances, there have been plenty of times for just that. This is one of them. We lean into the belief that God is providing for us in ways unimaginable. We are humbled to tears that on the heels of letting go of this situation that left us financially incapable of traveling to Uganda for Maggie, God shows up. We are undeniably grateful.
2 comments:
That is truly a amazing story of faith. I'm so pleased to hear that it all worked out for your family so you can book your flights and get Maggie.
I love that when wen have such a BIG problem in life and we hand it over to God and let him deal with it it just comes out amazing.
My husband and I been doing foster care for 4 years and have cared for over 34 children.
In Dec 2010 Social Services asked us to take in a new born baby girl. My husband and I feel in love with her from the moment I brought her home from the hospital. She was born to cocaine and marjuaine. We prayed over her and we did home therapy with her.
She is 15 months old and a very happy, healthy little sweet heart.
Her parents walked out of her life when she was 4 months old. So the only parents she has ever known is my husband and I. And her family has been our three children and our parents as her grandparents.
We told the courts and social services we want to adopt her. But the courts had to look for any family first.
There is a grandmother in Kanas that spoke up. This grandmother is 69 years old and in the 14 1/2 months that the baby has been in our care the grandmother has never come out to visit her granddaughter.
My husband and I have been praying that this child stays in our family and knows who Jesus Christ is.
But just a week and half ago social services paid for the grandmother to come out to pick up her granddaughter.
We don't understand God's decision on this but we have to Trust God that know matter where our baby is she is in God's hands.
We pray that someday we get to see her again.
Thanks again for sharing your story about Maggie. I know she will be a true blessing to you and your family.
Mary Wilson
Thank you, Mary, for being so open with your story. And thank you for taking the call of God so seriously in the lives of the 30+ children you have raised. Seems inexplainable that this heartbreak would happen to you. There are really no comforting words at a time like this. The thing that I find myself repeating when I feel like things are so unjust is that these kids really do belong to God. We are caretakers, not owners. Even when I think about the possibility of Maggie not coming home with us, somehow I am at peace with the fact that God is her father and is holding her in his hands. Thanks for sharing the heartbreak and beauty of your story with us.
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