Today God led me to read the book of Nehemiah. It is truly amazing when we seek out our Heavenly Father in praise and prayer, how He answers the longing of our hearts. Today, I was encouraged in my quiet time with the Lord and wanted to share a few verses that stuck out to me....
"The God of Heaven will give us success."
Nehemiah 2:20
"Don't be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons and you daughters, your wives and your homes."
Nehemiah 4:14
But I prayed, "Now Strengthen my hands."
Nehemiah 6:9
God hears our prayers and knows our hearts. He knows when we are happy, sad, or scared. All of these feelings are 100% ok to feel!! But the important part of feeling fearful or sad, is remembering that while its ok to feel this way, it is so important not to stay prisoner to these feelings. God wants us to reach out to Him and to find peace in Him. I love the feeling of peace washing over me as I reach out to our Heavenly Father for guidance.
There have been times throughout our adoption process where I have felt fearful of the unknown. There is so many questions that are left unanswered and it is easy to become scared. I believe God not only approves of these feelings, but He wants us to have these feelings. It is in the place of true surrender to Him, with our thoughts, feelings and actions, that we are able to depend solely on His loving Hand, mercy and grace. I am so grateful for our Heavenly Father, that He loves me so much that He would take the time each day to lift me up when I am lifting my prayers and praises to Him. Praise the Lord God of Heaven and Earth for His loving touch on our lives!!
I pray that as you read this, you find encouragement in our Heavenly Father today. If you are struggling in some area of your life, I pray that you find peace with the one who created Heaven and Earth and the entire universe!!! I pray dear friends that you know you are loved and you are worthy!! You are fearfully and wonderfully made!! God desires for you to know Him more and through your struggles, I pray you know that He hears your every plea and sees your every tear. He loves you more than any thing in the world!!
Thank you so much everyone who has reached out to us throughout these past 3 1/2 years! We are moved by your kindness, love and prayers. We are so grateful for everyone of you!! We will continue to keep you in the loop as we move day by day closer to meeting our dear, sweet Emma.
Take care and God Bless!!
Saturday, July 30, 2016
Monday, July 25, 2016
Emma
Words cannot even begin to express how our family is feeling
right now. We are so incredibly blessed
to be sitting here at this moment looking into the face of our little
girl. God has blessed us in so many ways
and we are so incredibly grateful for this amazing gift He has given to
us. Thank you Jesus for answered
prayers!! Thank you also to everyone who
has supported us and prayed for us, your encouraging words mean more to us than
you will ever know. God has not only
blessed us with Emma, but He has also blessed us with amazing friends and
family.
At this point we want to share a little bit more about Emma’s
name. It is kind of funny when I think
back at ALL the names we had picked for our little girl. The list is literally a page long. When we received information about Emma, we
discovered that her foster family renamed her within their home. Emma is not her “Chinese name” but it is the
name she has come to know as her own.
All the time we spent searching for the perfect name, God was laughing
knowing her name was already selected and a perfect fit for her. The name Emma means “whole” or “universe”. I find this meaning so incredibly symbolic as
out of all the children in the “universe”, God selected Emma to make our family
“whole”.
So as far as paperwork goes, we are currently working on our
travel portion of our paperwork. There
is so much we need to complete before we travel!! At times the amount of paperwork we need to
complete in the short amount of time we have can seem a bit overwhelming. But it is amazing how God can instantly calm
those fears when we reach to Him for comfort.
We serve such a loving and compassionate father!! In addition to paperwork, we also have a
significant amount of money to raise in order to fund the remaining costs for
our travel and stay in China. But we
know our Father is faithful and he will pave the way for us financially. We are so blessed to be on this journey with
Him as our guide!!
As we continue forward in the process, I will continue to post "mini" blog posts to help keep everyone in the loop with where we are in
the process. :)
Thank you all again for
your love and support.
God Bless!
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
We would like to introduce OUR daughter!!!!
We are very excited to announce that after 3 1/2 years of waiting, we have officially been matched to our daughter!! On July 6, 2016 we received a phone call from AWAA (our adoption agency) about a beautiful little girl. Due to confidentiality, our agency asked we not share publicly about our daughter until China approved our family for her adoption. So the process began for us to prepare the necessary paperwork needed to submit what is called a "letter of intent" aka LOI to China. In short, this paperwork summarizes that we are prepared to adopt and will care for all of our daughter's needs. By July 9th we completed this letter and it was sent to China July 11th. Then the waiting began again...
Some families have told us that they have waited for months for approval from China. There doesn't seem to be any indication of why families have to wait, basically it is what it is. However, we feel truly blessed because by July 20th, 9 days after submitting our LOI, we recieved what is called our "letter of approval" or LOA from China. Once we received our LOA, AWAA indicated we were officially permitted to share publicly about our little girl we have prayed for over the past 3 1/2 years.
Now that we have our LOA, we begin the next faze of paperwork to continue forward with our adoption. The first stage is called the I800 which is submitted to the "United States Citizen and immigration Services" or USCIS. This paperwork is necessary so our little girl can become a US citizen when we bring her home. There are a few other steps we will need to complete and the waiting process begins again. Once all of this paperwork is completed and approved, we will get what is call TA or travel approval. It is at this point we will begin the travel faze of our adoption!!!
Our agency estimates we should Travel around mid September or mid October. This all depends on how fast we receive our upcoming approvals. There are a few Chinese holidays (September 15-17 and October 1-7) that will also affect our travel. We are beyond excited to see the end of all this waiting and look forward to bringing our little girl home!!
Again due to confidentiality, we can't share very much about our little girl but what we can share is that she is a beautiful gift from above; we will have her home before her 4th birthday and her name will be Emma Capri Ayres. For those of you wondering, Emma and Evy will be 9 months, 3 days apart in age. :-)
As we continue on in our journey, we will continue to keep you posted with our progress. We also ask for your prayers. We have a lot left we need to complete before we are able to travel, both paperwork wise and financially. We know in our hearts God will provide both emotionally and financially!! We also ask for prayers for Emma, Jaxon and Evelynn as their lives are about to change forever. Lastly, please pray for all the children of the world waiting for families and for families still waiting for their child(ren) to be forever home, for their continued strength and courage. This process is not easy but it is entirely 110% worth it!!
Thank you all for your continued prayers and support!!
God bless!!!
Some families have told us that they have waited for months for approval from China. There doesn't seem to be any indication of why families have to wait, basically it is what it is. However, we feel truly blessed because by July 20th, 9 days after submitting our LOI, we recieved what is called our "letter of approval" or LOA from China. Once we received our LOA, AWAA indicated we were officially permitted to share publicly about our little girl we have prayed for over the past 3 1/2 years.
Now that we have our LOA, we begin the next faze of paperwork to continue forward with our adoption. The first stage is called the I800 which is submitted to the "United States Citizen and immigration Services" or USCIS. This paperwork is necessary so our little girl can become a US citizen when we bring her home. There are a few other steps we will need to complete and the waiting process begins again. Once all of this paperwork is completed and approved, we will get what is call TA or travel approval. It is at this point we will begin the travel faze of our adoption!!!
Our agency estimates we should Travel around mid September or mid October. This all depends on how fast we receive our upcoming approvals. There are a few Chinese holidays (September 15-17 and October 1-7) that will also affect our travel. We are beyond excited to see the end of all this waiting and look forward to bringing our little girl home!!
Again due to confidentiality, we can't share very much about our little girl but what we can share is that she is a beautiful gift from above; we will have her home before her 4th birthday and her name will be Emma Capri Ayres. For those of you wondering, Emma and Evy will be 9 months, 3 days apart in age. :-)
As we continue on in our journey, we will continue to keep you posted with our progress. We also ask for your prayers. We have a lot left we need to complete before we are able to travel, both paperwork wise and financially. We know in our hearts God will provide both emotionally and financially!! We also ask for prayers for Emma, Jaxon and Evelynn as their lives are about to change forever. Lastly, please pray for all the children of the world waiting for families and for families still waiting for their child(ren) to be forever home, for their continued strength and courage. This process is not easy but it is entirely 110% worth it!!
Thank you all for your continued prayers and support!!
God bless!!!
Wednesday, July 6, 2016
Lifesong for Orphans - Matching Grant
July 6, 2016
Hello Friends and
Family,
Praise God from whom
all blessings flow.
As most of you know,
our family is in the process of expanding by two little feet. Three and a half years have passed since God
had first laid the idea of adoption heavy on our hearts and so much has changed
since we began the process back in February 2013. When we first began our journey to adopt, we
felt God had called us to adopt from Ethiopia. Therefore, we began the
paperwork and 8 months later we were on a waiting list to adopt a little girl
from Africa. However, two years into our wait, God brought us to a crossroad
where we could continue on our path to Africa or follow His lead. Because we
know that God’s plan is ultimately greater than our own, we decided to follow
the path God laid before us and we began the process of switching our adoption
to China’s Waiting Children List. Currently, we are around number 5-7ish on our
agency’s list to adopt a little girl…our little girl. Our agency anticipates
that our waiting time could be as little as 6 months from the time we submitted
our paperwork to China before we are matched with our daughter. We anticipate
and prayerfully hope that we are traveling before the end of the year.
While the wait is
hard, we know that every day that passes means we are one day closer to
bringing our little girl home. We know
God’s timing is perfect, He knows where our little girl is at this very moment
and He has His ever loving eye watching over and protecting her. There is such great comfort in knowing that
the Creator of the Universe is watching over our little girl and will continue
to do so even after we are holding her tight in our arms.
Needless to say after
three and a half years, we are incredibly excited to see light at the end of
the tunnel of our journey to bringing our daughter home!!! But while this is a very exciting time for
our family, it also has the potential to be a very stressful time as well. The devil is always lurking around, waiting
to devour and destroy. As we face mountains
of additional paperwork, prepare our hearts for leaving our two children in the
USA while we travel to China and plan our trip to a foreign country, it would
be easy to become frightened and scared of the unknown. If we allow the devil to intervene in our
hearts and minds, the process of adopting can seem downright terrifying and
impossible. But we know that with and
through God, all things are possible.
God has called us to this path and we know that He will lead the way as
long as we trust in His ultimate plan and look to Him for guidance. As we continue forward, we are asking for our
family and friends to partner with us in prayer for our family; for strength,
courage and continued faithfulness in Him.
We also ask for prayers for our children, both here in the USA and our
little girl in China, who are about to have their lives completely turned
upside down, that they feel God’s comfort and peace. Lastly, please join us in praying for all
adoptive families and for the orphan crisis around the world.
Over the course of
these past three and a half years, we believe God has grown us as a family in
so many ways. One of the biggest areas
of our lives affected was our faith. We have
learned firsthand that God calls us to be more than comfortable in our
lives. In fact, sometimes He calls us
out of our comfort zone and wants us to trust that He will make ends meet. We have found that when we truly surrender to
Him in all areas of our lives, He will bless us more than we ever
imagined. As I mentioned above, we are
prayerfully hoping to travel to China in 2016 to bring our little girl
home. Currently, based off our adoption
agency estimates, we are around $23,900 short of being able to fully finance
our adoption (this includes travel expenses).
Because we had initially begun the process of adopting from Ethiopia,
most of our fundraising efforts in the past were depleted. While this may sound discouraging, we are
holding onto the hope and faith that God will help piece together the financial
aspect of our adoption. God has already
been working miracles and we are excited to announce the most recent blessings
we have received from our Heavenly Father.
Through the Grace of God, we have recently been blessed to be selected
by Lifesong for Orphans to receive a matching grant for $2000 from Family
Christian Ministries of West Michigan!! Therefore, every donation we receive,
Family Christian Ministries will match in donations up to $2000. Will you please consider making a
tax-deductible donation to help us meet this matching grant and bring us closer
to being able to bring our little girl home?
If you would like to
partner with us financially:
*Please make checks payable to “Lifesong for Orphans. In the memo
- note “Ayres/#6091” - this assures it will go to the correct account. Please
mail to Lifesong for Orphans, PO Box 40, Gridley, IL 61744.
-Or-
*Another option is to give online. Go to www.lifesongfororphans.org/give/donate. Select “Give to an Adoptive Family.” Complete
the online form and fill in Family Account Number: 6091 and Family Name:
Ayres
Thank you for loving
us, we are among the richest people in the world with all the relationships we
have and the community of people we belong to who displays the Splendor of
Jesus. We can’t wait for our family to
all be together!!
For the Glory of
Jesus,
Nic, Nicole, Jaxon
and Evelynn Ayres
Lifesong has been
blessed with a partner that underwrites all U.S. administrative and
fund-raising costs (TMG Foundation and other partners). That means 100% of your
donation will go directly to our adoption. In following IRS guidelines, your donation is
to the named non-profit organization. This organization retains full discretion
over its use, but intends to honor the donor’s suggested use. Individual donations of $50 or more and
yearly donations totaling $250 or more will receive a tax-deductible receipt.
Receipts for donations under $250 will gladly be sent upon request. Lifesong is
a 501(c)3 tax exempt organization.
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