Who Stopped the Rain?

This week has been exciting as we have spent lots of time with family and friends and prepare for my (Patty's) aunt and grandmother to visit for 10 days.  We have had a project a week on the list so that by the time Isaac gets here we can have 12 weeks without projects. :)

It's also been nice here and the rain, snow and hail has stopped, well kind of.  Dane asked me today, "Who stopped the rain?"

Since Dane was born, we had stopped going to auctions, but recently we started going again.  It's a great way to get nice presents for reasonable prices and support some awesome causes.

Last week I went to the Liberty Lake Church dinner and auction and had a good time with our friends the April and Jayme.  All was going great and then they showed some pictures of some children from China that people in the congregation are adopting or hoping to adopt.  Floodworks begin...

One of the pastors of this church is VERY involved with adoption from China.  His sermon at our church last year really impacted Kevin and I as we made our decision to adopt internationally.  At the auction he shared a story of a little girl who was born with her bladder exterior.  He showed a picture.  I couldn't stand to look at the horror, and I was thankful my chair was facing away from the projected image.  His story continued as he explained his conversation with the surgeon regarding this little girl.

He asked the surgeon, "When will you be doing surgery??  The answer was, "We generally wait until they are five."  When he asked why, the surgeon replied, "We usually don't have to do surgery then."  And the pastor asked why and the surgeon replied, "They don't usually make it."

Floodworks stage two.

I can't imagine how stunned the pastor must have been. If a doctor in the US had said this, they would have to deal with the implications of the hypocratic oath, but in China, this was just fine.

Can you imagine someone saying this about a child to you and what you would say?  I wish this would make the headlines, because this is the reality of over 150 million children in the world.  Many of them won't make it to five, and they just want to be loved and have families, but because they live in a country that doesn't put children in their list of priorities, they don't have much of a chance of survival.  Their zip code, or lack thereof  limits them.

This was just the kick in the rear that I needed to remember why we are adopting internationally, and why the waiting, frustration and separation are worth it.  So answering Dane's question, we are stopping the rain.  We are taking the step forward and making sure that one little one who doesn't have a family has a forever family. It's not time to cry, but to celebrate.

Soon, we hope to be in Africa snuggling with our little man and letting him know how much we love him and helping make a difference for others like him.