Thursday, July 14, 2011

The Rest of the Story

And now...the rest of the story.

We have been waiting for 10 months now. Our 10 month anniversary was yesterday, in fact. All this time we have been hearing rumors. Rumors about how fast the Rwandan government is moving, when they will be done, amount of travel time changing, etc. There was one rumor that really caught our attention. The orphanage is running out of children. This should be good news to my ears. Really, I wish there were no more orphans anywhere but, in a country where there are reportedly almost 1 million orphans, how can they run out before they get to #136!! We had heard that one family had received a regret letter. This letter told the family that the orphanage had no children to meet their request and the government would hold their dossier for 6 months and if no child was found, close their case.

I called our agency to find out if this was true. This had me worried. They looked into the problem but it wasn't something on which they could get back to me quickly. This fear has loomed over our head for months now. It's like living everyday life waiting for the doctor to call and say you've miscarried. Stress grew! About a month ago, we got a call. We were told that several families from our agency would receive this regret letter but so far we were not one of the families. Was this because we weren't getting one? Was this because the government hadn't reviewed our dossier yet? No one was sure.

Now we are sure. At least as sure as we can be. You see, nothing has ever been sure throughout this whole wait. As of right now, the Rwandan government will be issuing regret letters to everyone that has not already received approval. That includes us. They will not be allowing families to adjust the age range in hopes of matching to another waiting child. The government does not have the resources and manpower to bring the other orphanages up to standard.

In short (short ha ha), where does this leave us? With a BIG decision to make. Do we stay with Rwanda and wait out the next 7 or 8 months (we haven't received our 6 month regret letter yet) and see if a child becomes available? Do we switch countries and start all over again? If only God had given us a road map!

This looks bleak. I have cried many tears over it but God has done some wonderful things for us. I will make a post just for the good things in a couple of days. Please pray for us. Please pray that we will know what God wants us to do.

4 comments:

  1. Oh honey.....oh gosh. This breaks my heart for you. I am here.....I love you and Paul.

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  2. I can't find your e-mail address on here, but would like to e-mail you. Could you please e-mail me at marybmitchell at gmail dot com?

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  3. Oh, Jennifer! I am so sorry you have had to go through all of this. All I know to say is that God is sovereign and good and that He loves you! I am praying for you and Paul as you make important decisions.

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  4. Oh, Jennifer! I am so sorry you have had to go through all of this. All I know to say is that God is sovereign and good and that He loves you! I am praying for you and Paul as you make important decisions.

    ReplyDelete