Things of the world

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. 
1 John 2: 15-17

I have some major flesh issues God has been working out in me and it hasn’t been easy to admit or confront.  Yes, I can rattle off the scriptures I need and I know it is 100% my own personal sin. 

However, knowing is much different than applying….

I was ATTACHED (firmly) to our beautiful house and yard. The family house.  The great entertaining house.  The yard with activities 365 days a year.  The gardens.  The patio.  The horse pasture. The tree house.  The land. 

And not only physical, visible aspects of the home, but the emotional side as well.  When most people say they “built” their house, they mean they hired someone (like my talented husband) to build it.  When we say we “built” our house, we mean it literally. 

•  I remember the day Bobby and I went out to stake the house and determine the exact angle we wanted it. 
• I remember back filling the garage and having the kids help compact the dirt. 
• I remember the argument over the location of the fireplace.
• I remember the friends that came over and helped us wire.
• I remember the LATE nights working hard for the final finishes and painting the entire house. 
• I remember every step of building (all the while, our kids were by our side helping, playing, and getting dirty).
• I remember moving in the week of Addy’s birthday, insisting we had her first birthday in our new home (even without counter tops or sinks). 
• I remember welcoming a foster child into the home the week we moved in and the sorrow we felt when his needs became too great and we had to move him to another home. 
• I remember the 14 other foster children that slept in those rooms.  And the 3 more children that came home to that house.
• I remember the Christmas parties, 4^th of July barbecues, birthday parties, and holidays (and of course the small mantle that became our favorite photo taking spot—besides the great family photos taken in the yard).
• I remember some HARD trials we went through with our adopted children and the people that came into the doors to minister to us and help us through days when we were so broken.

You see, in moving to Colorado I DID NOT want to give up the place we built to be our “forever” home.  I shed many tears and wasn’t even emotionally able to take a last family photo there. 

As our move became closer, many of you asked about our housing situation and my response was, “We’re renting for now, but we’re buying some land to build our next home.”  For the first couple months after we decided to move, I was not 100% certain.  However, after making a couple trips down and deciding on this particular land, I got more excited.  I took two weeks sketching, erasing, and drawing new house plans.  And what got me through many of the goodbyes and the heartache I was feeling, were the plans and dreams of this next house….

But…

The day before we left for CO we found out we were not going to be able to close on the land.  I was devastated and the day we arrived in Colorado, I was angry. 

But then….

We had HLF meetings and activities our first four days here and I was quickly reminded of the real reason we moved down here.  We didn’t move down here for the new land and house I had planned.  We moved here to serve a ministry we love. 

These last 10 or so days God has completely opened my eyes to the flesh issues I’ve been harboring.  He has brought me back to a deeper understanding of serving with arms wide open.  And, He has helped me to overcome the lack of joy I was feeling.

Am I still grieving my past temporal home?  Yes. 

But here I am.  Trying diligently to not be anxious about where we will live, and in the meantime staying busy making this rental feel like a home for our family. 

Here I am Lord.
Ready to love.
Ready to serve.
Willing to be sanctified.

Never Say Never

Wow!  What a year it's been.  As ya'll know, we welcomed Hannah into our home in June and in December she legally became a Williams. We took a lot of the summer to settle in, get to know one another, and go through all the pains of "Growing as NINE."  I've had to update the blog title a few times, and I won't be doing it again.  As you may have noticed, I'm not much into blogging anymore and I may not start up again. Plus, who knows, maybe someday the "Eight" will stand for eight children.  Maybe, maybe not.  (I am asked at least once a month if we are done.  As those of you have been with us from the beginning know, that is a word we don't take lightly.  Only the Lord knows!)

Another word we don't take lightly is 'never.'  Sometime early this fall, I very distinctly remember telling a dear friend, "I will NEVER live in Colorado again."

Well, the old saying, "Never say never," rings true again.

.......................

Our adoption story starts the year we were married. It isn't just a story of our Congo and Ethiopian adoptions...it's a story of God's unfailing love and the transformation He has done in our lives.

Some of you may know that when we were first married, we were definitely not living for the Lord.  Our marriage was ugly and our first year of marriage was tough.  We were dealing with some ugly situations: marital spats, drinking, and infertility. 

After about 6 months of doctor appointment after doctor appointment, we moved to CO to start fresh.  It was a wonderful move for the two of us and a fresh start to grow as a couple.  We continued to see a fertility specialist and months later we found ourselves giving up hope and started to consider adoption.

THEN, we found out we were expecting and decided it was time to move to MT to be closer to family.
Fast forward a few years and we were living in MT with not only our first born, Eli, but our second child, Ayla.  We were happy, content, and loving life.  During this time we found a church home, but it was only a home to us on Sundays.  I'll never forget the night our pastor came over for some discussion with us to join the church.  We started getting into a conversation in which we needed a Bible....and Bobby and I had NO CLUE where our Bible was!  Both of us grew up in Christian homes and had even began going to church regularly since Eli was born. BUT, we still were not living as Christ followers and neither of us could really explain our faith to anyone and neither of us had ever made the personal commitment to truly follow Jesus.

In December of 2008 we hesitantly decided to move back to ND to be closer to my family and extended family...
Through that move, our lives were completely transformed.

 Spring of 2009 we walked through the doors of the Evangelical Bible Church for the first time.  We attended on and off for a few months, after being completely “weirded out” the first few times there.  BUT, something kept drawing us in the doors.  We started going to Sunday School every Sunday, attending church regularly, praying together, and reading our Bibles (that we then knew exactly where they were). 

June 2010, we welcomed our 3rd child, Owen, to our family.  After  he was born, I was determined to convince Bobby to have another child...he had different plans.  He was adamant that if we had another child, it would be through adoption. 

We flew to a few adoption conferences to gear our hearts and minds for adopting.  The very first conference we went to, we learned of churches having ministries geared specifically to orphan care and from there we came back and approached our church board about starting what is now Embrace. At the next conference, CAFO Summit in CA, we were walking the booths and met a couple with an organization called His Little Feet.  We made small talk with the children at their booth and spent some time getting to know the organization.  We actually signed our church up for a possible choir booking and then brought the information back to bring His Little Feet to EBC. 

September of 2012, we welcomed Addy to our family from Congo after a trying adoption journey. Neither of us will ever forget the day we left the orphanage with our beautiful, chubby baby girl, tears streaming down our faces as we saw all the older children crying as we left….children who saw baby after baby leave, while they longed for a family.

Long story short, we came home and decided to pursue adopting 1-2 older children from Ethiopia.  Our wait time which was supposed to be 24-36 months for an infant was then almost immediate.  We were referred our boys, Detcho and Nagi, in May of 2013.  As that time, we had not clue they were former choir members of His Little Feet, nor that we had met them at that conference in CA.  HLF came to EBC fro the first time in July 2013, ONE WEEK before we left to meet D and N for the first time.

Since then, HLF has been back 4 times and we have grown a fond relationship with them due to their work and how it impacted our boys' lives so much.  Their discipleship program and commitment to seeing the children thrive beyond their time with the choir has impressed us over and over again.

Their latest trip to EBC was this November over Thanksgiving.  Our family was given the opportunity to host the entire team for Thanksgiving dinner, and one BIG slumber party!  But Thanksgiving night, God brought a huge turn of events to our family….

The HLF directors and our dear friends, Mike and Christa Hahn, were staying at our house and we began visiting about the growth and direction of HLF.  Out of nowhere (to us), they mentioned they had been praying for our family and they felt like they needed to approach us about joining their ministry. 

Looking back at our time in Dickinson, and how God has equipped us over these years is something we are humbled to share. EBC’s mission statement, “Building Faith, Sending Out, Sharing God” is something that is hitting near and dear to us. It’s appropriate to say that we believe God has truly been ‘building our faith’ these past 9 years in the most amazing ways that up until a couple months ago, we may not have truly realized the entirety of it.

As mentioned, in December, we officially welcomed Hannah into our family. Each of our children have taught us more about God’s grace, love, and compassion in their own beautiful ways, and Hannah has been no exception. Her courage to commit to our family has been a total encouragement and perhaps a final preparation point.

After being approached by HLF, we committed to pray and seek direction through our personal prayer and quiet times.  We returned to each other a few days after our time to ourselves and were terrified at the thought of  what this could mean…our family, our home, our jobs, our relationships, our involvement in Embrace, our church—and the list goes on. But yet, we both can look over these past 9 years and feel God leading us to this next journey...

We accepted the position as Directors of Campus and International Development with His Little Feet and our family will be making the move (to COLORADO) this summer.

For a couple that started 13 years ago with a rocky start, it's humbling and overwhelming to see how amazing our God is!