REFLECTING....


I found myself re-reading some old blog posts tonight. Wow, that was a quick journey God sent us on last year. What a blessing our Daniel Mamo has been to us over the last month! Visit our "He's been Home One Month" post HERE

I found this post that we blogged as we were rolling out our fundraising shirts... I got CHILLS when I read it tonight, so thought I would share with you again just how amazing this journey was for us. This describes the meaning behind our CHOSEN shirts that our friends helped us design and print that celebrated our Journey to bring our son home from Ethiopia.

On a sad note, the back of our shirts represented how many ORPHANS there were in the world (147 Million...)I saw a NEW number the other day, and even though it seems like we know a lot of people that are adopting, that number is sadly still GROWING. The numbers are now at 163 Million so our Adoption Memory shirt is just that... a MEMORY of how many Orphans there were. Now there are MORE. And there will be MORE tomorrow. We need MORE families to step out on their faith and say YES!

Did you know that 34% of Christian Families have considered adoption, but only 1% actually do it! Did you know that if we could raise that number to 7% that there would be NO ORPHANS LEFT IN THIS WORLD??? That was a statistic, shared by Katie Davis that SHOOK ME to my core when I was "just reading" her blog. We had no intentions to adopt, I was just reading her blog, but that statistic haunted me.... After I read that, everything began to change and I began to ask WHY NOT US? We had the room, we were capable of loving more, we had plenty to share with someone who had no one and nothing.... There were many tears shared over that quote.. I so didn't want to be a member of that 1%!

I promise you, that if you SAY YES, it will be a blessing beyond blessings. I only wish that ALL of you could experience the JOY and the LOVE that we feel each and everyday with our little guy! We can't imagine LIFE without him!

Here is the post descibing the meaning behind our Adoption Shirts and the story that was CHOSEN to be OUR Adoption Story............Thanks again to all our family, friends and perfect strangers who supported us on this AMAZING journey!

The word CHOSEN represents so many things for our family!!!

We were CHOSEN to be at our church the day our church launched the "Living a Better Story Campaign".
We were CHOSEN to receive that 35$ from that CHOSEN anonymous donor from our church that day.
We were CHOSEN to take our $35 and multiply it to help a local girl, Katie who lives in Uganda, with Amazima Ministries!
Our family and friends were CHOSEN to help us by donating items for a yard sale, in which we raised $563 for Katie's ministry!
We were then CHOSEN and begin to PRAY and research over Spring Break the desire we began to feel in our hearts to adopt!
We were CHOSEN to stand randomly in front of the continent of Africa (at our hotel on our Spring Break trip) as the backdrop of our family picture on our blog(we did not even realize this until we posted the picture...that was sooooo NOT on purpose!). We were not even pursuing or looking to adopt from Africa at this point....
We were CHOSEN to have an opportunity to decide about a Mission Trip traveling to Ethiopia, Africa this summer, in which we had 48 hours to make the decision to go or not go!
My son and I were CHOSEN to be on this trip with 20 other CHOSEN and AMAZING people.
Many of YOU were CHOSEN to help us financially to go on this trip!
Many of you were CHOSEN to donate toys, clothes, soccer balls and cash for this journey for the orphans we were about to visit in Ethiopia, Africa!
Those of you that were CHOSEN were part of God's plan to lead us to our son in a country half way around the world!
We were CHOSEN to go to our sons orphanage the day after he arrived there.
Our plans to go somewhere else that day fell through and we were CHOSEN to go to this unscheduled orphanage.
We were CHOSEN to meet Mamo, where we fell completely in Love with him. Instantly.
My husband's heart was CHOSEN to answer YES to God's calling after I texted him from Africa and told him about meeting Mamo and asked him if he could welcome him into our family.
He was CHOSEN the next day to contact our Home Study agency to set up our first appointment, while we were still half way around the world.
Our agency was CHOSEN to agree to let us pursue him, even though we weren't 100% paper ready.
We were CHOSEN to hear this news hours before our first homestudy visit!
We were CHOSEN to complete his paperwork diligently (at lightening speed) to be ready when the courts would reopen, which we were told would be sometime in late September/Early October.
Our paperwork was CHOSEN to be submitted to the courts the EXACT day the Ethiopia courts re-opened after their long winter break!
Many of you were CHOSEN to support us by buying the Uganda magazine beads for yourselves and your friends, which in turn offsets some of our adoption costs!
Some of you were CHOSEN to help us sell MULTIPLE beads and took it upon yourselves to tell your friends and help us raise money for not just our adoption, but also raising money for 147 Million Orphans and for Katie's Ministry.
Many of you were CHOSEN to donate or are donating TONS of STUFF for our upcoming Adoption Fundraiser Yard Sale, that takes place later this month!
A Lot of you were CHOSEN to offer your help at this upcoming event!
Some of you were CHOSEN to have the creative ideas for this tshirt design, the creative skill to create the shirt and the ability to help us pick some AMAZING shirts that signify this AMAZING journey!
As you can see CHOSEN means so much to our family... we have been on this journey to bring our son home from Africa,
and we KNOW we were CHOSEN to be on this journey, which no doubt has been a journey of a lifetime!
We are delighted that we have walked this walk with so many of you who have CHOSEN to support us with your prayers, your time, your love, your guidance, your support and your gifts!

This shirt is to CELEBRATE ALL OF YOU and the rest of YOU who are still joining our journey to bring our son home!

This CHOSEN shirt recognizes your role in helping us bring our son home from half way around the world and into our arms!

We couldn't have done it without you!!! We have been so grateful of all the friends, family and strangers that GOD has CHOSEN to be a part of something that we know HE favors! And we are anxious to see who else has been CHOSEN to join this journey with us!!!

"Do not be afraid, for I AM with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west. I will say to the north, 'Give them up!' and to the south, 'Do not hold them back.' Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth."
Isaiah 43:5-6

Blessings to ALL!
The Payne Family :)