A Time for Everything

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens; a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace. - Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

This verse speaks volumes to me right now as I go through this season of life. I think between Jay and myself, we have experienced one of these "times" at least once.

Since June there have been a lot of different events occur in our lives that have really put a damper on my mental, physical, and emotional health, which naturally (whether directly or indirectly) affects Jay. At the beginning of June, I had some issues happen at work that lead to a downward spiral of my mental health.  Poor decisions were being made by the people in our company which lead to them losing over half of their outside sales reps in a matter of 30 days. The amount of stress I was under caused so many issues that I ended up being sick for the large part of the summer into September. Thankfully Jay saw how this was affecting me and let me put my two weeks in before I had a secure job offer. My last day with GTM was September 19.

During this time, we were also dealing with some big curve balls that were thrown our way with the adoption process. I get a call from my caseworker in late August asking me when we sent our blue line fingerprints in for the initial clearance needed from DHR to start processing our paperwork and get a home-study set up. April 30- which is our anniversary, I told her. She explained to me at this point that she still did not have our clearances so I needed to call and figure out what was going on. I could feel the pit in my stomach rising up. As I hung up the phone I just started praying for the Lord to suppress the anger I could feel dwelling in me before I made this phone call.

I call DHR and tell her what is going on and ask her if she knows anything about it. She asks me to hold and I gently say, no problem...... 10 minutes later I hear a "Mrs Clark, I have some bad news." Apparently, the caseworker who initially received mine and Jay's fingerprint card was "let go" and the envelope containing all of the information necessary to clear us has been sitting on her desk since April. For those of you who know me well, I am sure you can imagine the fury that consumed me at that point. Intolerance is something I have always struggled with and at this point I knew something was going to come out of my mouth, but I wanted to make sure that I didn't kill my witness as a believer with a sin I have been praying about for years.

I took a big, deep breath as a tear of anger rolled down my cheek and said, "OK- what do we need to do about this?" She said, at this point there is nothing we can do except process it and wait for the clearances. I knew that is what was going to be said. I knew as soon as my caseworker at the agency told me that she still didn't have the clearances that this was going to be one more thing added to my list of road blocks for the summer. I gently began my sentence with, "I understand you are just the woman who answered the phone and I am sorry you have to hear this, but ...." I explained to her how their job was important and it affects the lives of people and their children DIRECTLY. Now my child, who could be homeless, starving, even abused, will sit on the other side of the world for 4-5 more MONTHS than necessary because they overlooked paperwork. If I did not call, we would still be waiting for clearances and I may be checked in somewhere. She apologized 100 times and I know it wasn't her fault, but it was so hard to swallow that pill.

 I proceeded to ask her about ten more times, is there ANYTHING else that needs to be done. I almost get off the phone in the clear and she says, oh I did see that one of your husbands cards are missing a signature, so he is going to need to get all of his cards redone. We can't except any of the cards if one doesn't have a signature. At that point I just simply say ok and hang up the phone and cry. I felt so broken and so worn out emotionally. I had been praying so hard about so many things that I was just exhausted. After a good cry I realized there was nothing I could do and just decided I would move on. It was then I started praying very intentionally for many things in my life- and then the real fun began :)

Jay immediately went and had his fingerprints redone and sent off. He received a letter about his clearance one week after sending it in. I thought, ok, this is a good sign, we are on the up and up.

After having a heck of a July and August, September didn't prove to be much better for me. Almost two weeks after the inital phone call to DHR, while searching for a job, I received a letter notifying me that my fingerprints could not be processed and I would have to go get mine redone as well.  In times like this, you laugh or you cry- I did a little of both and then went back to the Shelby County Sheriff's Office to get my fingerprints redone.

I get to the office, wait for someone to come and help me get my fingerprints. As I wash my hands thoroughly, put all of the necessary chemicals on my fingers to get them EXTRA clean, we start the process and immediately there are issues. The machine can't read my fingerprints. He asks me if I am a surgical nurse, I chuckle and tell him no. He said that he has the hardest time getting fingerprints from  nurses and brick layers. At this point I am just praying while I am in the room that somehow these prints will magically appear and not to my surprise, NO LUCK. I was in there for about 45 minutes trying to get a decent fingerprint. After he tries and tries and tries, he basically tells me - you can send these in since they are printed out, but I am going to be honest, I don't think they will accept these because there has to be a certain percentage of your print to read it and I just couldn't get it. I take them and thank him and ponder what I am going to do.

A couple of days later, I decide that I am sick and tired of hoping certain things work out, when I serve THE GOD that is in charge of every single thing in the entire world, including fingerprints. I literally sat in the parking lot of the post office and prayed over every single card that I put in the envelope, sealed it and understood that HE was in control of the situation and if he wanted my fingerprints to be cleared HE would clear them.

Fast forward to the end of October and several things just started falling into place. On October 29, I was offered a full time position with Champion Sports Medicine as their Sales/Marketing Rep and then shortly after, on November 6, I received the beautiful letter that said I was CLEARED and I met the "criteria regarding approval of applicants for an adoption."

So what does all of this mean ? It means that now, with me having a new job, I do have to tweak some of the financial paperwork, but hopefully it will all be approved in a timely manner. Please pray that it does go quickly and smoothly without any more speed bumps. Once the initial paperwork is cleared in the US, we will send our paperwork over to India for their approval.

God has our little one in the palm of His hands. There is not a day that goes by that I don't think about what he/she looks like. If they are tall or short. Will they be an athlete? a doctor? a missionary? How will I teach them to love Jesus and have a servants heart? The list goes on and on. I am falling in love with a child that I have never laid eyes on because I know in my heart that he/she was created to be ours. I know one day, I will look back on this time and fully understand why there were so many delays. Simply put, our baby isn't ready for us yet and when he/she is, everything will be cleared and we will hold them in our arms and never look back.

There is a time for everything in life. Weakness is a gift from God, so you can experience HIS strength.

Thank you for your continued prayers. We need them every day.

Love Always,

Jay and Erica