predestined to be adopted ...

.... as His son through Jesus Christ. (Ephesians 1:5)


We are praising God today that He has added another precious soul to His family. Tonight Spiderman asked Jesus to "give me a clean heart" and told Him that "I want to be part of your family Jesus". He actually prayed alone, in the bathtub, because he was too embarrassed to pray with me but he told me what he said to Jesus and at bedtime he thanked God for these things. His face was beaming and his eyes were shining. Of course, we did see this coming for awhile as he often talks about loving Jesus and God and says he can't wait to go to heaven.

Recently he told me that he had never heard of Jesus before arriving at Hannah's Hope. That was almost one year ago (Feb 3rd) and God has done much this past year. I recall being surprised to receive the referral of a muslim child (many Ethiopians are Orthodox or Jewish) and I'll never forget meeting Almaz and hearing her share her own prayers for him. She told me, "the world needs Abdu as a Christian". Praise God for grabbing the heart of this precious child.

On a related note, yesterday at church we publicly dedicated Spiderman to the Lord. He and his Dad met with Pastor earlier in the week to discuss what would be happening (our others were dedicated as babies). We wanted him to understand that it was our intent to raise him to know the love of Christ and we wanted the church to know of our commitment. Here is a photo of us at church. It was extra special to see hearts moved as Pastor read Jeremiah 29:11 that God has plans for Spiderman, "to prosper him and not harm him, to give him a hope and a future."