Another call from our sweet social worker to tell us that the MAPP class has an official start date of October 14th. It's every Thursday night from 6-9pm for 10 weeks and one Saturday in the mix that is 6 hours long. We should be finished on December 9th. In it we will be learning a lot of skills to deal with the children and Im sure many legal things as well (I can't wait to share with everyone what we learn). We are so excited we can't stand it. Its just one step closer to God's precious children.
On another note, I've made all comments on this blog private until I can read them. I had a crazy on facebook say some pretty nasty things to me. And I suspect there are more who don't like what we are doing and will most likely make that known so I'm going to head those attacks of Satan off before they can even get started!
I also wanted to make one thing very clear: This blog is in no way intended to make anyone feel bad about what they are or aren't doing for God's kingdom. That is between you and God. But I do hope that this blog will help people get an inside view on what it takes to become a foster parent and/or what it looks like to take a leap of faith in any area of your life. Maybe you are dealing with a big life changing decision and you know all you have to hold onto is God - I pray that this blog will help you take that leap of faith to fully trust in the savior of the world. Because in the end it's not works that get you into heaven it's your faith in God and your trust in him and him alone. I pray that God will move like he never has in Lakeland, Florida and I pray that he starts with me and my family.
Leslie
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Thursday, September 9, 2010
APPLICATION ACCEPTED!!!
I got an email today from our sweet social worker to tell us that our initial application has been looked over by the supervisor and is officially approved. I knew it would be but its good to get it in writing. We should know in the next few days/weeks when MAPPs will officially start. I'm on pins and needles waiting to hear. We have a desperate longing for another child in our home - it's pretty indescribable and even if I was able to articulate what I needed to say it wouldn't quit do it justice. So I will just say thank you Lord for choosing us to foster your precious precious children - we truly are the lucky ones in all of this.
We are asking our family and friends to please keep our future foster children in your prayers. Prayers for protection, prayers for acceptance, and prayers for their future and safety. We ask for support during this time in our lives. We have had nothing but awesome people encouraging us to take this leap of faith...we are truly blessed by all of our beautiful friends. We pray that not only are we touched by these children but that all of you who will come in contact with these children will see the face of God.
I know I promised a few question and answer's over the next few posts so Ill go ahead and do a few questions here;
1. Why did you choose to foster children and when?
My husband and I have felt a very strong connection to adoption after we adopted our first beautiful baby girl, Kate. We knew we would open up our home again but we weren't sure in what way and when. About a year ago a friend of mine in ATL told me she and her husband were going to be foster parents and it hit me like a mack truck. For a full year I tried to talk myself out of God's plan for our lives before I started a book called Radical (by David Platt if you haven't read it - READ IT). In it were really harsh but true words (that I won't go into detail about) that truly changed how I felt about what it really means to be a Christian. We knew we could no longer deny God's calling on our lives and thanks to my wonderful friend in ATL who has been praying for our hearts the last year we have finally stepped out in faith.
2. Are you trying to adopt any children from the system?
The goal of Foster Care is reunification with a biological parent and/or family member. We are doing our best to remember that our goal MUST be to love the child while we have them and live day by day KNOWING that the child will most likely be reunified. If something comes up where a child in our care becomes available to adopt we would strongly consider it - but it is NOT our intention to adopt out of the system at this point. We want to help as many families as we can be put back together.
3. Can you have any more biological children? If so, will you have anymore?
Yes, my husband and I can have more biological children. We adore each of our children not because of biology but for who they are and how they were giving to us on this earth. As far as us having more biological children yes I believe we will have one more biological child. At what point? Maybe as soon as a year or maybe in 5 years we will leave that timing up to God.
Okay I think that covers the big questions....I'll answer a few more questions in the next post!
Leslie
We are asking our family and friends to please keep our future foster children in your prayers. Prayers for protection, prayers for acceptance, and prayers for their future and safety. We ask for support during this time in our lives. We have had nothing but awesome people encouraging us to take this leap of faith...we are truly blessed by all of our beautiful friends. We pray that not only are we touched by these children but that all of you who will come in contact with these children will see the face of God.
I know I promised a few question and answer's over the next few posts so Ill go ahead and do a few questions here;
1. Why did you choose to foster children and when?
My husband and I have felt a very strong connection to adoption after we adopted our first beautiful baby girl, Kate. We knew we would open up our home again but we weren't sure in what way and when. About a year ago a friend of mine in ATL told me she and her husband were going to be foster parents and it hit me like a mack truck. For a full year I tried to talk myself out of God's plan for our lives before I started a book called Radical (by David Platt if you haven't read it - READ IT). In it were really harsh but true words (that I won't go into detail about) that truly changed how I felt about what it really means to be a Christian. We knew we could no longer deny God's calling on our lives and thanks to my wonderful friend in ATL who has been praying for our hearts the last year we have finally stepped out in faith.
2. Are you trying to adopt any children from the system?
The goal of Foster Care is reunification with a biological parent and/or family member. We are doing our best to remember that our goal MUST be to love the child while we have them and live day by day KNOWING that the child will most likely be reunified. If something comes up where a child in our care becomes available to adopt we would strongly consider it - but it is NOT our intention to adopt out of the system at this point. We want to help as many families as we can be put back together.
3. Can you have any more biological children? If so, will you have anymore?
Yes, my husband and I can have more biological children. We adore each of our children not because of biology but for who they are and how they were giving to us on this earth. As far as us having more biological children yes I believe we will have one more biological child. At what point? Maybe as soon as a year or maybe in 5 years we will leave that timing up to God.
Okay I think that covers the big questions....I'll answer a few more questions in the next post!
Leslie
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
IN CONTACT....
For the last few days (of course we sent the application over a holiday weekend, dumb planning) I have been trying to get a hold of the foster care social worker for FBCH. They are currently in the process of hiring a new social worker for the Lakeland area. So for now the poor social worker in Orlando is taking care of her area AND Lakeland...I can't imagine how over worked she must be. Anyways, she was able to find time yesterday to send me an email and she was SO sweet. She told me that as soon as she gets the application she will review and present it to the supervisor for "approval" once approved we will be in the holding pattern waiting for MAPP's classes to start. Im feeling so anxious to get the ball rolling and I have about a million questions in my head for this poor lady. However, I know that the MAPP's classes will answer ALL of them so Ill just keep letting them pile up and see what happens during training.
I know a lot of you might be thinking we are a little bit crazy for doing this. And maybe somedays I think we are a little bit crazy too but in the next few posts Ill answer some general questions that people have been asking me. I figure it will be easier to keep everyone updated on here than re-telling the story over and over again! =)
Leslie
I know a lot of you might be thinking we are a little bit crazy for doing this. And maybe somedays I think we are a little bit crazy too but in the next few posts Ill answer some general questions that people have been asking me. I figure it will be easier to keep everyone updated on here than re-telling the story over and over again! =)
Leslie
Monday, September 6, 2010
God's Will
Friday, September 3rd, 2010 we mailed in our initial application to become foster parents. We will be fostering through the Florida Baptist Children's Home. So far we have prayed, sought God's will for our lives, and came to the conclusion that if we truly wanted to be followers of Christ we can no longer deny his calling:
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this to look after orphans and widows in their distress -James 1:27.
We don't know where this journey will lead us but we do know that God is there. We now will be waiting for MAPPS classes to start (a 10 week training course) sometime in Oct/Nov and then we will move forward with home studies, background checks, finger prints and whole list of other things. It's a long process and at times I'm sure a scary and demanding one - full of set backs but also full of glorious triumphs.
Once we have the child in our home, we will not be able to post anything about the child directly but we hope that this blog about becoming foster parents will help answer questions people have about our decision to be foster parents and about becoming foster parents in general.
Once we have the child in our home, we will not be able to post anything about the child directly but we hope that this blog about becoming foster parents will help answer questions people have about our decision to be foster parents and about becoming foster parents in general.
We ask for prayer as we start this journey. We are praying for protection over our family and for guidance as we bring children into our home who need special love and attention. We hope that our journey will inspire others to open up their homes to a child who is in need as we have been inspired by another family who has opened up their home to a little boy. Their journey of faith and trust in God is nothing short of life changing and we pray our story will change someone else's life path to truly be the "hands and feet" of Christ.
Leslie
….once our eyes are opened, we can not pretend we do not know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows that we know and holds us responsible to act. –Prov 24:12
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