Update on Olga

***Their Chip-In account is up to $710!!!  If was all give what we can, they will be fully funded this week.  We can do this!!!***

I wanted to give you all an update on the precious little girl named Olga who truly has changed my life. 

About a month ago, I joined many other bloggers in an attempt to raise money so that her forever family could bring her home.  You can read my post here:  A Day to Save Olga.  What an amazing response we saw!  In just a few days time, so many people responded to the call by praying, donating and/or sharing the story with others.

I come to you now asking you to rally together once again.  While they have raised around $20,000 so far, the anticipated costs for this adoption is around $35,000.  For those not familiar with international adoption, you are probably looking at this number in shock!  I know I did when I first became aware of it.  It is outrageous that it should cost that much money!  But, no matter how disgusted we are by the complicated, over-priced system, the fact remains that these children NEED TO BE RESCUED!  If you haven't read my previous post, please take a minute to do so. 

These children are unwanted.  They are considered defective and disposable. 

And yet, there are loving families here that desperately want to open their homes to these babies.  The Abell family has the means to support another child.  They have the space, the love, the ability, and the desire.  But no matter how much they are willing and able to bring another child into their life, that $35,000 initial cost is overwhelmingly difficult to come by.  How many people do you know that have that kind of money just lying around? 

If they had chosen to bring another child into their family biologically, this would not be nearly as complicated.  Medical insurance covers most of the expenses involved in a pregnancy.  Unfortunately, there is not equivalent insurance coverage for adoption expenses.  So because they chose to rescue a child that is in desperate need of a family, they have this enormous up-front cost.

This is not a situation where the family is getting in over their heads.  They have not made this decision lightly.  They are not going into it blindly. 

They are following God's call on their family. 

Most of us at one point or another help to raise money for something.  We raise money so that people can get the medical treatment they need.  We raise money to help fund research for various diseases.  We raise money for organizations that help end human trafficking.  We raise money to help people recover from natural disasters.  We raise money all the time for so many different causes.  But they are all similar in that they are there to help others in their time of need.

This is not a welfare case.  This is not supporting someone who just doesn't want to work to get what they want.  This is not enabling someone who doesn't know how to manage their money.

The Abell family has cut out all non-essential expenses such as "cable, eating out, haircuts, birthday parties, vacation, knick knacks, etc."  Chris has taken on a second job and works extra hours any chance he gets.  They are scrimping and saving and working.  Jenn is making and selling various items.  Yard sales, bake sales, MaryKay sales.  They are doing everything they can to bring their daughter home.  You can read more about their journey, their struggles and their undying love, hope and determination for their daughter in their latest blog post here. 

Won't you be a part of helping them bring her home?

What can you give?  $10?  $25?  $50?  More than that?  Some tax return money that could be used to help a little girl get home?

I want to challenge you to be a huge part in this wonderful story. 

First, pray for this family.  Pray for peace and wisdom and strength.  Pray for miracles in the process.  Pray for Olga...for her safety and health. 

Go to the family's blog, Saving Our Starfish, and donate to their "Dossier Submission Chip-In" account on the right-hand side of the page.  Give what you can.  Check out all of their fundraisers and participate.  They currently have $635 towards their goal of $5458.  Let's all join in and blow the top off that goal!

Then, share this story.  Email it to all your friends.  "Share" it on Facebook.

I have seen what can happen when we rally together. 

Let's do it again.

A Day to Save Olga

Today I am sharing with you a message from a friend.  Her posts on her blog, A Perfect Lily, about Olga back in December opened my eyes, and I will never be the same.  Today, many of us bloggers are joining together to spread the word about this sweet girl and her family, The Abells, who are trying to rescue her.  They need $7000 ASAP to do so...Patti's note explains more.  When we started the day, the grant was at $75.

UPDATE:  The Abells have $1477 in their "Chip-In" account!!! And the family sponsorhip grant is up to $4548.94!!!  Let's keep it climbing!!!


Please take a few minutes to read this message from Patti. 

"But if anyone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need and refuses to help--how can God's love be in that person?"  I John 3:17 NLT

Once our eyes are opened, how can we turn away and do nothing?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dear friends,
So many of you already know this beautiful little face....



Olga turned five last month. She has spent the last five years in an orphanage in Eastern Europe, without the love of a mommy and daddy- simply because she arrived in life exactly as God designed her. One chromosome too many, and her fate was sealed from birth.





Sealed, because in Eastern Europe, babies who are born with Down syndrome are deemed unacceptable at birth. They are discarded as cast-offs of society, and when they turn five they leave the only home they've ever known...




And I wish I could say that for most of these children, leaving that home meant going to a place of safety, a place of happiness, a place where they would finally know the love of a family...know what it meant to be cuddled or sung to or read to, tucked in at night, prayed for, loved.

Instead, they are taken to a place that most people wouldn't leave their family pet.


A place of living hell, where they will never know the tenderness of a parent, never know the security of being raised in a family, and there they will stay, one ugly, pain-filled day at a time...until they die.






I read a post last December that stayed with me to this day. It was called from baby dolls to bedstraps.The blog author wrote about Elizabeth, an orphan on Reece's Rainbow who had been transferred to a mental institution, waiting for a family to step forward for her. Her words still haunt me.

I wonder where she thought she was going as they led her out of the orphanage that day. Did she think that maybe it was finally her turn? That they were taking her to her forever Mommy and Daddy?

And when they instead took her inside that dreadful place, when they shaved her head and tied her to a too-small metal crib

when they turned their backs and

walked

away…


when they left her confused, terrified,

in a room where the wails of schizophrenic adults echo through the cold air

what was going through her young mind?



Did she wonder if she was being punished?



How long did she hold out hope that this was only temporary?

That any minute, they would come and take her back to the baby house

to her baby dolls and teddy bear,

to her best friend, Angelina?


Did she long to free her arms from the restraints

to cover her head with her hands to drown out

the scary noises

the scary sights

the scary smells?



That could be my Lily….


It could be your child.

And what if it were?

What if you woke up one morning

and by some hellish, twilight-zone twist of fate

your child wasn’t still tucked into that warm bed down the hall,

what if your child was trapped

across the dark sea

in that nightmare that is

the institution?

What

would

you

DO?

Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter. Proverbs 24:11

Elizabeth is being rescued today, thanks to the efforts of that blogging mama, and others like her.

Olga is being rescued today, thanks to so many of you...you gave so much and created such a large grant that a family was able to step forward and start the process of adoption.

The Abells have done so much already, towards rescuing Olga. I can't even imagine all the paperwork and prayer and emotion and finances that goes into an international adoption. They have done numerous fundraisers, and will continue to do so until they can bring Olga home.

Through the help of so many, a grant of over $13,000 has been raised for Olga's adoption. That grant is set aside for the final travel costs and fees that it will take to bring Olga home. It will take every penny of that and then some.

Right now the Abells are in need of raising the $7,000 that is needed to submit their dossier for Olga. Without that dossier we don't even know if Olga has been transferred yet. Here in America you just pick up the phone and ask these questions. But here in America we don't tie five year old girls to cribs to keep them from climbing out.

The Abells need to submit that dossier as soon as possible- at the very least to find out if she has been transferred already- because I know an army of prayer warriors who is going to want to know that piece of information as well. And at the very most, it could be able to hold Olga at the baby house until the Abells can rescue her. I wish I could say with certainty that she won't be transferred- truthfully we just don't know that.

Olga has been so heavy on my heart for months- friends, I want you to know that I DO trust that God has a plan here.

I prayed like crazy for a way to help the Abells. I truly believe that there is a network of people who love Olga here in blogland...a net that is woven by God and is stretching out across this blessed country we live in, and even beyond to generous hearts in other nations. I really cannot express enough how thankful I am to be a small part of what God has already done for Olga, Peter and Kareen. But I don't think our job is done.

Olga needs us.

I don't want her to spend one more forsaken day in that place than she has to.

We're not doing a giveaway here today. I don't even think we need to do one- I know so many just have a heart to help and to give, and prizes were never the real reason we all gave anyway.

So I'm just asking- for one day- for you to do whatever you could to help Olga. Whether that's $10 or $20 or even a hundred...if you are able to help raise this money for the dossier, please do so HERE...

This is the link for the Chip-In giving on the Abell's blog.  (Scroll down and find the "Chip-In" box on the right-hand side of their blog.)  Every single dollar goes to the Abell's adoption fund to help towards the dossier, and every single dollar will help.

We're calling this A Day to Save Olga, because there are about 17 of us blogging mamas who have set aside this day to blog, post on Facebook, pray, give and spread the word to SAVE OLGA.

Will you help us?

I know you will:)

Love,
Patti
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Please prayerfully consider what YOU can do to help.  Don't just turn away.
~angela

What if it were your child?

God is so faithful to answer prayers that are in His will.  Over the past couple years I have read alot of books with heart-breaking stories, some biographies, some historical fiction.  About a year ago, while reading some of the historical fiction and sobbing my eyes out, I cried out to God.  I asked Him to open my eyes to see what He sees...to break my heart for the things that break His heart.  Boy, has He ever answered that prayer! 

These days it feels as if my heart is going to literally burst.  Do you know that feeling?  My chest actually physically aches.  Both last night and this morning, I felt like it took every ounce of my strength and concentration to not break down into the ugly cry.  Oh, how heavy my heart feels!

Today, I got to spend my morning snuggling precious babies.  I helped out in the nursery at our Bible Study.  We had four sweet little ones, and four of us adults to care for them.  While I thoroughly enjoyed playing with them, watching them giggle and rocking them to sleep...I could not stop thinking about all the children who never experience this.  All those precious babies in orphanages around the globe who never giggle at their caregiver, who don't get rocked to sleep, who don't get cereal-o's to snack on just because.  The thousands of beautiful children who spend their days laying or sitting in a crib crying because there is no one to pick them up, who don't know what it is to play, who don't get their diaper changed but maybe once a day.  The children who don't know what a loving embrace feels like, who don't know what safety and peace and joy and warmth and love feel like.  All because they are not "perfect". 

I want you to take a minute and picture your own children.  Whether they are little now or were long ago, picture your child as a toddler.  Now imagine that someone took that child away from you and put them into one of these orphanages where they were not hugged and not loved and not cared for, but rather neglected and ignored and abused and forgotten.  They were forced to stay in their crib all day long...in a room full of cribs with crying children who were never attended to...a room that smelled horrendously from all the children made to sit in their own filth...  A place where they barely got enough food to sustain them, and no one ever picked them up to cuddle them.  Endless days of dreadful existence. 

And your child is there, crying out for Mommy and Daddy to come...crying out for nothing more than to feel loved and secure and safe.

Could you turn your back on your child?  Leave them there?  Say it is not your problem?  It is not your "calling" to go rescue them?  Someone else needs to do it?

No?  Then why do you turn your back on the ones that are there? 

You may not have been the one who abandoned them.  But you are the one who is ignoring and neglecting them.

If that were your child over there, you would stop at nothing to save them.  No one and no thing would stop you from getting there as fast as you could to rescue them.  Your thoughts and actions would be consumed with trying to get them back into your loving arms and safe home.  You would be appalled and disgusted by what you saw there.  You would be angry that anyone could do that to a child.

So why don't you feel that way now?  Are those children any less deserving of love than the ones in your home?   Is it ok that they are treated that way?  Should you just leave them there and do nothing because they are not your responsibility?  Of course not!

It is your responsibility!  It is your calling! 

"Defend the cause of the fatherless..."  Isaiah 1:17

Doing nothing is not an option.  God says clearly in many places in the Bible that we are to take care of the fatherless.  In the book of Deuteronomy, He gave the Israelites many laws and instructions on how to live.  In there He repeated many times how they were to provide for the fatherless.  Does He care about the orphans less now, in today's society?  I'm pretty sure the answer to that is absolutely not!  He loves them and wants them taken care of just as much today as ever. 

"If a man shuts his ears to the cry of the poor, he too will cry out and not be answered."  Proverbs 21:13

So why do we go about our lives thinking that it is someone else's problem to deal with?  We live in a nice, suburban bubble here in America.  Even if we "struggle" a little financially, we still have no idea what much of the world's "struggling" looks like.  And instead of reaching out and trying to educate ourselves on the matter and figure out a way we can help, we gladly put on our blinders so that we can fully concentrate on our own lives.

"Woe to the shepherds of Israel who only take care of themselves!"  Ezekiel 34:2

You need to prayerfully consider what you can do to help.  As I said before, doing nothing is not an option.  Can you financially support a family who is adopting?  Can you babysit for a family who needs to take the training classes?  Can you make meals for the family who just brought their child home?  Can you donate $10 or $25 a month to an adoption grant, such as the ones on Reece's Rainbow?  Could you use your tax return to help a child get a home?  Can you forward this post to others?  Can you educate and encourage others to take off their blinders?

Could you open your heart and home to another child?

No matter what it is, trust God to help you...financially, emotionally, physically.  He is faithful!  You won't have to do it on your own.  Whatever it is.

Just do something!

And, may I make one more suggestion?  Don't pray, "Lord, let my heart be broken with the things that break your heart" unless you are really prepared for it to happen in a big way!

A Great Find

This blog has become one of my favorites:  NoGreaterJoyMom.com
What an amazing family living boldly for the Lord!

The entries on this link are mostly written by her husband.  When reading so many blogs by women, it's great to get the guy's perspective from time to time. 

Take a few minutes to read it. 
Very inspiring.


"God is looking for people through whom He can do the impossible. What a pity we plan only the things we can do by ourselves."  AW Tozer

Sweet babies

Today, I am stepping out in faith.  Today, I am trusting that God will do a mighty work.

You see, my eyes have been recently opened to atrocities on the other side of the globe.  Unthinkable things happening to innocent children.  In Eastern Europe, children with Down Syndrome and other disabilities are deemed unacceptable.  Many parents are strongly encouraged to put their babies in orphanages at birth.  Here they stay, some in unspeakable conditions, until they find a forever family.  Unfortunately, there are many who do not. 

But that's not the worst of it.  At the age of 5 or 6, they are transferred to a mental institution.  Once transferred, there is very little chance of them ever finding a family and reaching their full potential.  Instead, they waste away in dark rooms, sometimes tied to their beds for hours or days at a time.  These are precious children who just need a chance.  Sweet babies and toddlers who need proper medical care.  Innocents that only want someone to love them.

Here is a clip from the Today Show about the institutions in Serbia.  These exist all over Eastern Europe.  I warn you, it is hard to watch.



Now, I know this can all come across as quite dramatic.  And here in the priviledged land of America, we are often shown pictures and stories of the sadness around the world, innundated with requests for 'sponsorship' of some sort.  But please, please don't get numb to the needs of others.  There is so much that you can do to help.  You don't have to adopt 15 orphans with special needs to make a difference.  You don't even have to adopt one. 

There is a wonderful organization called Reece's Rainbow that raises money for adoption grants for the sweet children in Eastern Europe.  The average international adoption costs $25,000+ and many families who have a heart for it, don't have the bank account big enough for it.  That's where Reece's Rainbow steps in.  They provide grants for these children so that they can find a forever family to call their very own. 

What can you do to help?  Blog about it.  Post about it on Facebook.  Donate money.  Pray for the families who are in the process of adopting.  Pray for the sweet children who are in need of a family.

Over on the side of my blog, you will find a link.  Sweet Danila is getting very close to aging out of the orphanage.  The more money in her grant fund, the more likely she is to be adopted.  Help me give her hope.  You can donate via PayPal right here through my blog.  You can link this blog to your Facebook page. Please consider taking a few minutes to look into this and pray about how you can help.

It could mean the world to this sweet girl.