WE PASSED COURT!!!!!!

Anna,from America world, called about 9:30 this morning to inform us "We Passed Court" and "rights have officially been transferred to us". I just lost it, completly, all I could do was sob. I just knew we would pass. God gave me a peace like I haven't had in a long time. He is so amazing! He has given me a veiw into His working during these last couple months. I am in awe!! Just to seen what He has done in Mertalem's life, how He has held her.

Let me give you a glimpse. First of all Let me introduce our daughter. She is Mertalem Gilson (formally Yohannes). She is 7ish, they are telling us, though her birth date says she is 5 ( Oct. 14, 2003). That is not uncommon we have found out, becuause of illiteracy and children are born at home and they also have a different calendar year things aren't always recorded correctly. When Mertalem came to the orphange the staff ran tests assed her to be older than 5. Also, that is when they learned she was Hep b positive. She then went onto the "waiting list."

Our God story starts to unflod for us when we got the call on June 25th form Terra our corrdinator, WE GOT A REFERRAL! Terra told us Mertalem had just been retested and came back negative for Hep b, so she could be referred to us as "healthy." I asked a little more about her because Terra said she was very special to the America world staff. Terra told me she was a percious littel girl and that she had had a dream about Mertalem just recently. You see Mertalem had been on the "waiting list" for quite some time now (over a year) and hadn't had a new picture taken. Terra wanted to get a new picture of her, so much so that she had a dream about it.

Terra dreamt that she was in Ethiopia at the transitional house (TH) asking Duni for a camera to take a picture of Mertalem. When out ran a beautiful little girl and hugged her. She looked down and it was Mertalem. Terra bent down and told her "we will have a family soon for you." I believe it was from God. A week or so later her testing came back negative and our paperwork got there a couple(literally) days later. We were matched!

Come to find out Mertalem came in at the same time as a little boy and the two were being tested and one of them was going to a family waiting for the next toddler. She came in as a 4yr old and could have been placed with this family. In fact she was praying for the little girl. But God had different plans. Mertalem came back Hep. b positive and therefore could not be adopted by this family (paperwork). So she went on to the waiting list as "special needs."

At this point we were still in the El Salvador program, God was begining to work on our hearts. He has a plan! If she hadn't had been on the waiting list she would have been adopted out. But like I said God had a plan from the begining. She waited on the list until God got a hold of our hearts to change us to the Ethiopia program. Our dossier (paperwork)seem like it took forever..... that's because it needed to get there at just the time He had planned it to. So our paperwork and her retesting,which came back negative for Hep. b, could be there at the same time. She had to come back negative because at the time out paperwork said "healthy". We wouldn't have been referred her with a positive result for Hep b. God knew.

A day after we got the referral another family called and wanted Mertalem. God's timing is perfect! She was ours. He had made it happen! From the begining He was working. That is the awesome God I serve.

The July update came and we were informed that she had been retested again and this time it came back positive for Hep b. But that doesn't matter she's our daughter. She knows were coming for her and she's excited. God sure can melt a heart. God knows her condition and we pray He will heal her and we will be doing all we can on our end. But her conditon isn't contageous and she can live a healthy normal life, and that's what we plan on giving her, with the Lord's help. He knows what we can handle and He knew from the begining she was for us. He just had to work on our hard hearts. And He does it so gentlely, I pray I can be mor like that. If someone would have told us 3yrs ago we would be adopting a Hep.b positive older child from Ethiopia, I would have not believed it. Now you couldn't stop us!

Wonder what my amazing husband will say to the next adoption????????? Shhhhhhhhhh..

Is it right for everyone? I'd say "no". But if you truly want to see God work ADOPT and watch Him! Oh, it's not easy, but nothing great ever is. This was God's plan form the begining...Jesus was sent to bridge the unbridgable gap between sinful man and a perfect God. When we accepted Jesus' free offer of salvation we became "adopted" (God's words) into God's family. So see it's always been His plan.

Thank you Heavenly Father for this awesome journey! I can't wait to see what's next!

PRAISE MY GOD....Jen