Journeying

What a perfect month to start a new blog and share our journey with adoption...National Adoption Month!  Who knew that we had a National Adoption Month?!?

 We just wanted to document part of the road that God has us on.  We are officially starting the adoption process!!!  God has laid it on our hearts for quite some time, but the journey hasn't been exactly what we thought.  We started researching and talking a lot more about starting the process a year and a half ago...right before we found out  I was pregnant with Eliana! :)  Well, since that sweet little blessing was on her way, we obviously were not thinking about adoption quite so intentionally.  Recently, though, we have prayed, thought, researched, and looked more and more into it.  The Lord has brought SO MANY sweet stories to our attention and recently literally we can NOT get adoption out of our heads!  On our "getaway" anniversary trip a couple of weeks ago, we immersed ourselves into learning more.  All along the way, God has shown us more His heart for orphans, widows, and the poor.  We feel like this is a tangible way for us right now to show the love of Christ.  We are excited, anxious, sad about the orphan crisis worldwide, and burdened all at the same time!  As we began talking to agencies, we narrowed down our choices of countries.  Honestly, we were open to numerous places, and God has sovereignly led us to Ethiopia!  We have chosen an agency and started paperwork and will hear if we are accepted within the next couple of weeks.

We have so much opportunity to seek the Lord right now...
-on behalf of our child(ren) ...(yes... we are open to sibling groups) for their protection and the people taking care of them.  It is so weird to think that there could very well be a Crenshaw alive right now across the globe waiting to come home!
-for the Lord to protect our marriage and biological children
-for the finances...excited to see how God is going to provide the $25,000ish!
-for the patience!  I am sure the process will be longer than we would like for it to be!  I have heard that paperwork is a lot and the process can be a long one!
-attachment with the newest little Crenshaw!
-...just to name a few!...

As we were dreaming/talking about all of this, we were amazed at what a HUGE issue worldwide this is. There are 143 MILLION orphans worldwide.  Unbelievable...makes me so sad to think that 143 MILLION children do not have somewhere to call home. This number of 143 million is overwhelming. Here are some interesting statistics to think on...

-143 million orphans worldwide

-100,000 orphans in the US

-2.5 billion Christians worldwide

-using a median cost of $20,000 per child, the amount to adopt every child in the world would be 2.9 trillion

-The Iraq war is likely to top $3 trillion. And that's a conservative estimate according to Washington Post 3-08.

-If every Christian worldwide pitched in to adopt a child it would cost about $1,200 per person

-if every Christian in the world adopted 0.06 of a child, there would not be an orphan problem in the world

-of the 143 million orphans worldwide almost 5 million of those live in Ethiopia (a country similar in size to Texas)

-almost 4% of the world's orphans live in Ethiopia

-population of Ethiopia is approx 78 million (about 6.5% of the country are orphans)

There are SO MANY issues that go along with all of this...poverty, orphans, human trafficking, sickness, hunger, death just to name a few. We realize that this is just one small step in a HUGE world-wide epidemic. Hopefully the Lord will walk us down many other avenues in this battle before us. We long to help with just orphan care in general, and right now the Lord is leading us to adopt.

As you can see, we loved talking about how we can care for orphans worldwide. We are really excited about this journey that God has us on!  Please join in praying with us.

I loved this video I saw.  It just HIT me all of the sudden and watched with tears streaming down my face that these are REAL pictures of REAL people in these REAL situations.  People REALLY live like this.  Oh, Lord, never let this burden leave my heart.  I want my life to be about changing these lives for your glory.

Isaiah 58

First blogspot endeavor...Everyone I know uses it, so it must not be that hard, right?  I will find out!  Bear with me while I try to change and move around and see what works.  There are some old stories and posts on my other blog, but we have a new journey that we are starting (I will give details soon, but we are adopting a precious little one from Ethiopia!), and with that, I thought it would be a good "transition time" for blogging, too!

So, why I-58?  The "I" is for interstate...this road we are on.  The road of our life and journey with God. May be cheesy, but that is what we Crenshaws can be sometimes! :) There are ups, downs, twists, turns, and smooth flat areas.  We welcome them all and will strive to obey and glorify Him.  We really want our lives to count for something for the Lord.  With that being said, the "I" is also for Isaiah...Isaiah 58! We want our lives to be a "true fast" for Him.  The beginning of Isaiah 58 goes through a lot of RELIGIOUS things we can do for God...seeking God daily, delighting in knowing His ways, fasting, humbling ourselves, etc.  God's word says "behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure" (we do it for ourselves...for what we will look like to others...for what we will feel like). Religious things aren't acceptable to him.  The "appearance" of righteousness is not acceptable to him. I don't want to seek my own pleasure...

He says the fasting that He chooses is this:  starting at verse 6: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke.  Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?  Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall be your rear guard.  Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, "Here I am." If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness, if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday.  And the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.  And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to dwell in.  (ending in v. 12)

There is so much richness in all of that.  I will go into more pieces in more detail, but I just wanted to introduce us a little...

Here are a couple of fun family shots...

We love the beach...

 Daddy and Austin riding gocarts!

 

Brian and I on a weekend getaway trip!

 

Pumpkin patch!

 

We like to call this "hollywood!"