There are those moments I appreciate the Lord's teaching and growth more than others. Today, I struggled to embrace his opportunity to live by His faith. I continue to revert to trying to live by my faith or faith in my own efforts. Note to reader: IT'S NOT WORKING!!!
SO, in December we received notice Josh's fingerprints would expire with the USCIS March 3rd. (For those of you who have not adopted internationally, this document is vital for all international adoptions.) USCIS only allows application of re-printing 60 days prior to expiration. We applied for a re-print January 3rd according to protocol. Yesterday, Josh received his ASC appt. for Feb. 18th. On an average, USCIS spends 6 weeks on processing. This seemed okay, until we spoke with our caseworker. We are scheduled for court in ET on the 16th of Feb. Should we pass on the 16th, Gladney would then immediately schedule our travel date for 2 to 4 weeks out. Gladney, however, cannot schedule our travel until they have the updated prints in hand. Grrrrr! Can't we just get a break.
I set out to fix the problem. We contacted our senator and congressman. We spoke with the head of the Africa program for Gladney. I called and spoke with the USCIS personnel. I asked our other international adoptive friends if they could help. I emailed our adoption groups. NOTHING WAS PRODUCTIVE! I emailed the USCIS office, and the address didn't work. We loaded up and headed 2 1/2 hours to Dallas for a fun filled afternoon in a government waiting room with two children. Yippee!!! Praying friends hit their knees...they asked God to place the perfect person at the entrance desk for USCIS. They asked God allow him to show favor on us and print Josh today.
God is faithful. The gentleman at the USCIS desk was kind and gracious. He didn't bat an eye before sending us BOTH to be printed right then. There was no line, no wait, no problem. Praise be to God! Truth is this doesn't solve the problem.
We are praying Josh's prints clear without any problems and immediately, imparticular, in 2 weeks. We would love to see God work this out according to His glorious ways. He alone is able to orchestrate all of our details and needs. He will be our advocate. He is the One, who is our victorious warrior in our midst (Zephaniah 3:17). So we will trust him..."the righteous will live by HIS faith." Habakkuk 2:4
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Praying right along with you Lori! God is SO capable of handling your fingerprints to get you to Ethiopia in the perfect timing! So glad showing up in person worked out...God is GOOD.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for posting this. I am so thrilled to read this news. The Lord IS faithful. I am dealing with a similar situation. Our fingerprints expire on February 25. I was able to email our local office and heard back today. They have scheduled a fingerprint appointment for February 22. We don’t have a court date yet, but we received our referral on December 29. We are hoping to find out about one soon. I am afraid that we are going to be stuck waiting for our fingerprints to reach the Embassy in Addis long after we pass court. I am trying to decide if we should email them back and see if they can get us in any sooner.
ReplyDeleteOur fingerprints from last month still have not shown up in Addis. Very frustrating!
ReplyDeleteSo glad to hear things worked out perfectly today! Hoping yours get there quick!