Pulling out of Bethany

In my last post, I said I had called both Bethany and CHSFS. When I spoke with the person who answered the phone at Bethany and explained our situation to her, she thought it would be an independent adoption from Korea (there is no such thing). She went on to say that they would not be able to do our home study if Korea was one of the countries they worked with (she told me to check their website to see if it was one of the countries - it was). I said I would still like to speak with the social worker who deals with international adoption to verify the information she had given me. I didn't get a call back from her until the end of the week. Meanwhile, I had already gotten accurate information from CHSFS. I missed the call when Bethany called me back and since we were already in contact with CHSFS I didn't want to waste their time by calling them again. To be honest, this was just one more thing I found myself disappointed in with Bethany.

It led me to the question of why we went with them in the first place. As I wrote before, I did have a peace about Bethany and did sense God pointing us in that direction. Prior to making that choice, I had a conversation with a very good friend who pointed out to me that sometimes we just have to make a choice. We can be so afraid to take a step forward, afraid that somehow it is going to wrong and we will have irreparably messed things up. When we think this way, we miss the grace of God. "See to it that no ones misses the grace of God" Hebrews 12:15. She reminded me that His grace is sufficient and if I don't get things quite right He still works it for good. What I realized is that I had to stop being fearful and take a step forward. That was the peace I had about taking the step of filling out the application with Bethany. I also realized that God would continue to guide me if I continued to listen. So often I hear from God and then set my course and go. I don't continue to listen for the course correction that may need to be made along the way. This time He has given us not just a course correction, but a change in course. So was I wrong about Bethany? I don't believe so, at least not at that time. It was all part of God teaching me and preparing me to pursue international adoption from Korea. Before, I was far too overwhelmed and fearful of the adoption process. The formal application with Bethany served as a nice practice run. I wrote before that every time I thought of going in a different direction besides Bethany (usually a quicker one) I had no peace. The thing is, had we gone with another agency with a faster timeline, we would have been so far along in the process that I would not have been open to this situation. Because all we have lost is $100 and an afternoon filling out an application (which as I said will only help us this time around), we are not upset or concerned about this change in course at all. In fact, we are very excited, something that was missing before.

Our formal application to Bethany was submitted September 26th. The next step was an informal interview with our social worker. I knew she would be calling at some point to set up the interview. I hoped to have an answer as far as the Korea adoption situation before she called. We had our first meeting with CHSFS on Wednesday, Oct 28th and she still had not called. I planned to call her Monday to pull out, but she called me late Friday afternoon so I had to tell her then. I was wondering if I was going to feel scared about officially pulling out and the thing is I wasn't. I felt relief and excitement. I have already seen the Lord work in a mighty way in this situation. I am looking forward to how He will continue to show Himself as He fulfills His purposes.