Our family would like to thank you, once again, for your willingness to help us adopt Misha. However, events beyond our control have prevented this from happening.
We realize that a shadow of disappointment may engulf many of you as it has us. It was easy to see God glorified as we all watched people unite and sacrificially share, to help us adopt Misha. For the moment, a cloud prevents us from seeing the light of God and His purpose in this situation.
Through the years, we have found peace in reflecting on the fact that God never loses control. He knows the future and every circumstance needed to bring Misha to an understanding of Him.
We hope God allows us the opportunity to keep you informed about Misha's progress on our blog (http://www.helpmisha.com/).
May God richly bless you all,
The Johnson Family
6 comments:
I am sorry for you loss. I too had a failed possible adoption and the Lord did take my Issac as well. BUT just 1 week later, he opened the doors for our David and God has blessed us fully through him!
Praying for you, during this VERY difficult time.
Please keep in touch, Melissa. I do want to come for a visit next summer, and drink ice tea with you. :)
Laurel
Melissa,
Hi! I don’t know if you ever received my first email or not. I am an adoptive mom of Sasha, a friend of Misha’s from the orphanage. I was afraid that the pictures I sent earlier did not go through and my email might have been blocked. So I wanted to try and get in touch with you again.
I just wanted to encourage you and your family. Sasha has similar medical issues and came from the same orphanage. He was a little younger than Misha when we adopted him. We know that adopting an older child is very challenging, so we wanted to encourage you. After three years, we know that God had purposed for our whole family to grow to be like Christ through this process. We realize now what a gift God has given us. We didn’t always feel that way. I hope you don’t mind hearing a bit of our story.
We knew that God brought Sasha into our lives. Like you (reading from your website), we also believed that God’s Will would be for us to care for this orphan boy who was placed on our doorstep.
I immediately felt a type of love for Sasha (not the same strong emotion as I felt for my natural born children). It might have been closer to pity. I knew that God could grow my heart--- after all He asks us to love our enemies and those that might be unlovable! He was certainly powerful enough to help me love Sasha (difficult as it seemed at times). Through other adoptive parents, books, etc. I learned that this would take years to develop. It helped me to know that it wasn’t going to be immediate. I needed to think long term. I knew that I needed to pray each day for God’s love and keep trying to love him through his stubbornness, lying, cheating, stealing, disobedience, immaturity, anger, and attitude. God reminded me that Sasha was coming from a complete different culture and language, religious system, never been in a family, had been raised by his peers, never felt loved before, physically and emotionally abused, abandoned by his parents, and handicapped!
(Sasha used to call himself “trashcan” because he felt that people just threw him away)
These orphan kids have a long road to understand Christ’s love for them and our love for them. Sasha would go through cycles of wanting our love and then rejecting us. (He would even say that he wanted to go back to the orphanage. I think he just didn’t realize how difficult having a family would be We expected things from him that the orphanage didn’t---- like an education!)
Even knowing God’s purpose and will, sometimes we just wanted our old life back. Our selfish desires would take over and think “why did we do this” and “this is just too hard”. Well, we knew that this thinking was NOT from the Lord. The Lord tells us that if we want to save our life, we must lose it. We must take up His cross and Follow Him. We had to just cling to the Lord during this whole process (and still do). I’m so glad that God gave us the strength to continue and we trusted Him to grow us and Sasha. I would never trade this experience and growth for anything. We have peace knowing we walked in God’s will---- he was our encouragement and strength. I so desperately wanted the Lord to find me faithful with what He had given me (and still do). I can’t do it on my own strength though. I KNOW that I need Him.
It takes time to integrate these children in our family. Our natural born children suffer initially from all the time invested in the new child. We had to reassure them that it’s like having a new baby. Eventually not as much time is needed. The road seemed so hard at times. We even went to a Christian counselor for a little while to help with some issues. Other people in our life did not seem to understand how we could struggle. I can see the fruit of this “suffering” in my children. I see how they have hearts for handicapped children and compassion for others! They want to adopt children some day. It has helped them to think of things more eternal than their short/temporary thinking.
It’s a beautiful and difficult journey. I want to encourage you that God is faithful--- He will bring beauty from ashes. We look forward to seeing how God will continue to grow us through this. (We are still waiting for answered prayer on Sasha’s attitude about school! Although, his attitude is MUCH better than it was in the beginning)
We are praying for you. Please let us know if we can do anything to help you. Some day, I hope to meet you and your family.
God Bless you!
Your sister in Christ,
Jacque
Melissa, we are praying for you during this difficult time. This must be so hard on all of you! I am praying God will continue to make his perfect will known to you and give you His perfect peace. We also pray that Misha will be settled into a good Christian family, even though it is difficult to imagine him not being in your family! God's ways are not our ways, but we can trust that he is Good and Wise in all things.
Concerning contributions, please do not return any money to us. Please use it to reimburse expenditures you have made on Misha's behalf, or to help Misha be adopted into his new family.
We love you all!!! ~~Elizabeth
Praying for your peace and comfort in this difficult time. Any small gift I sent does not need to be returned. It is yours now to use as you see fit.
Melissa...have been praying for you! You may remember me from visiting Greenville Assemhbly..my name is Denise and we have adopted three small children from Liberia. I am willing and would love to talk with you anytime. I understand what you have gone through! Adoption has twists and turns! Call me or email me if you want! we understand, we really do! We'll be at the dance also on SAt. but I know many will want to talk to you then. here's my email, and we can talk on the phone or email, or whatever...just know that we pray and understand. God has a plan for Misha! You obeyed, you are loved! Denise Horrocks
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