Can we talk?

 OK. I confess, there's so much I've wanted to write about, but no time because of trying to finish Grafted. This day started miserably: I was physically tired, staying up late, getting up early, not sleeping well in between. In our recent wildfire adventure, a dear friend asked how I was sleeping. "Like a baby," I replied and I really was. Now I go to sleep thinking about Grafted and wake up right where I left off, usually at dark:30 in the morning. Waking up sleepy usually makes this girl grumpy, and today was no exception. After sharing my grumpies for breakfast, Lisa and I started working, while Randy and Caleb went to the Apple store for a One-to-One appointment, hoping to solve a particular film issue we're having.

When we went to church yesterday morning, we thought we had just one more section and some B-roll (the footage that overlays the speaker and adds visual interest to the film). People asked us if we thought we could finish; to which we replied, "If the Lord allows us to keep up this pace." We watched the film last night; I think we were all assuming we'd all be pleased. Not so much.

Today, we awoke with a LONG list of repairs, as well as the plan to completely rework at least 1-3 sections. ACK! That's why today started so miserably. But wait! There's more! Nothing was working; creative juices were not flowing, one computer went on strike and our film software stopped importing pictures properly. All this after a quiet time! What's a girl to do? We stopped to pray again (and again later), about the software issue, and it finally finished importing the photo, but only by the long way. So we got back to work, but still those creative juices were flowing like syrup in January-- in Alaska, because it will probably still be summer here in Texas next January.

Would you like a little whine with your dinner? It's probably a good thing you can't hear my voice. This has been much harder than we anticipated, more involved than we could imagine, more technically demanding, and more draining on the brain.

I confess, I debated over writing this post. My attitude today has not been honoring to God, and I don't want to glorify sin in any fashion. But the sin is not the end of the story. It never is, when you're a child of God.

But, God ...  Pastor Voddie says that's one of his favorite phrases in the Bible, and I'm inclined to agree with him. So here's the way we finished that sentence today: But God always provides, and today is no exception.

The highlight of today was listening to one of Pastor David's clips, one that was completely new to me. How I didn't hear it when I was sitting in that study interviewing him, I will never know. But tonight, I heard that clip for the first time. It was exactly the encouragement we all needed. He was talking to prospective adoptive parents in the clip, but tonight, he was talking to a family who needed the encouragement. I wish I was technically capable of figuring out how to upload clips to this blog, but I haven't figured it out yet, and I won't have time until next week. So I'm afraid you'll have to wait, but we plan to post some of the clips that have kept us going through this project. You don't have to be an adoptive parent to be encouraged by his words.

Honestly, it has been an amazing privilege to travel with these families on their adoption journeys; we have learned so much. We have laughed and cried and everything in between. We have learned deep lessons about the love and faithfulness of God and the sufficiency of Scripture.  Our primary goal has always been to glorify God, but in doing that, we desire to be honoring to these families: to tell their stories faithfully, to share their triumphs and their cloudy days, and ultimately their victory in Christ. We pray that we will accomplish these goals with Grafted.


Thank you for your prayers.