Memorial Box Monday: Saved By The Gavel

Memorial Box Mondays has been created by Linny at http://www.aplacecalledsimplicity.blogspot.com/ , where she shares stories of God's faithfulness and puts special items in a Memorial Box to remind her and her family of God's grace and love. I have been doing the same thing for a few months now.

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about how we adopted our son Mark while living in the Philippines. God was faithful in bringing him into our lives. Today I am sharing a story of how God protected us during our adoption proceedings.

We had to appear in at court in Angeles City, for the adoption of both Mark and and our daughter N. before leaving the Philippines. It was a very hot day ~ most were~ and we sat in the courtroom from early morning until late afternoon with two babies....Mark was 15 months old and N. was 20mo. old at the time. No air conditioning, no breezes, and not much space had us all feeling cranky, hot, and sticky. Waiting for our case to come up made us anxious, not only because it took all day, but because we had been told my the social worker exactly what we were to say on the witness stand. The problem with that was it was all lies! If Joel got up on the witness stand and said what he was told to say, and they found out he was lying, he could be put on International Hold and end up in an "international incident" keeping him in The Philippines indefinitely. If he did not lie, we could lose our children to social services. We were not comfortable at all with lying, so we prayed....and we prayed....and time passed and more time passed as we sat on crowded benches in the stifling heat.

Then it was our turn and we watched and listened as the doctor who delivered our daughter was drilled and chewed out by the judge...and then the social worker got on the witness stand and told her story, including the lies, to the judge. I was called to the witness stand and asked strange questions about how I treated my children and if I thought of them as my children...and what I would do if our "own" kids called the adopted kids negative names... I was very straight forward with what I felt about their questions and tried to convey that they were ALL our own children ~ we loved them with all our hearts. Thankfully, I was not asked any questions where I would contradict what the social worker and doctor had said.

Then Joel was called to the witness stand. He stood up and moved forward. As he got to the front of the courtroom, the judge said, "Due to the late hour of the day, and the the fact that you are an officer in the US military, I will not call you to the witness stand. Down came the gavel, the judge approved the adoption of our two babies, and the proceedings were over. Not only did Joel not have any questions asked of him, but we were only the second couple at that time to adopt two children from The Philippines! God intervened and we rejoiced!

I think I will need to find a gavel to add to our Memorial Box! God's faithfulness came to pass for us and we were able to keep our integrity....and our babies! Our "babies" are not both 35 with children of their own! Praise God!!