Updated pics and host family info

For more information about these boys from their host moms please visit this blog post.

Welcoming with Love

For more information about each boy, please read this blog post. 

Your invited to a Chinese buffet luncheon this Sunday 2/28

If you want a causal way to meet any of these boys or have any questions about the process of hosting, please join us this Sunday 2/28 at 12 pm at WEPC in room 22 (downstairs) and the gym will be open. Children are welcome. Please RSVP by 2/26 to Heather Jarvis heather@wepc.org so we know how much food to provide. 

All three host families will be present, please join us for awkward noodle slurping. No chopstick skills required ;) 

Save the Adoption Tax Credit

The Facts:
The adoption tax credit provides financial benefits to families that open their homes to children through adoption from foster care, intercountry adoption, or private domestic adoption. The adoption tax credit, with a maximum of $12,650 in 2012, has helped to offset the high cost of adoption for hundreds of thousands of families since it was established in 1997. The IRS estimates that the credit benefited 96,949 children and their families in 2010. With more than 100,000 children in U.S. foster care available for adoption and countless millions of orphans and abandoned children around the world, the continuation of the adoption tax credit is vital to providing love, safety, and permanency through adoption to as many children as possible.
The Need:
The current adoption tax credit is set to expire on December 31, 2012. If that happens, adoption may require a cost insurmountable for many American families, resulting in fewer children finding love and permanency through adoption. Although the credit remains through 2012, many families will not benefit because it is not refundable. In 2013, the credit will decrease to only $6,000 and will be available to very few adoptive families.
Congress must act now to pass legislation that will protect and extend the adoption tax credit and
encourage the right of every child to grow up safe and loved in a family of their own.

A sample letter that can be sent to your state's senator can be found here on page 6. Please help save the Adoption Tax Credit.

A regularly updated list of relevant pending legislation is available at: www.adoptioncouncil.org/ policy-priorities/adoption-tax-credit.html or www.adoptiontaxcredit.org/legislation.

The above info has been quoted directly from the National Council for Adoption website

Our Advocate. Their Advocate.

As the Foster Care discussion last Wednesday approached, I was tempted to believe the information wouldn’t be new to me. Our family has already walked down the roads of domestic and international adoption. I have seen and read about specific foster children and we even put our name in to be considered as adoptive parents several times. It was PAINFUL. 

But I was pleasantly surprised on Wednesday night. Jim Carey, from the Department of Social Services spoke about PROGRESS in the implementation of new goals and procedures within their department and in the state. I saw HOPE because it seems these goals mean fewer children are entering the foster care system. 

Yes, foster families and adoptive families can join the system and help, but what these children really need is an advocate. On Wed. night, I was reminded that they have one.

Even as believers, we often forget we have an Advocate.

“… the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” John 14:25-27

Thankfully our advocate isn’t wishy-washy like I am or fearful of turning life upside down. He is capable of perfectly loving the lowest, the neediest and the helpless. He is capable of giving me exactly what I need to follow Him.

Often times, we get bogged down with the details like: 

“How on earth can we matter?”
“This problem is so HUGE!”
“This might be HARD”
“How can God possibly use us here?”
etc...

On my own, I am not equipped to love these children. It is my LORD who is equipped and he generously invites me to join him. 

I don’t know what lies ahead for this Schwarz clan of 7 in caring for those in need. I do know it is our job to be willing to enter wherever HE calls us. It is rarely neat and orderly and under my control and it doesn’t have to make perfect sense to me. I just need to follow him. 

If we had never followed His ever so simple nudge, I know 2 toddler boys from Ethiopia who would not be gracing our home with JOY and LOVE. YES... there is sacrifice. SO WHAT? Why did I work so hard to avoid that? For I have learned that the smallest of sacrifices on my own part allow me a taste of the ultimate sacrifice on my behalf.

In addition, recently God is reminding me that HE does put people in our paths. Do we see them? Are we bothered by them? I’m grateful for a few of them that text me, call me, ask me for help, receive my little help and prayers, and allow me to enter into their world; one VERY DIFFERENT from mine. It gets me out of thinking MY world is THE world and into HIS heart and KINGDOM. It’s better!

I'm challenged to consider if I really believe my Advocate is for me and those in need. Since He is, then it's worth following Him where He leads. 

By Cindy Schwarz, group member, adoptive mom