Another Addition to Our Family

Guess what happened today?
God did something cool!  Okay...so He does that all the time - everywhere - every moment.  But today He did something cool HERE at my house, for us.
There is a Compassion Blogger Trip going on right now in the Philippines.


I am already a regular reader of a few of the bloggers on this trip, so I thought that was pretty cool when I found out they were going on a trip with Shaun Groves to spread the word about Compassion International.  I've followed two prior trips like this, one to Kenya & one to Guatemala and as a result we sponsor two children through Compassion.  Get it?  2 trips = 2 kids that God has given to our hearts.  Makes sense right?

Fred is our first sponsored child and he was chosen after many tears over blog posts and quite a bit of time poring over photos and bios on the Compassion site.  He has grown a lot since the first photo we had of him!

Next came Blanca in Guatemala whom we only were blessed to sponsor for a brief time as she left the program due to school pressures.

Then God sent us Fernando - in a part of the world where Christianity is beyond a minority.  He is the same age as B and we hope that they will eventually become friends & pen-pals.

So... to the cool thing God did today for us.
I've been reading posts and trying to not get too involved... I've been feeling a bit maxed out emotionally lately and was afraid of the raw feeling of life in places of desperate need that is always right at the surface of these blogger trips. 
You try and keep arms-length when you read posts like this, and this, and this.  I dare you!

I'd already been feeling God tugging me about sponsoring a third child - a girl - J's age (like Blanca had been).  We have three kids at home, we should have three kids out there.  Makes sense in my head & heart.  But I've been putting that feeling aside - not wanting to stretch the budget a bit more just yet.

Today's mail brought an envelope from Compassion with a letter that told me how they have over 1,900 older children waiting for sponsors - and their definition of 'older' means 10 years old or more.  Not exactly OLD.  Seems lots of people - bless their generous hearts - are taken with the photos of little ones, and no one faults them one bit!  They are some cuties!  But the older kids are often overlooked.  Compassion serves these kids amazingly and you can read more in Shaun's post here.

So on a whim (who knew God used whims?), I clicked over to the Compassion site and did a quick search (female, waiting more than 6 months for a sponsor, birthday in the same month & year as J).  Nothing too demanding, didn't choose a country or anything other than those 3 criteria.  Guess how many girls popped onto my screen?

Just. this. one. 
Isn't she beautiful?

Her name is Diosenie.  She lives in the Philippines.  Right where those amazing bloggers are traveling this week.  I know that isn't a coincidence.

So that is my really cool thing that God did today.  Won't you prayerfully consider sponsoring a child in Jesus' name?  There is a special one that God has chosen for you.  I just know it.

Blessings on the journey,