Big Things...

I would like to say that things around here have been pretty quiet, but that would be a lie!  Things are a 'movin' and a 'shakin' at the Miller household!  This post is going to be a mishmash of a lot of things that might seem pretty random, but all serve to point out that BIG THINGS ARE HAPPENING!

If you've been following us for any stretch of time, you know that Adam was scheduled to deploy to Afghanistan at the end of July.  And as hard as that was, it was really going to provide some financial cushion for us to buy a house and save all the money we needed for our adoption.  And while we certainly could adopt while we still live in an apartment, we feel pretty strongly that we should be in a house before we start that process.  So, yeah, that's a ton of money. 

I remember when Adam and I first agreed to adopt.  And his brain immediately went to, "How are we going to pay for this?  How are we going to make sure that all the kids have braces and go to college?"  ('Cause, let's face it, any biological Miller kids are gonna need glasses and braces!)  And I just remember feeling this peace about it and saying, "God wouldn't have called us to do this if He weren't going to show us a way to pay for it."  There are low-interest adoption loans available, but we also feel pretty strongly that God doesn't want us to go into debt trying to pay for an adoption. 

So we've basically been praying our guts out that God would do some BIG THINGS to help pave the way for our adoption.  Wanna know what God has been up to?

1.  Back in February, Adam had a kidney stone, which required two ER visits.  Since I'm self-employed and carry our health insurance, we have pretty lousy insurance coverage.  As a result, we recieved a $7,000 bill from the hospital.  The next week, we recieved a letter from Tricare (military insurance), stating that Adam was covered by their insurance for about 3 weeks, which just happened to be when he had his kidney stone.  So, yeah, $7,000 bill GONE!

2. We are working on paying off any debt that we have, so that we can really maximize our savings for a house and adoption.  We paid off a $1,500 credit card in three weeks!  We cut a $2,500 credit card IN HALF in a week!

3.  Adam had a student loan bill for $1,800.  It turns out that his school no longer is using the same company to process payments, so the account got cancelled somehow.  If Adam enrolls in school for this next quarter (which he will) and doesn't drop out (which we won't), they will wipe that debt clean.  Uh...what?  I've never ever heard of a school just forgiving student payment debt.  So, yeah, $1,800 GONE!

4.  A year and a half ago, I met with someone from the Indiana University School of Social Work (where I went to school) about possibly teaching an undergraduate class or two.  That person then went on sabbatical for a year, and I never heard back from her.  She e-mailed last week and asked if I was still interested, and we have a meeting set up this week to talk about me teaching a class about diversity.

5.  Back in March, I agreed to do a Project Odyssey with the Wounded Warrior Project.  It was completely volunteer, but it was basically a chance for me to travel and help soldiers (and ski for the first time!), so I did it.  Well, after that, they were able to partner with a volunteer group that I belong to, and they found funding for me to do another Odyssey in May.  Oh, and they back paid me for the Odyssey in March.  And they asked me to do two more before the end of summer. 

6.  In an effort to save money, we have stopped eating out.  We have allowed ourselves the treat of eating out once a week, but we don't get to go anywhere nice (and if we do, we don't get to pay full price for our meal and we drink water only).   We decided to go to our favorite wing place on Thursday because they have a discount on wings then.  The wings were delicious, but the service was lousy, so they offered to give us 50% off our meal.  So we ended up paying 25% of the full price for our meal. 

God works in the big ways and in the little ways.  Sometimes it's $7,000 in hospital bills.  Sometimes it's discounted wings.  Either way, we are thankful.

As Adam and I were figuring our finances, he said, "You know, it just seems weird that some of this stuff has dogged us for years, and now it's just all going away."  I truly believe that this is a direct result of our commitment to adoption and praying faithfully for God to deliver the goods. 

In April, when I had the chance to see Joyce Meyer speak, she said that she thinks God might get a little insulted when people say, "Well, all we can do is pray."  Because it makes prayer sound like a small thing.  And, to be really honest, praying about our adoption is the only way we are going to be able to make it happen.  And we trust in our hearts that God wants our child or children to be with a loving, mostly stable (ha!) family. 

I CAN'T WAIT to see how God moves in the next year! 

"Grant me that I may not pray with my mouth alone.  Help me that I may pray from the depths of my heart." ~Martin Luther