God is My Strength

Today I was remembering a "God-moment" I experienced towards the beginning of our adoption process....
Before I began searching different adoption processes extensively, my heart was drawn towards Ukrainian adoption because of my family history. My Great-Grandpa Havelock immigrated to the U.S. at age 16 or 17 from Ukraine. His daughter, my Grandma, spent some of her first years in foster care, then in the care of her grandparents. There she learned and spoke only Ukrainian until age 7 or 8, when she was first enrolled in public school. Her life consisted of being shuffled around from one relative to the next, never wanted, never loved the way each and every child needs and deserves to be loved. Her story ends with hope, though. She encountered so much hardship and so much pain in her life, but was able to leave a legacy of love and triumph. So, the thought of being able to adopt from Ukraine and offer that same love and hope my grandma was denied as a child was (and IS) absolutely thrilling to my soul!

But after researching different countries' adoption processes, I was most intimidated by Ukraine's. I wasn't sure about the "blind referral" process, or the length of time we'll have to be there to complete the adoption. So we went against our gut feeling, and began the Guatemalan process. Interestingly, problems with the Guatemalan adoption process seemed to intensify right as we finished our homestudy and dossier, but had not yet received a referral. Ross and I prayed and talked some more , and felt like God was closing that door for us, but leaving the door and our hearts WIDE open to Ukraine. So we began the dossier process again. :)

As I began doing research online about Ukraine, I also dug deeper into my grandma's "memoirs," or letters she wrote to my dad in response to questions about her life, etc. I found that my Great-Grandpa Havelock's name was changed when he entered the U.S. It originally was "Hawryluk." I did a name search online and couldn't believe what I found. Way at the beginning of the Guatemalan adoption process, Ross and I talked about possible names for our new little guy, and we agreed "Gabriel" was a great name. Guess what? "Hawryluk," my Grandma's original family surname, means "Gabriel" in Ukrainian. And "Gabriel" means "God is my strength."

God was my Grandma's strength, He continues to be my strength, and I know He is our little one's strength as well. I thank God for the clear, undeniable little glimpses of Him when everything else seems to just not make sense or is so blurry at times.