1. Pray. Seriously we need all the prayers we can get. Specifically you can pray that we will trust God and His timing in all of this. I've said it before and I'll say it again-we really want a baby, but more than that we want our hearts to be warm towards God and we want to trust Him more. Will you pray that for us?
2. Donate money. As I have written before, adoption is crazy expensive. By God's grace we have raised a lot of money towards our adoption, but we still need more. I know some of you aren't in a position to give money or may not want to and that is totally fine, but for many of you I know you have asked about it so I thought I would just put the details on here. Every little bit helps! There are a few ways to donate money so I will list them and then if you decide that's something you want to do, you can choose what works for you.
- Donate through Paypal. Right under the picture of Heath and I there is a button that says "Donate." If you click that button it will take you to our account with Lifesong for Orphans, an organization where you can donate and it is tax deductible. You just go there, make sure it says our name in the blue box, add your credit card info and follow their instructions from there.
way. First, it is tax deductible. Second, Paypal
will take about 3% of your donation for
processing fees. Third, you must donate by
July 17th (that is the deadline they gave us)
- Donate by mailing a check. There are also a few ways to do this. If you want it to be tax deductible then you can mail it to Lifesong at:
Attn: Racine2798
PO Box 40
Gridley, IL 61744
Please put Racine 2798 in the memo line of the
check. Again, you must donate by July 17th.
check. Again, you must donate by July 17th.
If you don't need it to be tax deductible and would
rather send a check just to us (we will use it for
travel expenses and any fees that we will owe at
the end) then please email me at
theracinefamily@gmail.com or message me on
Facebook and I can give you our address.
rather send a check just to us (we will use it for
travel expenses and any fees that we will owe at
the end) then please email me at
theracinefamily@gmail.com or message me on
Facebook and I can give you our address.
3. Donate frequent flyer miles/hotel points. That may seem odd, but we will have to travel to pick up our little one and most of the states are not within driving distance so we will have to fly. There is also a time period of up to two weeks that we will have to stay in that state until some legal things are taken care of. Up to two weeks in a hotel can get expensive fast. Both of those things would be super helpful to us. If you are interested in that, please email or Facebook me.
I'm sure there are lots of other ways that you can help, these are just the major ones we can think of right now.
Let me take a second to explain why we have asked people to give. We believe adoption is the heart of God. Each of us who are believers have been adopted into His family, so by us adopting a child, we are able to be a picture of the gospel not only to our child but also to those around us (even ourselves). In James 1:27 it says: "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." We are called by God to take care of orphans. We really view this as a ministry opportunity and are thankful God has called us to this. We tell you about ways to help so that you can also be a part of this ministry. We understand that not everyone will give, but we can all pray. There is no pressure to give in any way, but we really do beg you to pray for us.
I hope I explained our heart in all this and that no one feels any presssure. We just wanted the people who wanted to know what to do to know how to do it!