We have BIG news!
We are adopting!
Ever since I (Megan) was a little girl, I have felt called by God to adopt. I even wrote a letter to my parents from "God" saying they should adopt (somehow they knew it was from me? Maybe it was the handwriting? Haha!). Luckily, I married a man who has just as much of a heart for adoption as I do - we even talked about adoption on our first date! And now the time has finally come where we feel the Lord telling us to move forward with it. We are so excited to truly get to live out James 1:27: "Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you."
You may or may not already know that adoption can be VERY expensive. The average domestic adoption is costs $30,000-35,000. Crazy, I know. And often, you can need a large chunk of that money as soon as you match - and you never know when that is going to be. All that to say, we are hoping to go ahead and raise at least some money up front, so that when we do find a birth mom who chooses us to adopt her baby, we are able to say yes. This is going to be a journey that requires a lot of faith. The waiting and the financial aspect can be overwhelming. But we are choosing to trust that before we ever made the decision to adopt, God has known the exact baby He has to be a part of the Downer family - and He will do whatever it takes to make a way for us to bring them home!
It is often said, "It takes a village to raise a child." In this case, it is also going to take a village to bring our child home. Will you consider being a part of our village? There are several ways to do so:
1) PRAY. We know that prayer is going to be a HUGE part of this process. We plan to keep everyone updated with how things are moving along so that you can know exactly how to pray.
2) SHARE. Please share our desire to adopt with everyone you know, and if anyone knows of a women who is pregnant and considering adoption, share our information with them so that we can connect with her. You never know how God is going to connect us with the right birth mother!
3) GIVE. As said before, adoption can be incredibly expensive. We are humbly asking others to join us in the finances. I have heard it said, "Not every believer is called to adopt a child, but every believer is called to care for orphans." Maybe this is your part in caring for orphans!
Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for being a part of our "village" and helping bring our sweet baby home!
-Richard, Megan, and Raiden
