Grant and Elizabeth "go live"

I am so excited to share with everyone that Grant and Elizabeth, our very first sponsored couple on Because of Isaac, now have their profile on Bethany Christian Service's website. This means that they could be picked to be a child's mom and dad at ANY moment! While we haven't raised all the money needed for their adoption, we have raised a lot of it, and are confident that the Lord will provide the rest of the funds in His perfect timing.

I am enclosing Grant & Elizabeth's letter to the future birthmother of their child. Get your tissues ready. Talk about powerful. Talk about moving. What great parents they will be.

Dear Birthmother,

We should start at the beginning ... Elizabeth grew up loved. Her father was a storyteller. She spent hours listening to his tales and making up her own. Her mom instilled a love of flowers and gardens and bumblebees.

Grant loved to play.....and still does. His mom claims he was a handful; he prefers to think of himself as "active." He was, and is, a ball of energy.

As the eldest of six children, Elizabeth knows the joys of a big family. With four brothers and a sister, several of whom are now married, family gatherings are crazy and chaotic but never dull!

Family has created a foundation for her; it is a heritage she hopes to share with children of her own.Grant's family started with three boys, Grant as the youngest. When his Dad remarried, Grant became a big brother when he was twenty-four. Now he has an excuse to goof off and play around.Our extended family, which now includes two nieces and four nephews, is an integral part of our lives. We work to fit in visits and family gatherings whenever we can.

Grant uses his degree in Outdoor Education and his Master's Captain's license to work as an interpretive kayak guide and boat captain. He leads trips of children and adults, sharing information on wildlife, ecology, and natural history.

Elizabeth is a high school English teacher working with juniors and seniors. Her love of storytelling and reading are a perfect fit with teaching literature.When at home, we both love working in our garden. We have dreams of expanding, growing an orchard and adding more animals, one day becoming as self-sufficient as possible.

We live in the hayloft of a restored barn set on three acres and completely surrounded by woods. We're a bit off the beaten track, a tiny bit of privacy tucked in the middle of civilization. We have been happy here, but we imagine more for this place. We imagine it's a perfect home for children. A place where a child can run and explore, a place where forts can be built and things can grow, a place where memories can be made and a child can be loved...It has great potential.

In many ways, we feel we’ve been drafting this letter for years, for the dream of a family has been long in the making, and this letter, and most importantly you, are a part of that dream. We had no idea five years into our marriage, when first we started to plan for a child, that the desire we had for a baby of our own would take us down the path of infertility testing and treatment, of eight years of waiting and hoping, and now writing a letter to you, a young woman we don’t yet know but for whom we have prayed and imagined, nonetheless. But sometimes, the unexpected, the unplanned, brings about the opportunity for prayers to be answered in a miraculous way.  This is how we imagine you: God’s grace in action, offering what we don’t deserve, but for which we are so very, very grateful.

How much you must love and cherish this baby to be making the choice that you are. It takes great courage in our culture today to make the decision to give a child life. We are humbled by your willingness to do this for your child. Humbled not only for the gift you are giving to us, which awes us in the magnitude of what you offer, but by what this action says of you and your character; it speaks of bravery, of sacrifice, of integrity. We know it must be a decision that comes with pain as well. Though we may be in very different points in our journey, we do understand the sadness that comes with sacrifice, the grief that comes with letting go. We cannot take that part away; knowing and living with this pain ourselves, we wish we could for you. We can, however, honor you for the plan you have for this child, and respect you for the bravery it has taken to get to this point.

Because this gift is so amazing, so very great, we cannot imagine raising a child without sharing the depth of your sacrifice with him or her. This baby will know that he or she was loved completely: prayed for by us before he was even conceived, loved passionately by you while you were carrying her, and loved unconditionally by us all as he or she grows up. This must be a part of his or her story; we promise that it will be so.

We realize that this letter will be read by many people, but it is, in fact, written just for you. We imagine already what you are like, what characteristics you will impart to this child, what qualities you are already bestowing upon him or her. We want you to know who we are as well, to somehow see the life we will share with this child, to know that, above all, beyond home and lifestyle and possessions, we will work to instill faith and a love for our God in this child, and that we will fiercely love him or her.

Thank you. It is not enough to say, but we hope it expresses the fullness of our hearts and the depth of our gratitude to you. You are, in every way, a blessing to us and to this child.

With great humbleness,

Grant and Elizabeth