The fight to make it known.

If we keep working like we are, then it should be less than 2 months before we are debt free!!! (other than our house of course) Which translates to me that I can start adoption paperwork again soon. I am very excited and have been working like crazy. Aaron went to AR for 2 weeks and made overtime and he is going again for 2 weeks soon. I hate for him to be gone so much, but we have prayed for God to give us money or to give us a way to make money, so we figure we better take it while we can get it. Whenever I think that I need to work less next week, I look at our debt snowball and sign up for more. It is so close I can almost taste it. I have been sending off money to the debt even between when payments are due. Every time I get paid, I take out a little for babysitter and extra, then immediatly mail the rest so it is unavailable.

The more I research on orphans, the more I realize that God's family is not stepping up. There are estimated to be 147,000,000 orphans in this world. God speaks of helping the fatherless so many times in the Bible, yet almost every church I have been involved in never speaks of it.
Confession time... I have really struggled with bitterness about this. Bitterness that to all appearances, of course I may be misunderstanding, but unless I bring it up, only one person we attend church with asks us how the adoption is going. Bitter that we have had two countries close on us. Bitter that we lost over $15,000. Bitter that we tried to do a good thing and not only did it not work, but we have spent the last 1 1/2 trying to pay off something that didn't work. Bitter that when I try to do the right thing, it backfires. Bitter that the church/our church doesnt seem to give a flip about orphans. Bitterness has filled my heart and attitude and has made my smart alec self that lives in me come out to fight. Bitter that when I have tried to teach a little about orphans that I can't even seem to get that done.

About a month ago, my best friend at church pointed out to me my bitterness and rightly said that if I go about teaching people bitterly it will turn them off and perhaps the church's nonaction is not that they don't care, but that they just don't know. So I took my bitterness to God, confessed it and prayed that he would take it away. And the last 3 weeks I have done so much better, actually been excited and optimistic. About a week or two before that, I had asked the Ladies Class teacher if I could have 2-3 classes to talk (I didn't even tell her what about) and she said we'll see. The ladies class hasn't met for a few quarters, but I knew it would be starting up soon. So, I waited to hear her answer and decided that instead of being pessimistic, I would be optimistic and go ahead and prepare a lesson and assume that she might let me teach. Well, I am glad I did because last Sunday she told me that I could have the first 3 Wed nights. I was so glad I prepared. Then here comes my pessimistic self saying that something would happen to keep me from teaching, I was thinking I would get sick, lose my voice, etc. Silliness, but still always looking for the worst.
So, Sunday morning, the preacher comes up to me and tells me that with all the other classes offered on Wed. nights, he just doesn't see that there would be a place for the ladies class this quarter. Wow, and here I thought I would be sick on Wed., this caught me totally by surprise. Good one, whomever you are trying to keep the plight of orphans from being known. Wasn't expecting that. I made the suggestion of perhaps the teen girls meeting in this classroom that half was being used for storage. Plenty of room for less than 10 people, but he didn't seem real keen on it.
I am so close to just saying forget it and may have to since I am not the decision maker. All day Sunday I went back and forth between should I fight for it and try to think of a solution or should I just accept defeat.? What would you do? Am I cocky in thinking that my lessons would affect anyone? But I am not even cocky in myself, I was planning on using 90% Bible for my lessons. Let the Bible preach it, not me. You can't argue with the Bible when it is so clear on God's love for the orphan. Perhaps this whole ordeal has nothing to do with the Church. Perhaps, and I am beginning to think this may be it as it always is. It is between me and God.
Our homeschooling is between me and God.
Me being Aaron's helper is between me and God.
Maybe God knows I won't be successful in that I get to teach at church, but perhaps the success is more in the effort. That alone is what keeps me from giving up.
I thought I had a great solution Sunday night. There are two classrooms downstairs at church hardly ever used. I didn't figure the ladies would want to meet down there since it is pretty steep and a lot of the ladies are older., but no problem for teens. I mentioned that to the preacher and he said we would have to talk to the youth leader when he gets back from a trip with the youth he was on. Perhaps it was my bitterness coming back but it almost seemed like my ideas weren't welcome.
I still have a few more things to do to get ready for the class. I am in a quandry. Do I keep preparing, blindly thinking that I will get to teach. Do I quit preparing because it sounds as if I don't have a chance and then show up Wed, with a class to teach and not be prepared? Or do I just bite the bullet and call and find out. The last one is probably the best solution. I will need to do a lot of prayer before calling, so I don't let the bitterness come.