GO Big or GO Home

Go Big or Go home

I must say, that phrase has taken on new meaning in the Shelton household over the last several months. Remember the post back in January where we were overwhelmed and overburdened? I compared our point in the journey to Moses when he needed Aaron and Hur hold his arms up for him, to help him carry the weight of the staff God commanded him to hold to ensure the Israelites would be victorious against the Amalekites. In January, we were trying with all our might to follow God's calling on our lives, to keep walking the adoption journey, but we were battle weary and weak. I asked for people to pray for us, openly admitting we needed them to come along side, to lift us up in prayer, and to be Aaron and Hur for us.

Apparently, they did.

I decided at that time to step back from fund-raising. All my ideas were starting to sound the same, or like things we'd already done. The boys were in basketball, which would be followed by soccer, and I didn't have the creative energy or time to put together new fund-raising campaigns. I prayed that God would just take over, and vowed not to move until he said “go.”

One Sunday morning, while singing worship songs, I felt God say to me, literally, “I've got this.” (It was odd hearing the voice of God in such modern vernacular, but that was the message my heart received, and with it came calm, and my anxiety washed away.)

It was around this time that Steve's creative side really started shining through. On our anniversary he introduced me to gofundme. It's a way to fund-raise on-line through Facebook. You tell your story, ask for money, and set a goal. It couldn't hurt to try it. It was a fundraiser without a product and required no event planning. We decided that if it netted us as much as $500, we'd consider it a success. I wrote a blurb, we posted a photo, and we were off.

The next creative idea was to create a video asking people to donate just $5.00 a month, $60.00 a year. If 500 people would do that, we'd be fully funded in just over a year. Steve put his researching and technical skills to good use, downloaded some free software, and began production on a family video using his laptop, a script we wrote together, and the voices of the Sheltons who are old enough to read. Again, the video cost us nothing. We launched it, asked our friends to share it, and prayed.

Donations started pouring in, some from people we hardly knew, and some from people we didn't know at all.

We followed up the video with a couple of photos of the boys that we took while we were on vacation. One shows them standing on a beach with a sign that says, “Our sister is on the other side of this ocean. Can you help us bring her home?” The other showed all of their little feet in flip-flops, and an empty pair of pink flip-flops beside them, a reminder that our family isn't complete yet. They're simple messages, and again, we took the pictures, and simply posted them and prayed.

One day shortly after the video was posted, I was walking while on break at work and praying. I will openly admit that I have become very compulsive in my prayers that God will send us money and provide. I know a lot more about anxiety and financial worry now than I ever did before we were fund-raising for an adoption. I have experienced waves of overwhelming fear and discouragement when I have focused on the numbers, and have had to learn to battle back with prayer and faith in deliberate and intentional ways.

This particular day, I was saying to God that I just wished I knew how it all turned out and how it would end. I had another one of those rare moments where God spoke words straight into my soul, a message simple enough I couldn't possibly miss it, and yet profound enough that I was left in wonder. This time the message was, “But if you knew how it ended, I would miss all the fun of surprising you.”

I had no response. I pondered a God who would take delight in surprising me for the next few minutes, stopped stressing, and went back to my desk to find that three more donations had come in.

To date, gofundme has raised $4,008.00, and we're not done yet!

The next encounter with the word “go” came in May when we became acquainted with GO Exchange. This company has changed our lives and we will never be the same. GO Exchange is all about orphan prevention. They are a company owned by Global Orphan Project, which works with local churches around the world to provide direct care for orphans. Through their work with orphans over the last decade, Global Orphan Project's workers came to realize that eighty percent of the world's orphans are a result of poverty. Let that sink in. Eighty percent of the children placed in orphanages have living parents, but their parents cannot afford to keep them, and have to abandon them in hopes that their children will somehow escape and find a better life. It's heart-breaking.

This is especially true in Haiti, where our adopted daughter is from, and it's a reality that cuts to the heart and takes my breath away as I imagine the pain of those mothers and fathers, and those children. We must do something about it!

So I am now an ambassador for GO Exchange. We pay living wages to mothers and fathers among the extreme poor to make beautiful things, allowing their families to stay together. My job, as an ambassador, is to present their wonderfully made products in living rooms and other events, selling them, and keeping the cycle moving forward. All of the profits, 100% of them, go to orphan care. We are working with real children, real families,, providing uniforms, education, job skills, employment, and a hope for a better tomorrow. Meanwhile, I am paid a commission (not from the profits, but separately) for my part in presenting the products and sharing my passion. My commission checks go straight into our adoption account. And this month, for every $50.00 spent on our web site, goexwithjanelle.com, GO Exchange will donate a school uniform to a child in Haiti - a uniform sewn in Haiti in a GO Exchange sewing center, allowing adults to continue working, and children the opportunity to go to school. It's a win-win-win-win! I am so blessed to be a part of it!

Oddly enough, over the last few months, we have not decreased our level of busyness whatsoever. If anything, it's increased, but somehow, in the midst of it, God has strengthened and equipped us, and when I'm tired, it's a good tired, and a happy tired, not an overwhelmed, weary and broken tired. I am currently not stressed at all about our adoption fund-raising. I know that God has it under control. While the process is still long and daunting, and I don't know how it will all work out in the end, I know that it will. And I can also attest that being surprised by God is way more fun than skipping to the last page of the book and knowing the ending ahead of time.

The weekend we came home from Orphan Summit, God surprised us again and again with donations we didn't expect. People handed us $600.00 in donations that week we hadn't asked for and weren't expecting. And if he can do that, just to strengthen and encourage us, He can take care of the rest when the time is right.

In the meantime, he is giving us yet one more “go” command. This time the message is, “Go serve.” While God is taking care of us in his own way and his own time, we are working to take care of others. We are cheering others on who are ahead of us on their adoption or foster care journeys. We are giving of our time, teaching the boys to serve, and devoting our lives to lifting up others. We've been blessed to give financially to others and time and again have been able to meet specific needs of others with things that we just happened to have in our house and could live without. Each time we are able to give, I thank God for providing us with the means and the opportunity to do so, and I delight in getting to be part of one of His surprises for someone else.

So, for the time being, we will keep going forward, letting go of our own plans, and going with God, who goes before us. We will go where He sends us, when He sends us.

And when the time is right, we will go to Haiti and tell a little child that we are there for her, and that it's finally time for her to go home.

Psalm 1:17 “Praise the Lord all you nations; praise the Lord all you people. For great is His love toward us and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord!”

“Give thanks to the Lord. His love endures forever!”