This story is a series of amazing events that I am more
convinced than I ever have been that God’s hand is so powerful – AND that He
listens when two or more gather in His name and earnestly come to him with
supplication and humility. I have
labeled the events “By the grace of God” that we were specifically texting our
family and close friends to-the-minute prayer requests of what specific concern
needed prayer over that very minute.
There were literally dozens of people praying us through step by
step. Only a perfect God could have made
it happen in this perfectly orchestrated way…
Saturday morning, March 9, 2013 started out like any other
first day of spring break – snuggling, sleeping in, pancake breakfast, thinking
through all the things I was going to be able to get done that I’m not normally
able to do, working full time. However,
this particular Saturday, Gary had his bags packed to head out of town to
complete a week-intensive course at Lincoln Christian Seminary in
Illinois. He was ready to leave town,
but we decided to make one quick trip to Kohl’s to buy Gary a new pair of
tennis shoes. I knew I would miss him
for the week, but I was (deep down) just a little excited to make a trip to San
Antonio to visit my folks and spend some good R&R with my mom.
We pulled into the Kohl’s parking lot at about 11:15 that
day, and as Gary was driving, he got a call from Robin, one of the Northside
Life Group leaders and a phenomenal woman who heard the Lord’s voice loud and
clear that morning. She had received a
phone call from a friend of theirs who had just found out that there was a
woman on the other side of town in labor with a child that she did not want to
keep. Robin asked Gary if we would be
interested, to which Gary – without hesitation – answered a very serious, “Yes,
of course!” I was already in tears. Yes, I’m a huge cry-baby. A few minutes later, she called back and told
us that her friend would be calling us and that we needed to head over to the
hospital NOW. By this point, we had made
our way into the shoe department, grabbed hands and hurried back out to the car
and began the 45 minute race to the hospital.
Robin’s friend (who wished to remain anonymous) - we’ll call her “Elizabeth”
– called us to make sure we were on our way and let us know that a social
worker was there and was waiting to begin drawing up paperwork. Seriously?!?! Begin drawing up paperwork?? Is this really happening?! Her next question was if we had a
lawyer. We said No, but we would try to
by the time we got the hospital.
Only by the grace
of God #1 During that 45 minute drive to the hospital, we called
everyone in both of our phone contact lists that had anything to do with adoption, foster care, lawyers, or those we
knew were widely connected to another large group of people, etc. We finally heard from Robin’s husband, Guy,
who was a lawyer and happened to have worked with another attorney 20 years ago
who he knew had switched over to the adoption scene. He called us and let us know the attorney
agreed to work with us, but that a couple of things had to happen in the next
few moments, in order for things to be legit.
The most important thing was that the birth mother had to make contact
with us to offer us the baby. Our hearts
sank almost immediately because the nurse who had been working with the birth
mother since she came in was very doubtful that she would talk with us, much
less meet us. The birth mother had told
the hospital staff that she did not want to know the gender of the child nor
have anything to do with the adoptive parents.
The amazing social worker – we’ll call her Mary – was a little more
hopeful than the nurse and said that she would do whatever she could to make
the birth mother aware of the entire situation.
They both left us in the waiting room, and we waited for a
few minutes before they came back out.
They were accompanied by the doctor who came to introduce himself to us
and told us that they had just administered the epidural and she was 9cm and
just about to deliver. He then let us
know that it was a boy about to be delivered.
At 12:55pm, our beautiful baby boy was born into this
world. The doctor came back out to
congratulate us (another “WOAH!”
moment…) and tell us that everything went very smoothly and that we would be
able to go see the baby in a few minutes.
At that time, one of the nurses came and put an identification bracelet
on my arm, granting me guardianship of the tiny soul until he was discharged from
the hospital. My heart was in my throat,
and I could not believe what was happening.
Only by the grace
of God #2 After the delivery, the “Mary,” the social worker, went in to
talk with the birth mother and she came out a few minutes later to let us know
that the birth mother had agreed to contact us.
What we didn’t realize until a little while later, was that she had
agreed to actually meet us face to face.
We were whisked into the nursery, and as soon as I stepped
foot into that room and saw the little guy in the “warmer” at the far end of
the room, I started shaking and really could not believe what was happening
(this was only about two hours after we had initially received the first phone
call from Robin…while we were at Kohl’s…looking for tennis shoes…). The entire day the entire crew of nurses had huge
smiles on their faces and tears of joy at the excitement of it all. They were witnessing, just as we were, this
amazing story unfolding. The nurse
pulled me over, calling me “Mama,” and asked if I was ready to start learning
how to take care of him. I answered,
“Yes…?...” Still in disbelief. We fed
him a bottle of formula and then gave him a bath, trying to take pictures all
the while, but still not believing that this was all happening. One of the nurses went to get the hospital
camera, so she could take pictures for us.
We were at that time informed that the birth mother was
ready for us to come and meet her. I
didn’t have the slightest clue what I would say to this woman who had carried
and given birth to this baby that was getting closer and closer to filling that
empty hole in my arms and heart. Mary,
the social worker, came to get us and brought us into the room. I was quickly wiping the tears from my eyes
to try to gain at least a little bit of composure to meet her. When we walked into the room, she was eating
some lunch and I went to shake her hand.
Gary and I were at a loss for words, but what I remember was that we
told her, “Thank you for bringing this baby into the world and for carrying him
for us,” we mentioned that I was a teacher and Gary was a pastor, and that we
would raise the child with all the love in our hearts. I also mentioned to her that this was the
most perfect situation that we could have ever asked or hoped for. And then we left. She was extremely polite, quite laid back and
gracious as well, with me and all my blubbering. This whole time, I observed the fact that
Gary was more taking the position of an “observer” so he could take it all
in. I could tell he was really in shock
the whole first 24 hours. I allowed my
motherly instincts to take over and, come what may, I was going to take care of
this baby until they pried him from my fingers (which never happened, by the
way).
The amazing hospital staff told us that they would set us up
in a room down the hallway, so we could just camp out with the baby until we
took him home. (They were all extremely
confident that it was going to happen). J I loved that about them. They treated us like royalty. It was so fun to be surrounded by a great
group of strong Christian women nurses who were just as amazed at the unfolding
of events they were watching that day.
Mary came into the room after a little while and let us know
that she would have the birth mother sign the “Third Party Release” form for
our attorney, Terry, to be given the baby upon discharge. And then asked us what his name would
be. Hmmm…hadn’t quite gotten that
far. Gary and I have talked about baby
names randomly throughout the years, but this was it. We both liked the name Andrew. I also liked the name Michael. We were also given the name Jordan. For some time, in my shock and confused
brain, I kept calling him Michael Andrew, Andrew Michael and Michael
Jordan…yep. I had told a good friend of
ours that his name would be Michael Jordan… Anyway, after all was said and
done, by the end of that day, after repeating it over and over to myself aloud,
it finally stuck: Andrew Jordan Luedecke.
(Only by the grace
of God #3 One side note: We were informed at a later time, that there
aren’t ever Social Workers around or
on duty on Saturdays. “Mary” was just there
for one reason or another, and Praise God that she was. We were also told that had it been any other
social worker who worked there during the week, that it would not have happened
as it did. Others would have not been as
invested in trying to push things along in our favor. Thank you, Jesus.)
Andrew was brought down to our room within a half hour of us
settling in, and we were this much closer to heaven. I spent the afternoon and evening holding
him, until the nurses had to come and do his vitals, take him to do this test
or that… I really was in heaven.
The nurses came in at around 5, after Gary had left to run
home to put together an overnight bag for us.
They let me know that the birth mother had decided to go ahead and leave
the hospital and did we need to ask her anything more before she left. Her leaving was a finality – good and
bad. Bad because although she had given
us her phone number, there was no guarantee that she would follow through to
sign any of the final paperwork for everything to go through after the 48 hour
mark. But good because he was that much
closer to being ours. We found out that
she left the hospital that evening at 7:00pm.
Scary from that moment on. Gary
had received a phone call from our attorney letting him know that she still had
not been able to talk with the birth mother, and was there any way to get her
to call her from our phone. That never
happened, and the nail-biting began…
We spent the next 24 hours praying with every other breath
that the birth mother would just respond and do what she had promised when we
had originally met with her.
That Sunday afternoon, we had set up a home study
update. We left Andrew with the nurses,
went home, got showers and just got everything set up and ready for the social
worker to come to our home for the home study.
Our amazing roommate, Stephanie, had done some nesting in the house –
cleaning all the carpets, dusting, and just beautifying the house, making it
ready for all the company coming that week.
The home study went well, and we headed over to our friend
Julie’s house to pick up the car seat that the group of amazing ladies at the
church had gone together to purchase for us.
After we picked that up, we headed straight back to the hospital at
around 6 that evening. Got baby Andrew
back into our arms and continued to wait to hear from the attorney, Terry.
Only by the grace
of God #4 At 7:00, Gary decided to call and ask Terry if it would be
okay for us to reach out to the birth mother, by voicemail and/or texting, to
plead with her to respond. Gary called
her and left a voice message, letting her know that it was as simple as signing
a couple of documents, and that neither one of us wanted to get CPS involved
because that would almost undeniably erase us from the picture completely and
her life would be turned upside down. I
also formulated a text and sent it to her.
Gary left the room to go and gather his thoughts and emotions, and I
waited in the room with Andrew. Not 5
minutes later, I received the anticipated response from the birth mother via
text message. She had accidentally
dropped her phone in water the night before and had just 10 minutes prior
gotten another one. She said she would
call Terry at 8:00 in the morning. We
all breathed a collective sigh of relief and then began requesting prayer from
our prayer warriors that she would, in fact, follow through with contacting
Terry the next morning.
Only by the grace
of God #5 The next morning, at 8:45am, we received a call from Terry
telling us that she had just gotten off the phone with the birth mother and
that they had agreed to meet at 1:00. We
had to conjure up two witnesses and find a notary to meet them at their meeting
location at that time. Done. Later we found out that the birth mother had
agreed to come up to the hospital to sign the surgical consent form for Andrew
to have his circumcision before being discharged from the hospital that
afternoon. It was done before we got
back from lunch and having a TB test done later that day. When we got back to the hospital, our friends
Stephen and Paige and Amber were all there ready to be our witnesses. One small kink. We got a phone call from Terry at around 1:00
asking where our notary and witnesses were, since she was there at the
McDonalds with the birth mother… umm…what?!
We were assuming that they were going to meet at the hospital and we
would just call the hospital notary to come and notarize the documents…
Only by the grace
of God #6 Our church secretary and friend – and NOTARY - Frances hopped
in the car with our other friend Christy to race over to our side of town to
meet Terry and the birth mother and our two friends Paige and Amber, the
witnesses. By 2:20, the documents had
been signed, the birth mother’s parental rights had been signed away, and
Andrew was one step closer to being ours.
The case manager had come in and very adamantly made us
aware that we would need to be out of the hospital by 4:00 that afternoon and
no later. (NO ARGUMENT HERE!!!). We worked quickly with Terry to go through
the 2-inch stack of papers to sign, to fulfill our end of the agreement.
At 3:45, we loaded up the wheelchair, walked out of the room
and all the way out of the hospital with our son, Andrew Jordan Luedecke. Terry stayed with us for a few minutes, to
make sure we were aware of other things that needed to happen soon, and then we
said goodbye. We were finally on our way
home. With our son. Two and a half days ago, life was
normal. Our lives will never again be
the same, and we couldn’t be more thrilled.
I wanted to take another minute and mention a couple of
other things that are integral parts of the story, just so I have a record of
them and can shine a light on just a few more amazing facets to this story.
Many people are aware that Gary and I have been in the
adoption process for just over 4 years.
We started trying to conceive a child beginning in the summer of 2007,
went through fertility testing in the summer of 2008, and finally decided to live
out the gospel by applying to adopt from Mongolia. We applied beginning in February, and found
out in November that the country had put an indefinite hold on all incoming
applications. A year later, nothing having
happened with Mongolia, we inquired with our agency what other options there
were. He told us that Ethiopia had been
having great success, and we could have a child within 6 months! We waited until June, after school was out
and we could put more energies into putting together another dossier for
Ethiopia. Right around the same time we
sent in our dossier, we found out that Ethiopia had just taken steps to really
slow down their adoption process, in order make sure each child being adopted
was truly and completely adoptable and not a victim of child trafficking. We were very supportive of this, and decided
to continue on. In January of this year,
we received word that Ethiopia had put an indefinite hold on renewing the
licenses of all of the adoption agencies working in their country. Talk about another complete devastation.
All the while, I had been having some major health concerns,
and ended up finding a doctor who was excited about helping us conceive a
child. So…being deflated with Ethiopia
(and still Mongolia)…we were then being inflated again with renewed hope of being
able to conceive a child. Gary and I
were on an emotional roller coaster, and had really and truly hit rock-bottom. But what we didn’t know was just exactly what
God had up his sleeve.
A couple of notable events that happened, that just so
happened to coincide with each other, that make this story even more amazing:
All at the end of January:
1. We were informed that Ethiopia had put the hold on all
re-issuing of agency licenses – total and complete deflation for Gary and me.
2. I had a minor surgery to help the possibilities of Gary
and me conceiving a child – renewal of hope of Gary and me having a child.
3. Our friend “Elizabeth” mentioned early on in the story
was prompted by the Lord to write us a letter to let us know that for some
reason, God had laid it on her heart so heavily that she was to help us get a
baby. Whether through surrogacy, or
through her line of work. This was in
January. We didn’t receive the letter
until this weekend played out, and she gave us the letter that she had written
to us, but never got the courage to give to us.
4. I had a dream – a very vivid one – that I had a baby
boy. I woke up while I was changing his
poopy diaper, but it was SO real and SO vivid.
I did not want to wake up because I was so happy in the dream, caring
for a baby that was my own.
5. We found out this weekend that the birth mother had not
realized that she was pregnant until a little over a month prior to giving
birth…at the end of January.
We have been blessed with an amazing family, church family
and group of wonderful friends who have wrapped their loving arms around us,
and truly lived as one in the Body of Christ.
They have prayed us through this (from the very beginning, when we first
started trying to conceive, through both failed adoption applications, and now
through this whirlwind of a weekend receiving our first son). As soon as they found out about us even
possibly bringing home a son, our church friends and family members joined
forces to pull together a mountain of baby items necessary. They also graciously threw us a baby shower
one week after finding out about Baby Andrew.
We have NEVER in our entire lives, felt so loved and supported than we
have through this entire process, but especially this past week. Our God is so amazing.
Now, if this is not the hand of God working all things
together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His
purpose, I really don’t know what is. As
with all things that we are able to give testimony to of His great and almighty
sovereignty, we can look back and see just how perfect His timing truly
is. He is a good God. The Almighty Counselor, Prince of Peace and
Lord of lords.
Praise You, Jesus, for Your great and mighty power. Thank you, Lord for allowing us to have a
testimony of your Great Love and provision for your children. You are amazing.
With Love,
Gary, Krissy and Andrew Luedecke
