Did we still have a purpose waiting for us in Colombia?

Now we faced a new problem. He lived in Colombia. We lived in the United States. In order to have a future with this boy, we had to make it to Colombia because his status as an orphan severely limited his chances of ever coming here.

As I boarded the plane the next morning to fly to my parents’ house for a week, a new song took shape inside me. While David occupied himself with the toys and books in his backpack during the flight, I started to write.

“Take us to Colombia, God.” I knew we needed to keep quiet about our relationship with Julian because the adoption committee in Colombia already asked us to break our ties with his siblings. We didn’t think they would react well to our involvement in their brother’s life, so we agreed to keep quiet until he turned eighteen, only ten months away.

After only a month of this new communication with Julian, we agreed as a family to go see him once he turned eighteen. We felt compelled to meet him and support him as he took those first steps on his own. God has impeccable timing.

This new turn of events excited me, filling me with purpose and passion again. When David and I arrived at my parents’ house, he didn’t even give me a chance to fill them in. He quickly blurted out, “Next summer, we’re going on our own little mission trip to Colombia to help Julian.”

How we’d work out the details remained a mystery, but we knew, without a doubt, we had to go. Only ten months remained until Julian’s eighteenth birthday, and we assumed he might still reside in his orphanage for a few more months after that. That left us nearly an entire year to listen for God’s guidance. Maybe we’d actually make it to Colombia, after all, by June of 2011.

We made him no promises. We said we wanted to support him when he turned eighteen either by helping him further his education in some way or by helping him out with his daily needs. However, a new thought brewed inside me. I wondered if maybe God held more for us in Colombia than just Julian. He used Juan David and Viviana to burden our hearts for Colombia, and now He may use Julian to actually get us there.