I write this sitting on the front porch of a coffee shop in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Men walk by dressed in suits alongside women adorned in beautiful hand-crafted scarves; students in their school uniforms. From this perspective… here on this coffee shop porch, I would never know that such a beautiful people was in such desperate need of help.

One of the oldest civilizations on the planet, Ethiopia is the birthplace of coffee and the resting place of many of the kings and queens of the Old Testament. The only African nation to not be colonized for slavery, it now lays captive to the devastating foe of poverty and disease. HIV has stricken the country and left it a fatherless nation, now home to over 5.5 million orphans. We are adopting 2 of them… Surafel and Esrael, soon to be Jude and Liam Miller… my sons!

We arrived here at night after a “short” 25 hour flight, slept and immediately drove to meet our sons. It took a moment for them to warm up to us. Surafel has a big personality – certainly opinionated in almost every way. Esrael seemed a bit aloof and unaware of our presence… until we tried to help him play with one of the toys we brought him. He immediately yelled and pushed his toys into a pile as far from us as he could get it. He wasn’t so interested in playing with them, he just wanted to make sure no one else could!

Surafel in a similar way was very protective of the things we brought him. We had brought an entire suitcase of gifts to lavish on our sons. Some food, some toys, some clothes, and of course – some candy! Surafel deemed himself guardian of the suitcase and always kept it zipped shut, ready to kick anyone who tried to take what was rightfully his. It was hilarious to watch.

It wasn’t long before we could feel the walls coming down and within an hour or two we were all playing together. The boys both even climbed into my lap and we played a few rounds of Angry Birds together. I figured it worked on my girls at home… it would probably work here and sure enough, it was a HUGE hit!

Esrael was obsessed with the cars on the dirt road just outside the care center. He kept exclaiming “Makina!”, which I can only assume is Amharic for car, so I would hold him and take him out to see them and we would turn the music on and dance in the dirt lot. He also loved airplanes and so I would lift him high in the air and fly him like a plane which he thought was pretty hilarious!

Surafel seemed to ping pong back and forth with his affections, giving them momentarily and then retrieving and putting his guard back up. But before the day was over, I had him on my shoulders and he was laughing hysterically and kissing me on the cheek. That first time my son kissed me made the 25 hour journey worth while!

It was very hard leaving. In the same way we came, Esrael seemed aloof and unaware what was happening… But Surafel, now 4 years old, felt it much more. Perhaps the sting of wondering if we would return brought back the pain of losing his father or being abandoned by his mother. His eyes began welling up with tears as I held him in a long embrace and told him, “I love you, my son! I WILL be back tomorrow!” He walked back into a shadowy corner and buried his face in his hands, unsure of whether to trust me or not. But today I will continue on the long journey of proving to him that He can.

This is day 2… We will be heading to see them again in 20 minutes! I can’t wait. I have no idea what to expect. Will they have to warm up to us again? Will they run to us? We shall see!

Ethiopia is a country only twice the size of Texas but with 5 MILLION orphans! You can help end this orphan crisis by helping send Ethiopian pastors to be equipped through a pastoral training on how to care for orphans. Watch this video and I would heavily encourage you to consider getting involved.

Our adoption agency, International Adoption Guides, recently sent us an update on the situation with the adoption courts in Ethiopia. Apparently last Thursday, they reached a consensus to reduce the number of hearings to 20 per day, not the proposed 5. The Ethiopian Ministry of Women, Children and Youth Affairs (MOWA) has been mandated for almost a year now to not write more than 20 approval letters per day, therefore, by law MOWA can only approve 20 cases a day.

But despite the MOWA mandate, the Ethiopian courts were continuing to increase the number of cases to avoid backlogs as the number of people wanting to adopt from Ethiopia increased, as did the exponentially rising need for children to be adopted. Sounded like a good plan at the time…

The unfortunate result, however, was an increase in their workload due to the fact MOWA could not get the necessary approval letters in on time, which resulted in the judge having to set new court dates, double duty, etc.

So it seems that while this isn’t necessarily ideal and there is a reduction in the number of cases seen per day, it is still better than what we were faced with this time last week. And it could in fact just even everything out. If there are 20 court hearings per day and 20 MOWA referral letters being written per day, this may in fact take away some of the confusion and keep the process moving along at the same pace it’s been moving at. Who knows?

This doesn’t effect our current April 13th court date, as far as we know. But it is impossible to know how this may effect the length of time after our court date before we get to bring the boys home. The hardest part is not knowing. We just want to hold our little boys. It’s hard to think about other people taking care of the boys, clothing them, feeding them, tucking them in at night.

We’re trusting in God’s sovereignty and goodness, and know without a doubt that he is in control.

Thanks for your prayers, and please keep praying for the boys while they wait to come home. We aren’t the only ones experiencing this, and we aren’t the only ones that will see God bring this to completion. This is yet another reminder to not rejoice in our circumstances because they always change. It is only God that never changes. We’re so thankful that we can depend on him!

Grace and peace,
Stephen and Amanda Miller