Visa Lessons, Part II

I do not remember praying for patience, stick-to-it-iveness, or more faith, but if I had this is surely how God would have answered.

Last October, I spent many many long hours (enough to read 4 books if I remember correctly) in the immigration offices of Santa Cruz and La Paz, Bolivia working on renewing my visa. Saner people have a lawyer do this for them, but I'm much cheaper than sane. It came down to the very last minute, and was its own lesson of faith as you can see from Part I of the saga. Then a few days after the visa miracle, and the urgent visit to Peru for veterinary continuing education credits, I started the adoption process, because 1 whole week without bureaucratic paperwork was just too peaceful.

I knew I'd be traveling to the U.S. for Christmas so I recommended to the lawyer that we start the process after I returned, but he assured me repeatedly, that there was plenty of time to finish the process and take her with me to meet the family in December (should have looked into the accuracy of this statement before elating the family.) I believed him, started the process, and slowly learned just how clueless he was about the U.S Department of Homeland Security and such things. But Dad was not discouraged, between attempts to get a U.S. senator to help us get Ange into the country, he said I was just like the disciples when they found themselves surrounded by more than 4,000 hungry people for the second time in a few months wondering how they were going to feed them all, even though Jesus had just fed even more people with even less bread and fish. If God, and Immigration, could get my visa to me just in the nick of time in October, why did I already doubt that He could do the same for Angie's visa in December?

Turns out, that was a miracle God was not willing to perform this time around, which is exactly why I'm skeptical, how do I know when He's going to come through?

So last month, after something like 8 months of daily Bolivian bureaucracy, I was once again starting to doubt whether we'd get the paperwork in time for our next attempt at a visit to the family, scheduled for July. One afternoon when I was particularly discouraged after a phone call with the lawyer I said to Angie, "I think God is playing with us."

To which she immediately and forcefully replied, "You shouldn't talk like that, because God doesn't play with people."

"Maybe not, but He does test us, and teach us, and maybe He's teaching us about faith now."

"What's faith, Mommy?"

"Faith is confidence. Not confidence that God will give us everything we want or ask for necessarily, because sometimes He won't, but trusting that He knows better than we do what we need, and that's what He will give us." Or as I just read moments ago, Max Lucado says, "Faith is not the belief that God will do what you want. It is the belief that God will do what is right."

So, that became my prayer, as we struggled through the arduous adoption process, the wait for the birth certificate, the painstaking paperwork for the identity card, the mountain of requirements for the passport, all finally culminating in the trip to La Paz for the interview for the Visa. That I would trust that God knew best, whether He chose to agree with me or not, and that my attitude would glorify Him in either outcome. Fortunately for me, He seems to agree that a quick trip to the States is what's best for everyone involved. I picked up her passport with her 10-year Visa inside today! Praise be to God (but don't worry, I was gonna praise Him either way.)