This week, our team in Uganda set out to search for Leah's biological family. According to her file, she had been abandoned on the door step of a police officer, shortly after her birth. As with many things in International adoption, I did not know whether to believe this story -- particularly because every child seems to have been "abandoned."
Our searchers first called the telephone number of the officer who found Leah. While she had been transferred many miles away, she still had the same phone number, was still an officer, and remembered quite clearly the day she found Leah. Our team met with her and showed her photographs of Leah. We have a picture of her! Yay!! The officer also sweetly remembered collecting money from her fellow officers to purchase Leah some milk before taking her to the orphanage.
Next, the searchers went to the actual location where Leah was found. It is here, on this step, that Leah was gently laid at just a couple of days old.
When I think about what that must have been like for her birth mom {or whoever carried her there} my breath catches in my throat. Carefully placed at the steps of a place she knew she would be safe.
Thank you, Jesus. All of this is just so emotional.
In the summary of the visit that day, our team said as follows:
"We also had a God moment (honestly I felt the Holy Spirit on me when it happened and knew it was due to the prayers in the US). We were in the car, just about to leave the village and the [community leader] in 2008 turned up and spoke to us. . . . She then took us to the [police] house at the time in 2008 and I took a photo of the house and the step where Leah was found."
YOUR prayers.... our prayers.... thank you Jesus!!!
Before this week, I had nothing to tell or share with Leah about her past. Precisely zero. Now, her story has been confirmed. I have photographs of the lovely lady who found her, the place she was found and some {private} stories for Leah about those first days. Yay!
The second day of the searching, our team followed up on two other leads in Leah's file. It turns out that they did not relate to Leah and are likely the story of another child at her orphanage. BUT they have been addressed and put to bed. For that, I am extremely grateful. I am also glad to know that Leah's story {while tough} is true and that she was left at this door in what must have been a wrenching act of sacrifice and love.
We know that people in small communities like to talk after events like this week so we are PRAYING that when our team returns to the village next week, something may have come up with regard to Leah's birth family. Will you continue to pray with us that her biological family will come forward?
He is faithful.
