Dear Friends,

Last week was another difficult week. We celebrate on one regard because the process is finally back to the court. The difficult thing is that the report that was returned was extremely negative and full of lies. Really, we're dealing with perjury. Someone, without gathering information as evidence, wrote lies about us as a family and the director of social services signed the document. Of course, this hurts and means the process will likely take longer as a result. 

We met with our lawyer of Friday, after, we felt much more peace. He had already done some foot work and has a plan moving forward. 

Again our heart's ache that anyone would think it's better for Zinha to be in an orphanage rather than be with us, even for one day, yet alone weeks or years. These few in social services are not at all thinking about the welfare of children. How tragic and evil.

We need continued prayer. We will fight this until Zinha is home. We believe the next steps are for the prosecutor to give his opinion, we have reason to believe this would be positive. Then the judge will decide if any more "investigation" needs to be done or if she just gives us a court date and then we defend ourselves in court. Our lawyer assures us that we need not "worry" (easier said than done). He feels the judge is very favorable towards adoption and we just need to prove that the one report is perjury and defamation. 

Chad and I  were able to get away for the weekend,  we enjoyed Kentucky Fried Chicken and some retail therapy. It was wonderful to have a distraction from all of this for a couple days. We thank dear friends for having Nede and spoiling her with a sleepover. As we drove home our hearts turned back to the fight we're in and we return to our knees. 

As was clear with Nede's long adoption process, it would seem God has some HUGE plans for Zinha as well. The enemy, the father of lies, doesn't want Zinha to find her place in our family, he's trying his best to discourage and prevent this. We rebuke that possibility and will pray  in faith...

Until She's Home....

Thank you to all of you who are standing with us. We pray for this week to be a week of positive progress. We pray every week that it'll be the last week we have without her. The ache is deep, as is her pain. 

Please pray:

• That the prosecutor with boldly report favor of this adoption
• That the judge will not require further investigation, prolonging this difficult time
• That one court case will prove that there were lies in the report 
• That the judge will be convinced that Zinha is far better off with us than anywhere else
• Protection over Zinha-- physically, emotionally, spiritually and psychologically 
• For us to have peace and encouragement
• For Andre, our lawyer, to have the right contacts and words in our defense 
• A forever reunion
• For the corruption to come to light and for justice to prevail