Court

What a long and exhausting day we have had!

Thank you all so much for covering us in prayer as we had our court session today. Although we did not get the answers we really wanted, God was present and still moving on our behalf, according to His will.

The orphanage director went to the wrong court building so we didn't get started until almost 3:30. From what we have heard, court was "easy" for us as not many questions were asked. We were asked in the beginning to state our full name, date of birth and home address, and for Matt, his occupation. Then our translator, the orphanage director, the social worker and the persecutor were all asked to introduce themselves and give their credentials as well.

These were the questions we were asked...

1. Why did we choose Rance, a sick child. (Asked by the Judge, Answered by Matt)

2. Why we were adopting when we had a biological child of our own. (Asked by the Judge, Answered by Stephanie)

3. Why we chose to adopt from Ukraine. (Asked by the Persecutor, Answered by Stephanie)

4. Again, how did we choose Rance and why, knowing he was sick. (Asked by one of the two judge's assistants, Answered by Stephanie)

Then the social worker and the orphanage director gave a summary of their conclusion and why they were in favor of us adopting Rance. Then the persecutor said after hearing all of the above, she too was in agreement with us adopting Rance. 

Finally they read through all of the official documents, which was boring and took forever. Then the judge and his two assistants left the room to make their decision.

Oleg was not allowed in the court room with us, and we were so thankful he volunteered to watch Cavin for us during our court session. What a blessing it was not to have to entertain him and keep him quiet while trying to pay attention and answer questions!

After about a 15 minute break the judge and his assistants returned and read us their lengthy decision, which basically said....

"The request of Matthew and Stephanie Richards to adopt Rance is satisfied!!"

It also included permission to legally change his name to Rance Matthew Richards and to list us as his parents on his new Ukrainian birth certificate. Court ended right about 4:45.

We knew beforehand that the 10 day appeal period would not be waived, but we were praying the judge would allow us to get the official court decision at the end of the 10th day. We were definitely disappointed to find out that we would have to wait until Monday, the 31, to get the official decision, and in turn, be able to get Rance from the orphanage and begin the paperwork to come home.

After court we waited around for what felt like forever until we left to go to the orphanage to tell Rance the big news.

Matt told Rance that we went to court today and that the judge said it was okay for Rance to be ours forever. Rance's response was, "tomorrow?" He is so ready to be with us always and forever! It broke our hearts having to tell him it would be yet another 13 days until we could come and get him forever.

I have much more to write, but its late and as I said earlier, its been a really long day and we are exhausted.

Again, we thank you all for praying with us, and we continue to praise God for his faithfulness to us throughout this journey!