6 Years with Jesus

My sweet baby boy, Kyler, we miss you so much. Words can't express the grief and ache we feel. We would love to be able to hold you one more time, and we know someday we will hold you forever. God never said that we would get to choose what comes our way, but He has promised to walk beside us. Jesus suffered for us and will never abandon us.
KYLER BRADEN

K--Karsten and Kylie--your brother and sister--Karsten misses you everyday and talks about you often. He wishes you were here to play with him. Through his pain, Karsten is depending on the Lord and growing to love our Savior more each day. He still continues to have many questions about why God allowed you to leave us along with other questions I find hard to answer. Kylie was born into our hearts after you went to heaven. She is named after you and her middle name Hope was given because of the HOPE we continue to cling to in Christ. Our prayer is that we bring her home from China this year.

Y--Yoke--Jesus says in Matthew 11:28-30, "Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

L--Life--Even though you are not alive on earth with your family, we know and believe that you are alive in heaven, and will forever have life in heaven with our Savior and King. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6).

E--Endurance--Romans 15:4, "For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope."

R--Rejoice-- Romans 5:2b-4, "And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.""


B--Beauty--Since you left this earth 6 years ago, we have seen beauty from ashes. God continues to be at work and is glorified. Isaiah 61:3, "to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair."


R--Refined--Our faith has been refined and strengthened over the last 6 years. 1 Peter 1:6-8, "In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith--of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire--may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed."

A--Adopted--Your Daddy, brother, and I praise God that He has adopted us into His family when we trusted Christ as our Savior. Salvation depends totally on God. Ephesians 1:5-6, "In love, He predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves."

D--Days and Denis--Psalm 139:16, "All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." It's no surprise to God that you would live inside my womb for 38 weeks. God made you, Kyler, to live for such a very short time, but with a great purpose and plan in mind. We don't understand and don't like it, but we trust our Father and continue to walk by faith. God knew you before He ever created you and loves you dearly. About 2 years ago we started sponsoring a child through World Vision named Denis. Karsten picked him out because you and him would be the same age. Denis lives in Albania and it is such a privilege and blessing for Denis to be a part of our lives.

E--Eternal life--1 John 4:11, "And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." Praise God for His glorious hope in heaven! We find great comfort in knowing that you are in heaven with Jesus and someday we will be reunited as a COMPLETE family forever, in which we will all worship as a family at our Savior's feet.

N--No good-byes in Christ--I'm reminded of Mercy Me's song, "Homesick"

You're in a better place, I've heard a thousand times...the reason why I'm broken the reason why I cry is how long must I wait to be with you...

Amazing song!




I know that when I think of heaven I should first think of seeing Jesus. But, honestly, so many times I think of seeing my precious boy. Kyler is the first one I want to run to when I get to heaven. I'm working on that because I know that first and foremost I should want to run to Jesus. When you think of heaven what do you think of most? Is seeing Jesus number one? Or do you place seeing your loved one(s) above Jesus? It's hard. I think, too, that here on earth I have Jesus with me and the Holy Spirit living inside me. I can talk to my heavenly Father. Yet, I don't have Kyler with me here and can't really talk to him. Oh, I have talked many times to him. Every night before bed I kiss his picture and tell him I love him and goodnight. But can he really hear me? Biblically speaking, I don't think so.

So we continue to walk through life with a limp. God continues to heal us a little bit at a time. My prayer is that we will continue to be conformed to the image of Christ. God put us here on earth for His glory and to make Him known. Heaven is our real home and until then we must fix our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith.

Happy birthday, Kyler B.! We love you!!

Care for Orphans

For those of you who do not know, Kylie Hope, was born into my heart over 5 years ago from the pain of my son, Kyler, leaving this earth to entering the glory of heaven. I have gotten asked so many times, "Why China?" Well, why NOT China, or Africa, or Guatemala, or Bulgaria, or Russia, or America, or Vietnam, or Korea, or...this list could go on. The fact is there are 143 million orphans in the world. Adoption is all about Jesus. I'm not a blood relative of Jesus, yet I was adopted into His family when I trusted Christ as my Savior. God doesn't look at our external appearances, what race we are, but He does look what's in our hearts.


I have never seen my daughter and yet words cannot express the love that Brad, Karsten and I have for her. We have prayed for her for so many years and love her as much as we do Karsten and Kyler. Although we have been waiting for Kylie for over 4 years now, we strongly believe and know that GOD IS AT WORK! He has been doing amazing work in our lives by allowing us to know Him more and giving us a STRONG desire to want to care for orphans and raise awareness for orphans. We want to encourage and see God do incredible work in the lives of others by giving them a desire to adopt an orphan or care for orphans as we are commanded by God to do. It will change your life and you will be blessed. So many people say, "Oh, you're doing such a great thing by adopting an orphan, she is so blessed." When, actually, we are the ones who have been blessed during this journey because God continues to change and mold us.

Many people would do anything to "adopt" a cat or a dog. Why not adopt a boy or girl? Or at least help someone who is adopting by doing a fundraiser for them. Store up a treasure in heaven by helping a family bring their son or daughter home.

God is a Father to the fatherless. If believers aren't going to care for the orphans, then who will? Jesus says in Matthew 25:45, "Whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me." We need to speak up for orphans. How will they ever hear of God's love?

Currently, the China Center of Adoption Affairs is in April 2006 and continues to move extremely slow. Our log-in-date is July 2006. We are still waiting for a healthy infant girl, but we are open to a special needs girl up to age 5. Please continue to pray with us and especially for Kylie and the other 143 million orphans in the world. Maybe even ask God what you could do to help orphans.

Visit our website to watch a 4 minute video about orphans. http://www.speakupfororphans.com/

Thank you all for continuing to pray with us throughout this amazing journey!