Cedarville Magazine, Spring 2018

The VanLieres (L-R): David, Donna, Gracie (holding the family crest), Troy, and Kate firmwith hairspray, and black eyes full of curiosity. She looked at us as if to say, “You’re the whitest people I’ve ever seen,” and Troy and I laughed at her expression. We named her Grace Zhenli. Zhenli means “priceless gift” in Chinese, and we think of her as a priceless gift of God’s grace. I held onto her and said, “We’ve been waiting for you!” We had been waiting for 22 months, longer than the gestation of an elephant, but had been praying for Gracie long before that. Long before we knew the woman who carried her was pregnant, we prayed. Long before we knew that a policeman found her on the side of a busy street, we prayed. Long before we knew that she was safe inside an orphanage, we prayed. We prayed for the woman who would carry Gracie inside her womb; we prayed for angels to surround her wherever she would be discovered; we prayed for the environment where Gracie would be for the first several months of her life; we prayed for the wisdom to raise her; we prayed she would be a child, young lady, and woman of great integrity and character; and we prayed that she would love and follow Jesus all her life. Long before we knew anything about her, we prayed. And we’re still praying today. BEAUTIFUL GIFT Both Troy and I felt as if there were another child for us in China. We began praying again for our baby and traveled in 2004 to bring Kate Meili home. Meili means “beautiful gift.” Kate was sucking on her sleeve when they handed her to me, and we discovered that her entire sleeve was wet. We gave her a blanket, and she began to suck on it as well; we realized she did this to comfort herself. By the time we left China, she was no longer sucking on her sleeve or blanket because she had finally found someone to comfort her. We felt as if our family was still incomplete and, when Gracie was four, I asked her if she wanted God to bring her a baby brother or baby sister. She said, “I want God to bring me a baby cow.” She got a baby brother from Guatemala instead. David was smiling when his foster mother handed him to me in July 2007, and he’s been smiling ever since. HAUNTED DREAMS In God’s perfect and amazing plan, Troy traveled to China 11 years ago with the Christian group NewSong and met a 13-year-old girl who needed to be adopted before she turned 14 and would no longer be eligible, per China’s rules. He took pictures of her and on his return home, had a Skype chat with our longtime college friends Bob ’88 and Dannah (Barker) Gresh ’89. He said, “I met a 13-year-old girl in China and her face has been haunting my dreams ever since. She needs to be adopted in the next several months and you’d be the perfect family for her.” He emailed a picture to them, and Autumn’s face began haunting their dreams as well. They had nine months before Autumn turned 14, which meant that a home study, background checks, and mounds of paperwork and red tape, which normally take two to three years, would need to be completed at lightning speed. At one point, when time was running out and it looked like an important piece of paper would never make it to a particular office, Dannah called me. I was sitting in an airport Samantha Bean Photography 20 | Cedarville Magazine