We are Ben and Kim and we live with our ten children, ages 1-9, in a small Mid-West town. We originally adopted our first child ten years ago from Korea due to infertility reasons, but after our second Korean adoption, we felt God calling us to adopt not only the lost sheep... but the broken ones. We went on to adopt three more children from Korea with special needs. After that, we were blessed with a sibling set from Libera, W. Africa ... followed by two private domestic adoptions from the United States. We adopted our tenth daughter two months ago through an adoption disruption. She was born in China four years ago, but brought to the US last year.
Seven years ago we bought a house not far from here which had three bedrooms, one bathroom and 1600 sq feet. At that time, we only had two children. Two years ago, when we were unable to sell that house due to the economy and having reached our "breaking point" with only one bathroom and three bedrooms, we were prompted by the Holy Spirit to lease it out. When we were obedient (leasing was something we had no desire to do), God immediately showed us leasers and opened up a huge house in the perfect location - for lease. We have been leasing this house (2600 sq feet plus a basement) for the last two years. We have been able to carry out a lot of ministry here! Not only have we adopted three more times in the last two years, but we have done respite care for one-six months for two young girls whose parents needed a break from their behaviors, taken in a single mom and her five children for a month, and have also been a safe haven for another single mom's daughter during a troubled time of transition. A lot of Kingdom work has happened here and for that we celebrate!
About a month ago, part of our house caught on fire due to a box fan's motor. We were blessed that no one was hurt and it was only the master suite that was burnt/damaged. However, that has meant that for the last month, my husband and I have been sleeping apart on separate couches and that we are down to one bathtub for 12 people. However, the biggest thing is that through this fire, we learned that the owners of the house had stopped paying on their mortgage several months ago and are headed towards foreclosure. They hadn't told us, nor do we think they would have... so this was a blessing in disguise. We estimate that we have about 2 months left before the house goes back to the bank.
We were approved for a home loan (much to our surprise) two weeks ago. We started looking for houses and found that there are only a handful of houses on the market, in our desired area, with five or more bedrooms under 250,000. Through talking to our realtor, we found out that most of the large houses in our area are bought up by investors with cash. 200,000-ish cash. We can't compete with that... the best we can do is a FHA loan at 3.5% percent (and seller concessions to help!). However, we found a huge bank owned eight bedroom house last week on an acre that didn't have an offer on it! We quickly put one together and submitted it. The bank didn't even counter offer... they flat out rejected it because we weren't a conventional loan or cash buyer. They wouldn't even consider our offer. It doesn't matter that they haven't had any other offers... they are holding out for a cash offer, or a conventional loan (40,000 down) at the minimum.
I posted our disappointment on our blog and we received a letter a few days later from a blog friend (and pastor's wife) Jen in California. We are so so humbled that anyone would even consider mentioning a GOD SIZED task/dream like what she has described! We obviously don't operate under the category "normal" (haha!) and so this made total sense to us ... why? but why not? as well!
A Chip In widget has been created in our honor and can be posted on all blogs, facebook, twitter, etc pages. While her vision is raising all of the 200,000 to buy this eight bedroom house cash, our initial goal is the 40,000 conventional cash down payment by next Monday, Sept 7th. so that the bank will even consider our offer and it can be taken off the market. If not, we run the risk of an investor buying it with their cash. When they do, no one will live in it ... it will be bought for a cash return down the road ... our desire is to buy it for a *heavenly investment*! .... to fill it with more children, more single moms, and do more respite care for weary families!!!
Feel free to check out our blog at
www.hishandshisfeettoday.blogspot.com to check out our realness, pictures of "the mansion" as our kids call it, and for pictures of the ten children the Lord has blessed us with!
With Humility,
Ben and Kim ... and their 10 blessings
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