Walt Mantis and his parents lived in Arkansas on a 100-acre property. He loved spending time outdoors and preferred being outside over watching TV or playing computer games.
He had big plans for his future.
Chloe
“God gives me a very vivid picture of a little kid,” Walt said. He saw himself swinging a little girl by the arms on their large property.
He knew that she was going to be his daughter, and he would name her Chloe. Walt said that she had “dark skin and dark eyes.”
The One
Walt knew that he had to find a woman first and marry her. She would be Chloe's mother.
Fortunately, the girl who lived across the road, Annie, happened to have a crush on Walt Manis.
Meant To Be
When Walt and Annie were both young adults, she admitted to him that she was placed on earth to be a mother. She knew she was going to have a daughter and even had a name picked out.
Like Walt, Annie wanted to name her future daughter Chloe.
They Got Married
Walt got married to Annie despite the fact that the little girl in his vision couldn't be hers as she had dark eyes and olive skin.
However, they both had the same goal: having a daughter named Chloe. That was enough for Walt to commit.
Trying For A Baby
The pair spent a few years doing humanitarian work at missions worldwide before finally settling down. After four years of trying for a baby and having no luck, Walt became impatient.
“I had always clung to this promise that God had given me about the daughter,” he recalls.
Difficulties
“I didn’t know when it was going to happen, but it was starting to get hard to wait.”
Annie also struggled to stay positive. “It was really hard,” she said. “I struggled with questioning God’s goodness at that time because I just felt like it was so mean.”
Frustrated
The pair started to fight constantly, and Walt began to regret his decision to marry Annie.
Did he make a mistake by getting married to her? Had it all been a lie? To make matters even worse, a lot of their friends were getting pregnant at the time.
"We're Just Fools"
“We’re just fools,” Walt thought. “We’re just fools who want kids, and it’s never going to happen.”
With each passing day, they were becoming more and more miserable.
Considering Adoption
Despite the pain and arguments, Annie and Walt never changed their minds about having children.
One day, Annie suggested that they adopt a little girl instead.
"A Band-Aide Baby"
Walt, however, didn't think adoption was a good idea and insisted that they kept trying for a baby.
“I had this thought,” Walt said. “I don’t want, I called it a ‘Band-Aide Baby.’"
Hurting
"We are struggling. We are hurting. I didn’t want just a fix. I didn’t want just some kid. I wanted the kid that we were supposed to have.” he explained.
Eventually, Walt came to accept the idea that adoption was their only chance at having a family.
The Adoption Process
He decided he would do whatever it takes to have the baby he had always dreamed of. So, the pair completed all the necessary paperwork for adoption and hoped to be chosen.
When the birth mom said the name Chloe, everything suddenly became clear to Walt.
God's Plan
"In an instant, I had become a father," Walt recalls. "Even before she was born, I was her dad."
Walter and Annie adopted Chloe just as God had always planned.
Annie's Thoughts
"This surreal presence of God was just all around us, and I felt him saying to me, 'See how much I love you?' Do you see this?"Annie recalls.
"What I saw as him not loving me was, in fact, him being the most loving he could have been."