Love crosses oceans

"International adoption? Are you crazy?"

Yes, we are adopting again and yes we may be crazy. 😉 

Before I start we want you to hear this: when we adopt, it's God's idea.

We are not adopting because we think we can save the world- Jesus already did that and until He returns we will live in a broken world with sin.

 We do not think we are somehow superior parents and have it all figured out. We are sinners and have sinful children just like anyone else and we have to strive everyday to point them to Jesus. We are learning along with them how to get rid of pride and selfishness...and to choose daily to ‘die’ to ourselves and make having love and compassion for others a priority. I love this quote by Jonathon Edwards "We contribute nothing to our salvation except the sin that made it necessary." So we just want it to be clear it is out of God's love and what He has already done for us that changes our hearts and breaks our hearts for what breaks His. In this we can take no credit. 

And no we don’t think everyone is called to foster/adopt, but our family is at this time. I do believe we are all called to care for orphans, widows, and the oppressed, and I don’t need to clarify all the different ways that can manifest. That’s why it’s called the BODY of Christ. We all have a role and it looks different for everyone. We're passionate about the least of these and we believe God cares deeply for them, so yes we want as many loving families as possible to step up and care for them and I will likely talk about it to bring awareness to it until the day I die.....but more than that we know each of us will stand before God one day face to face, so we pray each of us as individuals will have a close relationship with God where we listen to the Holy Spirit and act obediently to whatever it is He calls us to do. That’s what makes the body of Christ beautiful. 

So here we go with a little bit of the back story, we've known God wasn't done for a while and for the past two years have known that He was leading us to this..we just didn't know what the path would look like. God did specifically lay some details on our hearts about adopting a 'waiting child', but I will explain that further another time.😊 We have spent a lot of time in prayer and looking into all of our options waiting for God to reveal to us which path.

When we first looked into adoption at age 22 we didn't qualify to adopt internationally due to age. Clearly foster care was undoubtedly where God led us to Sean and where he called us to stay for the past 5 years. As our reassessment came due this year a series of events triggered us to pause and realize God may have different plans. The first was seeing with our own eyes the extreme poverty of a 3rd world country back in January- when we saw kids the same age as ours digging through a landfill for food it deeply affected us. Though nothing seemed great about the timing we knew God was calling us to pursue international adoption. The biggest roadblock seemed to be that on one income we couldn't afford to adopt internationally. 

Yeah, how ridiculous of us to tell the God of all the universe with infinite resources that we don't have what we need to follow His calling. 

That's when conviction started laying on our hearts. We realized when it came to buying a house or purchasing a car we didn't think twice about taking out a loan or dropping a big amount of cash to invest in it. Why would we think a child's life is not worth the 'investment'? An actual priceless soul that God calls us to love as we love ourselves. What lengths would I want someone to go if that was me or one of my precious children to make sure we had a safe place with unconditional love to call home. So yes we fully trust God will make a way and provide.... and we will do whatever He asks on our part if it means working extra jobs, selling one of our vehicles/returning to a one vehicle family, cutting back anywhere we can to make it possible.

We already knew one of the main questions we'd get is why international adoption? The answer to that could be different for each family, but for us personally here are the reasons:

1. God clearly called us to. That’s where our child is plain and simple. Trust me we tried to deny it and give excuses at first. Foster care had become familiar and we wanted to stay there. However, when you pray for God's will and for Him to speak to you be ready to accept it whether or not it makes sense. We pray we always stay in tune with the Holy Spirit and when he says something we obey. 
2. As previously mentioned this was a big one for us. The circumstances of orphans in underdeveloped countries is drastically different than the US foster care system. Yes, I'm passionate about foster care - always will be and God willing it will be in our future again. For us the reality that orphans in many countries are not guaranteed food, education, access to healthcare, or clean water for that matter is one of our biggest motivators. Like it or not even the poorest people in the US would be considered wealthy by the standards of most of the world. We do not ever want a child to become an orphan strictly due to poverty if they have a loving family....so we do what we can to support/advocate for children financially to stay in loving families. However, there are many orphans and no denying that they are children who do not just need money, but need a family that will love them unconditionally. 

This quote explains so much of how we feel-

"I admit the orphan crisis is completely overwhelming, the numbers are astounding. It's an ocean-sized problem and we are standing on the shore unsure what to do. But I know the answer. The answer is seeing 'the one'. The 'one' is the child sitting without a family. Because when we look at the whole, we lose sight of the 'one'. 

And what it can never be about, is money, borders or politics. It cannot be about the multitude of numbers or the politics of the day. It must be about the 'one'. The simple picture of one child with a family-sized hole waiting to be filled. 

The following was spoken at the 2013 CAFO Summit by a 30 year old man who aged out of an orphanage where he lived his whole life:

"When I grew up in the orphanage it was Christians who came and built nicer buildings. Christians who bought us beds, clothing and provided money monthly for food. It was a Christian, who wrote a letter in a shoebox, who first told me I was loved. It was the Christians who met all my physical and material needs in that orphanage."

"But it was also Christians who neglected my biggest need. Children in orphanages don't need more money, nicer buildings or better clothes. I am not an orphan because I lost my home or provisions. I am an orphan because I lost my parents. I needed a mom and a dad. I needed a family. Christians treated all my temporary symptoms of need but never cured my longterm disease of being orphan. I am still an orphan."

Lastly, it makes me a little sad to need to add this last part but, it seems necessary because as we have shared where God is leading us in the past we have met some discouraging words. We faced some opposition when we first started foster care, when we initially announced adopting Sean, when we decided to open our home again after his adoption was final, when we decided to take in a teen and her baby, and now this.  I've already grieved the fact that adding a child through fostering or adoption isn’t always welcomed like a child is from your womb. And don’t think I don’t realize the heartache/loss that is wrapped in adoption, but every child deserves to be wanted and celebrated regardless of how they enter your family. We really wish you could know our hearts on this, yet everyone can't intimately know our life, but God does....and each step of obedience has brought us more true joy, faith, and made our marriage and family that much stronger. We are so glad we didn't take any other path. We can look back now and see God's hand in it all!

I don't want to leave out how truly grateful we are to everyone who has been so supportive over the years- we have been truly blessed by so many of you! We also realize the ones who tried to discourage us did it out of love and concern.

Yet, in the end it doesn't matter what we (or anyone else) *think* is best for our lives. We've really had to do some soul searching asking ourselves do we really want to follow our mere finite human perspective on what we think we should do and how we could have our *best* life.......or do we want to entrust it into the hands of the all-knowing, all-powerful, loving Heavenly Father who created us weaving every detail together that He will do what's best if we're obedient? I have seen God come through again and again...and yes there has been suffering on the roads he has asked us to walk, but I can see how it was ultimately for our good (Romans 5:3-5).

We now know we get to experience joy in another opportunity to humble ourselves to witness God's faithfulness and provision as He displays His glory on yet another adventure! 

When it comes down to it the only reason we live and have breath is for a relationship with God- to bring Him glory and praise Him - and we will do it in whatever manner He asks of us. We hope you all will join us in praying for the child God has for us and patience as we head down the long journey of bringing them home!