What adoption means to me part 2

I wrote about what adoption means to me personally here.  Today I wanted to share what it means to me in our job.  Jason and I work with a local agency as well as with Christian Adoption Consultants.  It is more than a job to us because of our perssonal story of adopting 9 children it is a passion.  We live out adoption in our home daily as well as guide many families through the process of adoption every year. 

 What is that like?  It is amazing!  This small sample of amazing children and families is what fills our facebook feeds.  When the rest of the world goes crazy this seems like home to us.  It is a place where we feel God has called us to use our various gifts to share and help others. 

We know what it means to do a home study, write a home study for others, and what that is like for our clients.  We know what it means to look over a situation, pray for the birth family, work with birth families as they place children in the arms of a family asking God to bless them all.  We know what it means to check your email a million times a day waiting to be matched wanting desperately for it to be your turn! 

 That is why we feel so very blessed to work with adoptions from all sides.  From the side of the birth family, adoptive family, and being able to see God at work through it all!  It literally is miracle after miracle.  Miracles of healing and hope as the birth mother receives validation from the adoptive family that she is worthy and encouragement that her child will be loved and cherished.  That the child now has extra people who love them not less. 

Seeing the adoptive family thankful that such a gift would even be entrusted to them.  To see their family grow and include the birth family and a new gift of life.  To see the overwhelming joy in their hearts as they bring that child home. 

What does adoption mean to me?  It is the expansion of love through the bravery of birth mothers saying yes to life, and adoptive families saying yes to them in return.

What adoption means to me

When I think about this question I have to admit I am overwhelmed.  Overwhelmed with emotions, memories, pain, suffering, healing, and great joy all mingled together.  Personally our adoption journey is one that started almost automatically as if on auto pilot. 

I am a walking miracle and survived cancer at the age of 8 that should have taken my life, but God had other plans for my crazy determined self.  Of course the surgery was intense and they removed any organs not necessary for sustaining my life which meant losing the ability to have children.  After then going through grueling months and months of radiation treatments I was cancer free.  At the age of 18 I was declared healed PRAISE GOD!  Feel free to read my testimony here. 

 Not knowing really what we were doing at all Jason and I started the process of foster care 15 years ago.  You can read a shortened version of how all our children came to us here. 

What it means is so hard to answer because like my faith in Christ is so very personal.  It is as different for each family as a set of fingerprints.  There is a different road each time we have traveled it and they have all become a part of me.  In a lot of ways adoption has mingled in with my faith. 

My faith in Jesus Christ says when tragedy happens that God is still in control.  When adoption loss happens and a family for any of a million reasons can not care for a child/ren I choose to believe that God is in control.  I don't know why the circumstances are there.  I don't understand it all, but my faith tells me God loves us all equally and so deep we can't imagine.  So the same has to be true for the birth family, the child/ren, and the adoptive family.   



 

When God set aside our family for the journey He has taken us on there is no way we could have pictured what it looks like now.  The part of adoption that is true for everyone is giving your "yes" and allowing God to work on the rest.  We didn't choose the timing or how it all happened, but God knew the children that would be in our homes and he knows the whys.  We have to remind ourselves of that daily. 

Our faith is greatly strengthened by seeing our children grow, heal, learn, and become a family.  It doesn't mean they "give up" or "forget" their biological family.  It means that they learn through faith that God loves them, their birth families, and all of us so much and that He continues to love us beyond all comprehension. 

God continues to hold our family together and grow our faith in God together as we seek Him.  Adoption is more about our response to God and to others around us than it is about paperwork or finances.  It is more about taking those huge steps of faith that God will honor His promises to our children than about our wants. 

Our story is crazy and beautiful.  It is intense most days.  

A continuous reminder that God's love never fails..............

And His blessings are new every morning.