November Is National Adoption Awareness Month

November is National Adoption Awareness Month and over on Adeye blog, No Greater Joy Mom, she has invited any adoptive family to link up with her and declare that our lives are richer, lovelier and blessed by the Lord thru adoption.  Praise God!  I would have to agree with her 100%.

As a young adult, I had never thought on adoption much.  I know this sounds strange but I had only thought about adoption in terms of families that could not conceive children on their own, adopting babies from young mothers that had chosen to give up their children to adoption.   Back then, adoption was not talked about a lot.  I only knew a few people that had ever adopted or were adopted.  When I speak with people now days about adoption, most still don’t know much about the children in foster care waiting to be adopted, embryo adoption, or adoption of children from other countries.   It is talked about much more in the last few years than ever before.  Some in part because of celebrity’s adopting but I believe more people are knowledgeable about the plight of the orphan, especially in the churches across the nation, because of the many wonderful adoptive families that keep sharing and blogging about their lives and families, Orphan Sunday and National Adoption Awareness Month.  This is so encouraging and exciting.  To see the body of Christ rise up and support a child or see the wave of God calling families to adopt in churches or sign up for foster care just blesses my heart.  Anyone now days, can” google” the large amount of families on the internet fundraising to bring children home from other countries or to fund the cost to carry adopted embryos.  Glory to God.  I pray nightly that God would rise up a Christian army to adopt the orphans of the world.

Tim and I first talked about adoption while doing our training for foster care.  We knew it was a possibility that a child, that we had in our care,  would become available for adoption at some point.  We talked about what we would do.  Little did we know that within our second year of fostering that would happen.   Very soon after beginning foster care, we saw the overwhelming amount of children needing permanency.   So many children needing a Dad and Mom to love them,  a family to share God with them, love, support, direct, encourage and always be there for them.  There were just so many.  We knew we could not just help one or two.  There were just so many.  So we stayed in prayer about it always, to do the will of God and that He would bring to us, the children that were meant to be with us, as a part of our family.  To be honest, we never intended in the beginning, to have as many children as we do.  It is just the way God brought them into our lives.  Now we have learned, we just want to serve God however He wants in this area.  To never say we are done.  To never say we will never take a child with this or that.  We have learned that He calls us to the children He wants in our home.  Children that often stretch us and grow us, that we learn so much from and never knew we needed in our lives so much.  We have learned that God is faithful and He will always provide what we need, when we need it, for the family He has created here.

By our second year of doing foster care, we felt God had called us to children with special needs or that were medically fragile.  He called us to children that were harder to place because of their medical care or scary diagnosis.  Over the 9 ½ years of doing foster care, our first go around, we adopted five times and retired.  Our lives were full, blessed, busy, hard at times, and never boring.   I am humbled to the core that the Lord has entrusted Tim and I to raise these children.  We have seen daily miracles.  We have seen God provide in miraculous ways for us and always meet every need.  He has poured strength into us when we felt like we had no more to give.  Our lives have been nothing short of amazing because of adoption. 

Those who visit here regularly know that Tim and I made the choice last year to reopen for foster care and see if God wanted us to raise more children.  Even though we are both pushing 50, I had a very deep desire to raise more children I could not shake.  Even though many of our children will be spending all their lives with us, our retirement years were looking a little boring.  :)  I would get on my favorite internet adoption sites or read my favorite blogs (mostly large adoptive families) and would see the need was still so big.   Tim and I sought Gods face on this very important decision for over a year before reopening.  Glory to God it has blessed us mightily once again.   I will not lie…taking in children that have been through so much is not always easy.  But neither was Jesus choice to carry the cross and be crucified for us.  Sacrifice is not easy.  Adoption is not always easy.  BUT…it is totally worth it.  If Jesus gave His whole life for us and we are to give our whole life to Him.  He can do with it what HE wishes and some of what we are called to do might not be all easy… but the rewards are huge.  To witness a child blossom into a relaxed and happy child.  To see them put weight on and have a warm bed to sleep in.  To watch them overcome bad habits and behaviors and replace them with good.  To see them learn to give and receive love.  To see them give their lives to the Lord!  There is no greater joy.  No greater blessing in all the world to me, than to see these children heal, progress, be a part of our family and live for the Lord. 

Yes, I will always advocate for the orphan.  I will always talk peoples ear off about adoption and how great our God is!  We are blessed beyond measure and our cup over flows, just as the Lord has promised!

I ask you to please take this month and pray fervently to the Lord what your roll should be in providing for the orphans of this world.  You may very well be surprised at what He calls you to do!  It might be to adopt!  It might be to help fund someone else’s adoption!  It might be to donate a meal, clothing or help to an adoptive family!  It might be to choose an orphan from the many adoption websites and pray for them daily, till there forever family finds them and brings them home!  You will never regret the time and money spent in service to our God.

Just a few sites to get you started.  ;)
Adopt US Kids

Reece's Rainbow

State Adoption Websites

Psalms 10:17  Lord, You have heard the desire of the humble;

You will prepare their heart;

You will cause Your ear to hear,

18  To do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed,

That the man of the earth may oppress no more.

Blessings

susan