As our involvement in local orphan care and adoption ministry has increased, I have been reading many books on adoption that have been great sources of information, confirmation, and encouragement. My heart sings with joy as I go deeper and understand even more why adoption is so close to God's heart and I marvel that he has allowed us to walk this path four times...with more to come!
I just HAD to share the book with you that currentely is blessing my socks off. It is called Adopted for Life by Russell Moore. If you have even tinkered with the idea of adoption for a split second or know someone who has, then I pray you will read this book. It speaks to me so powerfully and has put into words, finally, why certain questions from strangers or nosy aquaintances bug the life out of me.
For instance, when someone asks "are they real siblings?" What does that imply?
I mean, really. What makes a real sibling? DNA? Eye color? A common womb?
Is it really that shallow?
Because if we base our judgment of relationships on those things then we are lost.
We are all adopted by God...Gentiles share in the heritage of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob through adoption. The blood of JESUS makes us family, not the fact that we prayed a prayer or go to church or grew up in a Christian home. Without the blood of Jesus paying our ransom, delivering us from a life of sin and death in the chains of the enemy to a life filled with the inheritance of blessings from the hands of our Father God, we are nothing but strangers to Him.
So when someone asks "are they real siblings?" they are, in fact, invalidating their relationship...saying it is something less than "real." In fact, as Russell Moore states in reaction to someone asking that very question about his sons..."The query seemed to be asking, 'is this a real family or just a legal fiction?' The question seemed to render them orphans again."
...it renders them orphans.
Finally, after 10 years, someone has been able to put into words why my heart bleeds everytime I have been asked this question. And it never fails, it is always asked in front of my children...and I always worry that it will plant a seed of fear, the worry that they are something less than siblings,
something less than my own.
Because from the moment the judge pronounced their adoptions final, they have been nothing less than "real brothers and sisters." Just as you and I share in the full heritage of our Father God, they share in the full heritage of their earthly parents. We are their real parents, they are our OWN children, and they are real siblings.
As we wade through the dossier and prepare for the new children the Lord has planned for us...as our hearts fall in love with thoughts of them and we pray for their safe homecoming...we are, in effect, pregnant. We are pregnant with expectation and anticipation, and it grows with every signature and every checkmark on my list that brings us closer to them. And the second the courts declare them ours and I have safely gathered them into my arms, they will be every bit "my own" and I will carefully bring them home from across the ocean to live with their "real brothers and sisters" and teach them what it means to be a "real family." I will rejoice in their uniqueness, and I will love the sound of their African accents mingling with the sweet drawl of my American-born children. I will watch as ALL of my children surround our dinner table and ALL of my children hang their stockings at Christmas and ALL of my children pile into our laps for bedtime prayers. And I will be fiercely protective, like a mama elephant, of their hearts. I will bristle at comments that threaten to render them orphans and imply that they we are anything less than "real", anything less than "family".
Because, like you and I, they will be adopted...for life. Fully, completely, and irrevocably.
How great is the love God has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! 1John 3:1
I just HAD to share the book with you that currentely is blessing my socks off. It is called Adopted for Life by Russell Moore. If you have even tinkered with the idea of adoption for a split second or know someone who has, then I pray you will read this book. It speaks to me so powerfully and has put into words, finally, why certain questions from strangers or nosy aquaintances bug the life out of me.
For instance, when someone asks "are they real siblings?" What does that imply?
I mean, really. What makes a real sibling? DNA? Eye color? A common womb?
Is it really that shallow?
Because if we base our judgment of relationships on those things then we are lost.
We are all adopted by God...Gentiles share in the heritage of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob through adoption. The blood of JESUS makes us family, not the fact that we prayed a prayer or go to church or grew up in a Christian home. Without the blood of Jesus paying our ransom, delivering us from a life of sin and death in the chains of the enemy to a life filled with the inheritance of blessings from the hands of our Father God, we are nothing but strangers to Him.
So when someone asks "are they real siblings?" they are, in fact, invalidating their relationship...saying it is something less than "real." In fact, as Russell Moore states in reaction to someone asking that very question about his sons..."The query seemed to be asking, 'is this a real family or just a legal fiction?' The question seemed to render them orphans again."
...it renders them orphans.
Finally, after 10 years, someone has been able to put into words why my heart bleeds everytime I have been asked this question. And it never fails, it is always asked in front of my children...and I always worry that it will plant a seed of fear, the worry that they are something less than siblings,
something less than my own.
Because from the moment the judge pronounced their adoptions final, they have been nothing less than "real brothers and sisters." Just as you and I share in the full heritage of our Father God, they share in the full heritage of their earthly parents. We are their real parents, they are our OWN children, and they are real siblings.
As we wade through the dossier and prepare for the new children the Lord has planned for us...as our hearts fall in love with thoughts of them and we pray for their safe homecoming...we are, in effect, pregnant. We are pregnant with expectation and anticipation, and it grows with every signature and every checkmark on my list that brings us closer to them. And the second the courts declare them ours and I have safely gathered them into my arms, they will be every bit "my own" and I will carefully bring them home from across the ocean to live with their "real brothers and sisters" and teach them what it means to be a "real family." I will rejoice in their uniqueness, and I will love the sound of their African accents mingling with the sweet drawl of my American-born children. I will watch as ALL of my children surround our dinner table and ALL of my children hang their stockings at Christmas and ALL of my children pile into our laps for bedtime prayers. And I will be fiercely protective, like a mama elephant, of their hearts. I will bristle at comments that threaten to render them orphans and imply that they we are anything less than "real", anything less than "family".
Because, like you and I, they will be adopted...for life. Fully, completely, and irrevocably.
How great is the love God has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! 1John 3:1
This speaks to me more than you could ever know. Thanks sooo much for your heart, sweet friend. You're AMAZING, that's all :)
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to hear those accents as well!
ReplyDeleteYour children are indeed siblings anyone who has seen them interact would know this is clear. I can't even imagine questioning it in the children I've met.
ReplyDeleteI too wish more would be able to see how much God loves adoptions because that is what he did for us.
I love this!! And I will get that book right away. Can't wait to read it as I wait for God's timing to become clearer for our family and adoption.
ReplyDelete