We Are All Adopted
What do you think of when you hear the word adopted?
Perhaps you feel empathy for the children in foster care, the babies of brave birth moms who are placed in the arms of waiting families, or the orphans in distant countries.
Perhaps you feel numbness because of wounds from your own adoption story or from being that brave birth mother who surrendered your child.
Perhaps you feel joy because your own adoption has given you a better chance at life, or you've been the one who brought that hope to a child when you adopted him or her into your family.
Whatever you may feel, here's what I know: we all have a connection to adoption. Allow me to explain.
On a crisp fall day, we received a phone call that would change our lives. On the other end of the line was our case-worker-turned-friend who had worked with us four years prior when we adopted our first child, Noah. This call could only mean one thing, so my mind began to race … We can't afford another adoption. I thought our journey to becoming parents was over. God, what are you doing here?
Still, I listened.
Baby boy. Due in two weeks. Ten percent chance he will be healthy. Can't find a family willing to take a chance on him.
And then the kicker: You have 24 hours to decide.
After relaying the information to my husband, we dropped to the floor and prayed. We were afraid, but we trusted God to guide our hearts and took the next steps forward.
The following week was a whirlwind. We met a sweet, young, red-headed girl in a Qdoba over lunch. She cried and thanked us for being willing to love her baby. Twenty-seven families had turned her down. Twenty-seven!
We jumped into action. Friends gathered baby items and dropped them on our porch. We rearranged rooms to create a nursery, filled out piles of paperwork, and collected everything needed to be approved by the state. Our families thought we had lost our minds, but at the same time, they loved and supported us.
I have never been so afraid in my life … a deep, soul-shaking fear. During his birth, which we witnessed, I was sick in the bathroom. My husband knocked on the door, saying, "Hurry, you're going to miss it." With only seconds to spare, I made it. He was beautiful. As that exhausted, kind young lady saw her baby, she tearfully looked away and motioned for the doctor to hand him to me.
Our sweet boy, Dillon, stole our hearts. He was ours. I still tell him, ten years later, "God chose us to be family, and I am so happy I get to be your mama." Even with the challenges of raising a child with special needs, I am constantly reminded through him that God is bigger than all we could ask or imagine.
Adoption can be a beautiful thing. Correction: Adoption IS a beautiful thing.
When we make the choice to be a follower of Jesus, we enter our own miraculous adoption story. We become heirs of God, cherished sons and daughters of the Highest King. This is our identity. This is who God says we are.
"But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God." (John 1:12–13)
There is freedom in this identity. There is freedom in living it out in our daily lives. So, I pray that no matter how the word adoption has hit you in the past, from now on you will embrace your own adoption story with joy and peace.
Adoption is a beautiful thing.