(According to UNICEF there are 143 million orphans in the world.)
Can you imagine a world where foster care was only a temporary solution, and not a way of life for thousands of children?
(In the US, there are close to 750,000 children in foster care at any given time. More than 120,000 of these children are currently waiting for adoptive families to give them a chance at a new life.)
Can you imagine if every Mama who chose life for her unborn child, but was unable to raise him or her, had someone waiting in the wings who wanted to adopt that child?
(It is a myth that it’s impossible to adopt an infant in the US. In reality, there are many babies that adoption attorneys and agencies struggle to find a family for – for reasons such as a lack of birth family health history, poor prenatal care, or the child's ethnicity/race.)
Can you imagine how things would change if God’s people stepped up and cared for the widows and orphans – something we ALL have been called to do?
(If only 5% of the 2 billion people world-wide who call themselves Christians adopted a child, 100 million waiting children would have a home. If the others committed to supporting those who actively minister to widows and orphans, the impact would be incredible!)
Oh, how this grieves our hearts...that there is a ready solution, yet very little being done. Why do so many feel they are exempt from being a part of that solution? Not everyone is called to foster or adopt, but we can ALL do something.
Please consider praying with us about this. Please consider loving and supporting a tired foster family, helping an adoptive family that is raising funds to bring a child into their home, or adopting a child into your own family. Please consider our modern-day widows, who need our loving support as they raise their children alone.
Love is an action word. Let’s act! Let’s make the choice to not let fear, the unknown, finances, etc. stand in the way. We are meant to be Christ’s feet. We are here for a reason…. And we are privileged to be able to serve our Lord this way.
What are some ways that we can support today’s widows and orphans? Do you know and love an organization that reaches out to orphans and widows with the love of Christ? Please tell us about them!
If you are a foster family, how can we support you?
Do you know of a family that is saving to adopt, and would welcome us coming alongside them?
~*~ Please share your ideas in the comment section. We'd love to hear from you! ~*~
If you want to do a little more reading about this issue, and feel challenged to do more, check out these blog posts:
Love is an Action Word by Courtney, at Storing Up Treasures
Abortion, Racism, and Adoption by Cate, a friend of ours
How to Blow Away One of the World's Darkest Clouds, by Tiffany, at The Lighted Path
4 comments:
Beautiful post! Don't have any answers, but you have me thinking hard tonight... Do you think Jeremy will let me adopt again?! LOL! :)
No doubt! After all, four kiddos age 5 and under is not nearly enough....you have time to spare, right? :)
This is something that's been on my heart too. sometimes I get to the thought "why would anyone NOT adopt??" "why would they choose against such tremendous blessings?!" and I find myself wondering what those people REALLY think about families like ours that choose adoption.... even though we can have 'children of our own'. Its a rather alienating feeling. as though, somehow we have chosen second best when we can still have our first best, and people don't really understand why we'd do that. Its irks me when others make comments about how blessed our daughter is (not mentioning our son by birth, of course) because she got us for parents instead of you-know-who! (who loves her oh-so much by the way!) arg! but, now I'm just venting :)
I appreciate your thoughts on how those families who don't feel the desire to adopt have a very important role in supporting those adoptive and foster families. Makes me want to continue the conversation with those friends and family members. to ask them if adoption is important to them, and if so, what ways they feel they can support families, widows, orphans.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
*has anyone had this type of conversation with a non-adoptive family? I'd love to hear how it went.
Kiara,
Your words are similar words good churches use to talk about missions - you are either a goer or sender or both but you are called by God to be involved somehow, period. Scripture says the same for the orphans of the world and the church is starting to wake up to that calling from the Lord as well now (which often overlaps with missions). It's very exciting and encouraging how many families around us are "into" adoption, either directly or indirectly - many more than 10 years ago even....and I'm not just saying this because now that we've adopted I hang out with more adopt-friendly families, although that is, of course, also true and will probably be more so as time goes on.
One thing here in Colorado there are a lot of churches taking on the challenge of getting all the kids in foster care that can be adopted. I just heard that the number was 800 something last year - kids who were ready to be adopted but hadn't been. This year that number is down to 500 something and a lot of the Christians who have taken on the challenges their pastors have given them are the families these kids are joining. AWESOME!!!
Shan in CO
Post a Comment