Do you ever have a week were it seems like theres one thing that keeps popping up over and over again? For me, this week God has been reminding me in my heart about adoption. A passion for adoption is one of the things that first drew to me Kevin (besides his adorable face & wicked sense of humor, that is!). Kevin's Mom is adopted, so this issue has always been close to his heart. When I lived at an orphanage for 4 weeks in East Africa, adoption became close to my heart as well.
Adoption is not some new thing. Yeah, we see a lot of celebrities getting into it, but God has called us to adoption since the beginning of time! Kevin's favorite verse in the Bible says; Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.(James 1:27)
So I've always known that Kevin and I will adopt one day. When, from where, how and how many children-I have no idea. My friends in high school used to joke that one day I would run a baby farm with hundreds of foreign children all running around. Doesn't sound too bad to me ;)
Anyhow, I think know its often easy to get caught up in mundane life and forget about the bigger picture. Right now, we are nowhere near ready to start the adoption process; but I think its still good to be conscience about it. God reminded me again of this calling today when I read this--The spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, "Abba, Father." Romans 8:15. This verse states that we are all orphans, but God has adopted us as His sons & daughters. What a beautiful reminder!
And yet another reason adoption has been on my heart lately; at work we are helping fund a local familiy's adoption! They are currently going through the process and should meet their son, Max, soon. (from Ethiopia!) I am so blessed to even be a itty bitty piece of this process for them. You can check out their blog here.
And I will leave you this this video, filmed at the orphanage I volunteered at. The thing about orphans which I think people often forget is that they are children. They have names, they have little personalities. They like to play and run & dance. It's important to remember that behind every statistic is a human being.
