A growing number of people are investing their lives in adoption and foster care. This passion is seen in how they live, what they speak about, what dominates their social media feeds etc. etc.
Often I wonder how my friends who aren’t in the world of foster care or adoption receive all my conversations about the needs of orphans. All my posts about hope in the challenging adoption situations and on and on. Do they “accidentally” hit the unfollow button? 😉 Do they roll their eyes? Do they think “Get a life, Becky”! I hope not…but I will unashamedly say “THIS IS my life”. Orphan care as a way of following Jesus is a growing number of families’ lives…praise God.
(photo cred. http://liannadavisphotography.com)
I’m not completely unsympathetic to the “eye rollers”, that’s for sure. I get it. No one enjoys seeing people blindly jumping on bandwagons and constantly spurting out the same loaded verbiage day after day. As a matter of fact, when we first started our foster journey, I was PETRIFIED to think that anyone would do this INCREDIBLY hard job just because they followed the “Orphan Care Movement” or wanted a ticket into the “Adoptive & Foster Parent Club” or even … heaven help us … to look good or holy or something. I had moments that I had to check my own motives for sure. Movements are exciting, but doing anything well must stem from an unshakable foundation.
So what are we TALKING about?
Children need families.
God’s love for the fatherless is abundantly evident throughout His Word and they are SEEN by Him. They are SEEN by us. We love them because God has shown us what it means to love.
We speak because God is calling us – His Church- to humble ourselves and raise up the most vulnerable among us. To LOVE them. THIS is how we know we are God’s people. By how we love with His love. How we lay down our lives for those who can offer nothing in return.
We speak to CHANGE the talk that has been held too closely for too long. That has deeply hurt too many. Statements like “I could never do that, I would get too attached” or “Don’t you want one of your own” or “Where is their REAL mom” or “You brought this upon yourself”. Because here’s the thing… In orphan care, Difficulty is not the sign of a wrong decision. Difficulty is the sign that we choose LOVE in a broken world. Vernacular that works against this love must be changed … and it takes a lot of education and perspective shift to do that. A lot of conversation.
Know that the vast majority of us aren’t using our valuable time for the rush of being a part of a “Movement”. The increasing number of Orphan Care organizations and ministries and conferences and retreats aren’t so we can all get together and pat each other on the back and proclaim how awesome we are. They’re for people who answer God’s call to meet a dire need. They’re for people humble enough to know they need to learn and find community so they can be effective and faithful in meeting that need.
We DON’T speak about Orphan Care because it’s cool. Or super fun. Or trendy.
We DO speak to love. (I mean seriously…look at that face!!) We hope to be voices heralding: challenging things are so worth doing. Though God has not equipped all of us for this calling in life, these conversations are still FOR all of us… making us more empathetic, more compassionate, more loving, more like Him.
So if you’re one of my friends who is saying “Get over this Orphan Care Movement thing already” …. you may just want to unfriend me now. OR I would love to talk with you about how to get involved in this amazing call of God to LOVE the fatherless!!
The Adoption Cottage 