Orphan Sunday

What is Orphan Sunday? This year it's the second Sunday of November, set aside to remind believers of the plight of orphans and our biblical responsibility to care for them in their distress. This morning at church, I was encouraged by a short presentation made by Kevin Squires, Senior Director of World Orphans, who also happens to be our kids' Sunday school teacher. He spoke about the millions of orphans around the world, how the numbers can't possibly be accurate because there is no way to effectively count all of the street children, children in orphanages, and abandoned children around the world, and how world orphans are estimated to be roughly equivalent to the population of the entire country of Russia. Despite all of this, only about 2 million (of the at least 150 million) are eligible for adoption. He encouraged the church to rally around adoptive families, supporting them and cheering them on. He called them heroes and stated that adoptive parenting is hard on both sides - hard for the children, and hard for the parents. It's a beautiful thing, but it's not the idealized image that we may think of when we hear about an adoption taking place. He also said that last year, only about 7000 children were adopted internationally into the United States. That number surprised us, as we thought it would be bigger. But Kami was one of the 7000, and she was one of the 183 children adopted from Bulgaria that the U.S. Department of State refers to here: http://travel.state.gov/content/dam/aa/pdfs/fy2014_annual_report.pdf. It's a wonderful feeling to be part of a church family that understands and supports adoptive families!

It was four years ago, in November 2011, that I came home from a women's night at our last church highlighting orphan care and adoption and told Mason that we needed to start the process. We had a 2-year-old and a 10-month-old at the time and had no idea how God was going to do it, but we knew He was stirring in us to take an actual stand for life.

It seems that believers are beginning to realize that "pro-life" must mean more than just anti-abortion. To be for life is to be willing to step in and entwine our lives with - in fact, to lay down our lives for - people who have been abandoned. There has been a lot of talk about the evils of abortion and child abandonment, but how much are we talkers willing to give up in order to save life?

What's the opposite of pro-life, "pro-death?" It seems outlandish to me that any living, breathing person would be anything but for life; but that's because I know our Creator. In His sight, life is precious, valuable, purposeful, creatively designed by Him, and meaningful. Those who know the Father will understand the value of each of His creations. Those who don't, won't, so it's not surprising that so many in our country and world champion their perceived "right" to exterminate voiceless lives that they deem inconvenient. We recently sat in on a Bible study about marriage by Paul Tripp. In it he discusses how marriage is a war between two kingdoms - the kingdom of self and the Kingdom of God. In the kingdom of self, all we care about is what is best for us, what we like, what makes us feel good, what gives us exactly what we want exactly when we want it. Anything that gets in the way of this cause is seen as an evil offense to be eradicated. This is how marriages fall apart, when "me! me! me!" becomes the cry of both parties and the kingdom of self has won the war, with another marriage as its latest casualty. This truth also applies to parenting. If the small person in a woman's womb interferes with her plans, her desires, her hopes, and her goals, and she is compelled by them, then she is compelled by the kingdom of self which she serves to get rid of the child. How sad to think that self is all that matters. For children whose mothers choose to carry them, the battle for life in the womb is won; but what about after they're born? Who will help them? It seems like believers are beginning to talk more about the fact that speaking out against abortion and child abandonment are not nearly as fruitful as standing up for, sheltering, and loving unwanted children. As is usually the case, actions speak louder than words.

The way God brought Isaiah into our family opened my eyes to the reality of God's huge plans for the unplanned. He builds families in such amazing ways. Isaiah is our only child who won't remember life before Kami joined our family. Just weeks after he was born, we were transferring into the Bulgaria program at God's specific leading. She's here because he's here, and we didn't foresee either one of them! As longtime friends can recall, we set out to adopt a sibling set from Peru when Eden was a baby. That's just funny to me now.

So on Orphan Sunday, what should we do? I believe we should offer our families to God, asking Him to use them to build His Kingdom here, specifically through caring for the fatherless. If we know adoptive families, we should reach out to them with non-judgmental listening ears and encouraging words. They have probably received enough pats on the back for the rest of their lives, and they probably realized early on that those pats weren't going to sustain them through the rough places. Sometimes it can be disorienting and confusing for people to tell you that you're a "good person" and that your child is "lucky to have you" when you feel that neither is true. But we can listen to adoptive parents, asking about their struggles and victories; and we can pray for them and hang out with them even when their families seem a little (or a lot) crazy.
You might think that because Mason and I have walked this wild road with Kami over the past 15 months that we are somehow qualified to approach adoptive families differently, but no. If anything, we understand that we can't understand any other family's unique situation. All we know personally is our own experience, and it is so sensitive that we respect the challenges of other adoptive families and know that no two will be exactly alike. Just thinking right now of the large handful of adoptive families we know, I see very few similarities in any of the details of our stories except for the fact that we each have at least one child in our home who was not born to us. Some stories appear happier and easier (whether or not it's true), others appear more hard-fought (and hard-won). Redeeming a life is costly. I have to accept that some adoption stories look perfectly peachy, with happy parents and chubby, healthy babies who somehow look just like their adoptive parents. However, it's my understanding that no adoption can be completely trauma-free. Where there is a mother who gave birth to a child who didn't stay in her arms, there is trauma. Adoption is a beautiful thing, but it comes with pain. So on this Orphan Sunday, I'm pausing to take note of and remember what God has done in Kami's life over the past year.



October 2014 - Kami, age 7, next to 1-year-old Isaiah in a little apartment in Montgomery, Alabama where we fought every day just to not give up the fight. Her hair was short from her last orphanage cut and she was wearing size 4T clothing. She could not dress herself, chew her food, speak, or use the toilet. The messes we saw in the morning sometimes were unspeakable. As you can see looking at her right foot, she could barely process the feeling of being barefoot on carpet. She was essentially nonverbal except for unintelligible babbling and spent her days screaming, thrashing, scratching, lunging, and pushing, and was paralyzed by sensory dysfunction. For days in a row she would not eat or drink. This feels like looking through a window into another lifetime for me.

 



November 2015 - Kami, age 8, at church this morning. She speaks in full sentences, and when I remember her at this time last year, it doesn't matter anymore that the words in the sentences are arranged strangely. She dresses herself, in size 8-10 clothing, uses the toilet like a pro, and has very few remaining sensory issues. She knows how to play, jump, climb, slide, obey, and communicate. As I write she's standing next to me looking at the pictures and talking about what I'm doing. It feels this month like we are finally emerging from the woods enough for some real bonding to take place. I took her to visit a special needs school last week, and I walked out feeling unsure if I even want to put her in school anymore. She is doing so well at home and, even on the hard days, she is growing and learning by leaps and bounds. We still have our share of challenges, but today I'm just celebrating the power of God's Word in changing her life. Because it's God's Word that told us to care for orphans, and it's God's Word that enabled us to go where He sent us to bring an orphaned child into our family, and it's God's Word that enables us today to train her up up in the way she should go, no matter how many years were lost to abandonment.