We have wanted you for ages. In fact for years before you
were born, we wanted you. God has been preparing us for you for a long time.
Maybe it’s better if I start back at the beginning. When I
was a child I remember being drawn by the idea of adoption. I pretended that I
had ‘adopted’ my stuffed animals. When I saw news stories about kids without
parents, it broke my heart. I remember watching movies like Disney’s Rescuers
and Annie, and my emotions were tugged. TV shows like Different Strokes
highlighted adoption while embracing the different colors of God’s children. As
I grew older and I saw movies about the defenseless, the fatherless, and the
lonely being protected, I was inspired. God was preparing me for you.
I know your mom played with dolls growing up, caring for
them, loving them, teaching them and feeding them. Some of her favorite movies
were about orphans….and singing (Annie and the Sound of Music). She watched
shows like Little House on the Prairie which showed her a story of adoption. They
had a home daycare where even as a young teen your mom got to love on real
babies, playing with them, caring for them and feeding them. God was preparing
her for you.
When your mom and I started dating we shared our desires to adopt.
The idea had grown in each of us before we met and now we shared something
special in God’s heart. We discussed our shared desire to adopt teens. Our
dating years came and went. They flashed by as we finished High School and
started college. Yet, God gave us many opportunities for practice and training
with our nephews and nieces. We had no idea what God had in store, but know
this…He was preparing us for you.
We married while attending a Christian college and soon
after we started supporting a child from Compassion International. This was a
small way to help a child in need. We prayed for and invested in the life of
that child. Our classes taught us more about God’s love. God was preparing us
for you.
After a couple more years at college, we joined a team of
church planting missionaries going to Ancona, Italy. We experienced highs and
lows on the mission field, but through it all we saw God’s plan for Italy and
our lives. During our time in Italy, we once again thought of adoption. Our
normal travel schedule was that we would be in Italy for two years and back in
the states for six months. We found that Italy wouldn’t allow foreigners to
adopt Italian children and there were hurdles with adopting children in America
while we were living abroad. We remembered an orphanage that we knew in an
Asian country and sent them an email. We heard nothing. We looked at other
opportunities, but didn’t really get anywhere. Months later, God led us to move
to another city in Italy and help lead a church plant there. We were packing
our things in Italy and coming back to the states to raise awareness and a team
when we received the apology email from the orphanage. They had received our
email but it went to their junk mail folder. They told us they were happy to
help us adopt, but because of the move it wasn’t the right time. It seemed God
was still working through us and preparing us for you.
While we were in the states preparing ourselves and our new
team, we took a training course called Perspectives. The course looked at God’s
heart for the nations. The presenters would often give us suggestions of events
and opportunities that helped us keep a heart open to the nations. We went to a
few of the events. One event was at a church that was hosting a group of
orphans from Russia. There were teens and older children that spoke and sang in
a choir. Their stories and the stories of other children like them shook us. We
felt the increased pull of adoption, but not at that time. God wasn’t ready for
us to adopt at that time, but He used their stories to continue molding our
hearts. God was preparing us for you.
At a Christian concert in late 2008, we heard two different
pleas. One was for Compassion International and the other was for an
international adoption agency. We were still preparing to return to Italy, and
while we talked seriously about the adoption challenge, we felt that that at
that time God was wanting us to get back involved with Compassion International
after a few years absence. Again, we provided financial resources for food and
Bible training for a child around the world. Again we were praying and loving a
new child, even if it was “long distance”. God was preparing us for you.
After almost two years of preparation, God sent us back to
Italy – to the city of Verona. Three months after barely settling in, we
received the kind of phone call you would never want to receive. My brother was
in a terrible car accident and we needed to return to America. We came back to help
our broken hurting family even while we also were broken and hurting. It would
take God the next few years to heal our brokenness. However, through this
tragedy God transformed us from an Aunt and an Uncle to substitute parents of
our niece and nephews in the place of my brother. Their ages ranged from 14 to 21.
Looking back, we realize God had been preparing us for this. And through this too
God was preparing us for you.
In 2010, our church showed a video from the 111Project. This
project has brought attention to the need of churches to see how they could make
an impact in the foster system. This pulled at our hearts and brought to mind
how God had given us a desire to adopt. Since my brother’s accident we had been
taking care of him at home. We were still figuring out how this worked and what
a normal life looked like for us. Yet the thought of being there for a child in
need hit us hard, yet we waited as God healed our hearts. God was still
preparing us for you.
In 2012, life seemed to turn a corner. I became an elder at
our church and we began to become more involved in local ministry again, even
as we continued to take care of my brother and his kids. Later that year, I
would even become the Youth Minister at this same church. Throughout the year,
close friends of ours waded through the waters of local adoption through DHS
and it seemed to be less difficult than we imagined. We saw once more that
children needed forever families, but this time we saw it in Oklahoma. God was
preparing us for you.
In November, right after Thanksgiving in 2012, we were
watching news that had been recorded on our DVR. We rarely watch the news, but
this time we had seen something that drew our interest. While watching, a
segment for “Waiting Child” came on. Waiting Child shows an interview with a
child that is waiting to have a forever family. Your mom and I both remember
seeing these interviews on TV when we were kids. So because of a bit of
nostalgia and actual interest we watched. And after watching it, we looked at
each other and rewound it to watch it again. Reality hit again that there truly
were kids out there, teens that were longing to have a family that loved them
and right here in the same state! We spent the next several days talking about
it. God was preparing us for you.
We decided to move forward and find out more about local
adoption, then start the process. That is how we got to this point of meeting
you. We cannot wait to meet you, hold you, love you and guide in a knowledge
that honors God and brings others to Him. God has prepared us for you.
You will be part of a family that loves the Lord, likes to laugh,
enjoys games together, celebrates life joyfully, comes together in difficult
times, knows the importance of praying together and longs to tell others about
Jesus. God has prepared us for you.
And I want to tell you something, you are God’s child. And
you are made in His image. This is something that we believe fully. And you are
made with a purpose. God wants to use you in His kingdom, to use you in His
story. You will be magnificent in the adventure that God has planned for you,
if you choose to follow Him. God has prepared you for Him.
We already love you and that love will only continue to grow.
We look forward to being together as a family just as God has prepared.
Love,
Your Dad and Mom
Your Dad and Mom
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