We are often asked if we think everyone should adopt.
Is Adoption for everyone?
by jamieivey | Sep 16, 2009 | My Story | 15 comments
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i agree with you one hundred percent!! i often tell my husband that it should be a LAW that everyone must adopt 🙂 but, then i see people that very clearly should not adopt. but, it makes my skin crawl when people say that is great that we are doing it, but it is not for them. i don’t think it takes a special person to adopt…we are no different than everyone else. i really struggle with this as well and have been wanting to write a post about it for some time.
i am interested in seeing what others think!
I personally think that more people should adopt. Although I don’t think it is right for everyone. I don’t go to church But I do believe in God. I thought adoption was only for the rich and christian people but we stepped out of our comfort zone to try adoption. We are adopting from Haiti right now and have 2 home grown kids at home who can’t wait for their brother to finally make it home. I has been a painful experience at times in this waiting process and finacially draining too but in the end we will have a sweet little boy! I truly wish more people would realize that they too, can adopt! There is far too many parentless children in this world. I hope by you doing this post, youu can help just one family to step out in faith and adopt!
Doug and I want to adopt; and I think adoption should not be a rare thing to find in a body of believers. I grew up in a white middle class church of about 200 members. I know of one family who adopted and I think that is shameful. That said, the verse in James people often quote says to care for widows AND orphans. If we only talk about orphans we’re missing the heartbeat of the verse.
What comes to my mind is that we’re called to care for the poor and needy. I have a house, I have extra clothes and plenty of food. Does that mean I go and find a homeless person and bring them home to live with me? Maybe it does and I’m being seriously disobedient right now. Or maybe some people are called to bring in the stranger, someone who has the time and energy and the heart…and I’m called to the orphan because I have THAT kind of time, energy and heart. This doesn’t excuse me from caring for the homeless in Austin, it just might look a little different.
That’s too BIG a question for me to answer. All I know is that many people would be adopting if they were more willing to give of themselves and their families. If they were more concerned about saving a life than preserving their own. If they read the word of God and saw that His heart was for the hurting children of the world. If people weren’t afraid to suffer and be inconvenienced to offer hope to someone else, whether or not their attempts were received or not. Adopting is not for the faint hearted, it is for those who TRUST in the Lord and hear His voice. Just as God gave me my children and not someone elses in my womb, I believe He also selects children that were meant for us who were not born of our womb, if we allow Him to pair us with them. Is it God’s will for every Christian to adopt? He may have given one man the heart to build the village for the children, and one man the money to adopt the children, and still yet one man resources to feed the children BUT do you see it’s still about the children. 🙂 http://www.childs-voice.blogspot.com Emma
I commented on Shaun’s blog, and will briefly here too. I don’t think adoption is necessarily for everyone, but I do think it’s for more people than actually do it. I do think that we as Christians MUST care for ‘the least of these.’ I can think of anyone who meets that description better than an orphan. God made it very clear to us that we were meant to adopt, and we have been so blessed by it.
Yes, adoption is hard to do. Everything that I value in my life has been difficult. Parenting in general can be hard. Marriage can be hard at times. Getting the career I love was very hard. If those things had come easy to me, they would not be very meaningful. But since I had to fight for them, I value them greatly.
I am opposed to telling others what they “should do.” I need to pay attention to what I should do. I will say that Christians should care for orphaned children. That may mean adoption. For others it may be sponsoring children through Compassion International, volunteering at an orphanage, donating to organizations that help adoptive parents.
So excited that we are adopting. 🙂 Just had to share that we were matched with a birthmom yesterday and the baby boy is due in December!!! We are thrilled!
I’m finally brave enough to chime in here – i’ve been reading for awhile, but I just want to say that I’m always getting worked up over why more people should adopt, and you know what? The only people who “get” my ranting are people who have adopted!!! 🙂 Anyway, people can say whatever they want, but the BIBLE is very clear that we are ourselves adopted and what a better way to become “more like Jesus”?!??!!!! For everyone else with an excuse – the least they could do would be to support an orphanage!! Good grief.
I completely agree with your post…but I bet more people would adopt if it wasn’t so hard and the wait so long.
Halleluha!! I m so glad someone finally said More people from the church should adopt. Jason and I feel this same way!! However, I do not believe that everyone is called to adopt. I do believe many think about adoption and kick the thought to the kirb because of finances. Really, if it comes to the pocket book, I don’t believe that is a good enough excuse. As we know it takes BIG and I mean BIG steps of Faith. BUT GOD owns everything! He wants to pour His blessings out on us. When there seems to be no way God makes away!!! I would never want to take back the closeness I have with Jesus becuase of this hard journey. We have absolutely had to surrender everything to him because we have no control. I’ll quit babbling now!! Love you Jamie. So glad to get to know you.
I think it is one of God’s ideals. Yet, not all of us are letting Him work us over like He needs to, to get us to the point where we can move forward.
Of course, that goes with everything – giving sacrificially, serving others, etc.
I have people say the same thing to me, but on a different level, “I’m not called to adopt the kinds of issues you are parenting in your home.”
Again – it could just be that those people have not stopped and asked, “God, what would you have to do in, and through, my life so that I could parent a child with a history/diagnosis of (fill-in-the-blank)?” And then, actually let Him do it.
I just pray that God uses our lives as an example. It took more than a decade of slowly letting God chip away at us before we could parent these kids in the way they need to be parented.
Yet, through all He has done with me … I know He still has more to do … for me to do.
Holy crap.
I’m going to go the other way on this one and say, NO. Adoption is NOT for everyone. In fact, despite being the mom of 5 children via adoption, my views on adoption have changed DRASTICALLY in the last 5 years. I think that fewer children should BE ADOPTED. (Bear with me.) All of my children have living birthparents. They were relinquished for reasons of abject poverty. God didn’t command us to adopt.. but to help the orphans (and widows, why do we always leave them out?).. and my children are not. What I should have done.. what I truly believe would have been the better option for my kids.. would have been to provide financial support for their families so that their families could remain together. I’m not saying this because I don’t love my children (fiercely) or want them (with every fiber of my being), but because I believe in my heart of hearts that they BELONG, ideally, with their first families.
I’m going against the tide here too and am going to agree with Corey. I think more people should adopt, BUT over the years I’ve seen met many who went into adoption with the best of intentions and an altruistic heart, but who really struggle with some of the day to day challenges of raising adopted kids. Since international adoptions are taking longer, the children are coming home older and they have spent more time in orphanages. This does have an effect on how they bond and with their new families and it can take longer and be more of a struggle than most people realize. I don’t mean to discourage, but I think each person has to look deep within BEFORE they adopt to consider how they would handle a “worst case”. Not everyone has the emotional and spiritual fortitude to handle more challenging kids, and that’s OK. I know there are no guarantees with birth children either, but when you add race, culture, prior life experiences to the equation it can be more challenging. Personally, I also think it’s more rewarding. 🙂
I also agree with Corey about adopting “true orphans” we have one child home already and expect to bring our twins home soon. Our daughter remembers her birthmom and loved her dearly, but because her mother is dead she thinks about her and misses her, but she doesn’t pine for her or worry about her the way some children do. Make sense? I would also recommend meeting your child first, especially older children. We’ve met all 3 of our kids before commiting to them and I think it was essential to making a connection. It feels less like an arranged marriage when you meet the child first and “choose” them.
Jen
All adoption is not equal. When you hear God’s voice you need to interpret what He is saying to you. Jesus asks us to help care for widows and orphans.
The fact is that worldwide 90% of children in orphanages are not orphans but have at least one living parent and usually other extended family who visit and are hoping to be reunited, as we saw with the two children adopted by Madonna. Many people in poor countries use institutional care temporarily and to obtain medical care for their children. They do not want or understand permanent adoption and it is thus cruel, not helping to take such children.
In Guatemala and elsewhere the high price westerners py to adopt has created criminal elements who kidnap children and sell them to orphanages who then send them overseas because the pric is higher! No one would wn to adopt out of altruistic, Christian charity only to find out that they had unwittingly been involved in taking a kidnapped child! This has also happened to thoe adopting from india.
Globally, as in the US, the children who might benefit from a loving family are left behind: older children, sibling groups and those who are disabled or diseased.
THESE re the children God is calling us ot help! Make no mistake about it and be clear about the difference! Do NOT pay $20-40,000 to adopt. The children who need you will cost minimum fees and many from the US come with subsidies. There are half a million children in US foster care – 129,000 of them can never be reunited with their family and cOULKD be adopted. Paying huge fees to adopt only feeds the baby brokers…the “money lenders” Jesus spoke against! Don’t do it!
Educate yourself. Read: http://tinyurl.com/adoptionfacts
Having said all that, no adoption is NOT for everyone. If you cannot handle children with problems: possible FAS, attachment disorders, and any number of delays and issues because of being separated from their family, culture and institutionalized or fostered – DON’T DO IT! The worst thing you can do is take a child that might overwhelm you and you cannot handle. Some of these children have been abused or GIVEB BACK or abandoned!
There are so many other ways to help children in need sch as Christian Children’s Fund, SOS Village…These charities help children remain with their family! That is the work of God. Taking children one at a time does nothing to ameliorate the poverty or other problems in their families, village or nations.
I pray you listen carefully to God’s word and do not fall prey to those who evilly twist them for their own profit!
Blessings.
My two cents is ‘No’ adoption is not for everyone. The creator of the universe calls us all to different ministries based on God given Gifts…or talents. The definition of Orphan is not being used completely. An orphan may have parents but no means for survival. An orphan may have 1 parent. Look in Webster for the definition. The children I care for and love are kids within the state system and many of them of orphans due to various reasons…and yet they may have living parents. God calls us when he wants and for His purpose. You may be called to move from month to month to new countries and preach the gospel, but he may not want you dragging a little one around. He may call you to live on the street with the homeless so you can witness to them about the love of God. HE has His purposes and reveals them to those He loves.
Are we jumping the band wagon promoting adopting Widows? Are we not called to care for them also? Where are the fundraisers for them? Are widows losing their homes because they can not afford to live in them anymore? Some elderly die due to extreme weather because they do not have the means to pay for heat or for a fan. Some die because they need medication their medicaid won’t pay for. Many die alone…even in nursing homes. All alone!Where are the t-shirts for them?
He calls us to “look after” or “to visit” the orphans and widows. Maybe some of us are called to raise money for the orphanges, or send monthly checks, or to make visits to them. Maybe some are called to visit nursing homes or start a foster home.
We are called to love our neighbor…so not only should we love the orphans and widows but we should love each other also. Pray for those who walk in fear and do not adopt though they have been called. Pray for those who do not travel overseas because of fear. Pray for them to get to where God the Father wants them…not where we think they should be.
God bless those who do adopt. God bless those who do serve in orphanges. God bless those who send money. God bless those who are still maturing in their walk with the Lord. God bless those who pray daily for all Gods Children.
Matthew 19:14 (NIV)
14Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as the these” To have love, trust, and faith like a child….the Kindgom of heaven belongs to those who possess that!
Children who have lost only one parent are called half orphans.
“Every child has the right to know and be cared for by his or her own parents, whenever possible. UNICEF believes that families needing support to care for their children should receive it.” UNICEF
Taking children from parents who want to be reunited with them, as was done in both of Madonna’s adoptions – is in opposition to doing God’s work.
Adopting children who were stone of kidnapped from their children – makes us, albeit unwittingly, conspirators with evil, not good. Beware false prophets, false Gods. Beware anyone who is making their living on adoption placements.
Please read first hand accounts of just how HORRIBLE it is to believe you are doing God’s work only to find out you have taken a child who was stolen form his or he rmothers. http://tinyurl.com/adoptionfacts