How it all began...

Well, I'm not exactly sure where it all began.  About 2 years ago we had a couple start visiting our church.  They had 2 boys that they had adopted and 2 daughters.  (They are now members of our church and I love them DEARLY!!!)  I remember noting how interesting it was that they had been able to have their own children and still chose to adopt more.  I remember being interested wondering were the boys family members that needed guardians?  How did this all come about?  I wasn't interested enough to ask or get really involved, I just remember noticing.  I believe this was the first awakening in my heart for orphans.  The next real punch in the gut (which there was no avoiding or denying) was when our friends decided to adopt.  They have 3 children, so why were they?  They were broken for these orphans.  These children that were cast away daily because they were not the right gender, or they were sick, or any one of a million other reasons.  Our friends were called by God to invest in one of these children's lives like only a follower of christ can.  When they were matched with their little girl my heart sank.  I remember seeing her picture for the first time and thinking "how can people do this to these little ones?".  From then on that pit grew deeper and deeper in my heart.  Why was I doing nothing?  Why was I waiting for someone else to pick up the slack?  Why was what I had not good enough for someone with nothing?  For the next couple of months I was bombarded with all things adoption/orphans.  I could not get away from the subject.  Every place I went, every song I heard, every time I was on the TV or computer, every time I talked to someone somehow or another these children were brought up.  It was God surrounding me with this!  I remember being in the most random places, talking with people I barely knew, and somehow they would start talking about orphans, or adopting, or foster parenting.  It was CRAZY!!!!  I would google and search for hours on end daily.  I would read stories and just cry.  My heart would break a little more every day, with every parentless face.  Why could I not be the one to help give that child hope, the kind of hope that only Christ can truly give.  If Christ is in me I should be sharing Him.  I should be allowing Him to work in and through me to give others His hope, the hope I have in me through Him.  What a way to show that, in adoption, the same gift He gave me through Jesus blood, my adoption into His family.  There was no doubt in my mind where God was leading my heart.  I knew telling my husband would be a totally different story.
More on that next time....

Ephesians 1:4-6
"even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.  In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved."