Hurry Up and Wait

Erika keeps reminding me to update the Adoption Blog. We’re definitely in a holding pattern right now as we wait for our home study to be rough drafted, redrafted and then final drafted. So the update is: we’re still waiting.

That the adoption process is slow and often uncertain is not new to me. The process of international adoption has just brought a whole new level of things to go slowly. Once the home study is completed then we’ll rush around to move onto the next part of the process and then we’ll wait there for a while.

The key in the waiting is to constantly remind oneself that the child God has for us isn’t going to be skipped over because the process took too long. Years from now when our little guy (or girl) is someone we know and love we definitely won’t be sitting around wishing the home study had come in a week or two earlier. God’s timing will have proven itself to be perfect.

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143,000,000

According to UNICEF that's the number of orphans in the world. Here's a video to put that number in perspective. It's overwhelming to think about. Every single one of those orphans represents a person created in God's image. Every single one, if adopted into a Christian family could be exposed to a father and mother who could teach them diligently the words of God as they sit, as they walk, as they lie down and as they rise up. Every single one of them has only two possible destinations in eternity: heaven or hell.

How can we think about helping 143,000,000 orphans? The answer is to help one at a time. People do overwhelming things all the time. How do we pay down overwhelming debt? We do it one month at a time. How do we get in shape? We take it one day and one pound at a time.

When I went to seminary I quickly came to understand that I was way behind everyone else when it came to the books that I needed to read. I was overwhelmed by the amount of material I needed to cover just to catch up. But I resovled to do it one book at a time and one page at a time.

I've been asked how adopting one child is going to help the orphan problem. Who am I to think that I can make a difference in such an overwhelming situation? I am convinced that for one child I can make a difference. For that one child I can help in a situation that must seem far more overwhelming than reading books or losing weight.

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