Tag: adoption

Why I Lie

I know a family who recently adopted a little girl from an impoverished nation in Africa.  The girl has been living with her adopted family for several years and has been functioning quite well except for one area.  You see, this little girl barely survived her first few years in Africa.  She was alone living on the streets–starving.  She would wait in line for days to be served a meager ration.  Food was the one thing that was constantly on her mind.  She barely survived and was always hungry–ravenously hungry.

Thankfully she was adopted by an American family who has provided her with love and plenty of food ever since.  But, she can’t seem to shake her old habits concerning food.  Her parents have found that she eats everything.  She will take seconds and thirds and eat until she nearly bursts.  At school, she will ask to visit the restroom and instead she will slip into the communal cubby area where all the kids keep their backpacks, coats and boots.  There she systematically opens each backpack and rifles through each lunch box eating everything she can until she is caught.  Although most of her other social behaviors would go by unnoticed she will eat, steal and hoard food at every opportunity.  Why?  She is fighting to survive.  Her little mind convinces her that she must eat.  She needs to eat.  Her very life depends on it.

Her body is with a loving family who has plenty here in America but in her mind she is still a starving child living on the streets in Africa.  Her mind hasn’t caught up with her present reality.  She isn’t alone anymore.  She is deeply loved and cared for.  This is her new reality.  Her mind just hasn’t embraced it yet.

 

CATCHING UP WITH REALITY

I do this same exact thing and my suspicion is that you do too.  So much of what I do is designed to win your approval–to convince you that I am valuable. The jokes I make, the stories I tell and the clothes I wear are chosen to impress because I have a fierce need to be accepted and valued…and so do you.

My problem is that I haven’t embraced my present reality.  Like the hungry little girl, I was an orphan and so were you..  Not in an physical sense but spiritually.  You see, we are designed to find our belonging and value in a close relationship with our Creator and Father.  When this relationship is estranged it is impossible for us to function as whole people.  The brokenness within us will drive us to behaviors that don’t make sense–like eating everything in sight or in my case being funny, buying a pair of jeans I can’t afford or stretching the truth in a story to make myself look a little more impressive to you.  I do this because I don’t feel like I belong.  I don’t feel like I am loved.

ADOPTED

I love that the Apostle Paul described our new relationship with God through Jesus as adoption.

But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law.  God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children.  And because we are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.”  Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child.  And since you are his child, God has made you his heir. (Galatians 4:4-6)

I can’t help but think that God looks at our behavior the same way that we look at the starving little girl–with pity and sadness.  Don’t you realize that you don’t have to act that way anymore?  You don’t have to lie.  You don’t have to sleep with him.  You don’t have to run to that addiction.  Don’t you know that you are loved?  Don’t you know that you are mine?  Who cares what everyone else thinks?  I love you.

I have a new reality.  I am accepted and loved.  I’ve been granted the privilege to call the Creator God, “Dad.”  No offense but I’m going to stop caring about what you think of me.  I don’t need to be funny, stretch the truth or dress a certain way to gain your approval because I don’t need it.  I have the approval of my Father.  I choose to believe my present reality and I invite you to do the same.

 

image credited to Even Earwicker via http://www.sxc.hu/

Goodbye to the Most Disappointing Year

I have to be honest, 2013 was not my favorite year.  In fact, it may have been the most disappointing year of my life.  To be sure, there were plenty of high points.  I absolutely love my wife and kids and really enjoyed our time together in 2013.  We had a great year with vacations, school and life as usual.  Also, this year I was blessed with the opportunity to lead our high school ministry and so far it has been a fantastic year of ministry.  We added 5 staff to our team this year which has been an adventure.  And yet, as I look back over 2013 one event casts a dark cloud over the rest of the year:  Our failed adoption.

Over the last few years, I have become more and more involved in partnering with local churches and ministries in Ukraine in order to reach out to and serve orphans.  In that time my family and I fell in love with Ukrainian orphan kids and even decided to adopt a girl who stole our hearts.  We worked incredibly hard to find partners, raise money, secure the necessary documents, and prepare our family.  God opened doors and the impossible repeatedly became possible.  She was so happy to join our family and we were so excited to adopt her.  The adoption process was such a difficult but amazing ride until our dreams crashed when our girl suddenly changed her mind about wanting to leave Ukraine.  She was manipulated by her orphanage director who was more interested in money than her future.  He convinced her that she belonged in Ukraine and that she needed to stay and take care of her alcoholic mother who had abandoned her years ago.

We did everything we could to persuade her but nothing worked.  And then, after the deadline for her adopt-ability passed, her mother committed suicide.  It was a terrible time and I’ll never forget holding this poor girl last summer as she cried and cried, wishing she could undo her decision to stay in Ukraine.  I’ve never experienced such heartbreak.

The adoption journey has been hard on me.  I still wrestle with why God allowed this to happen.  Clearly, He is the Father to the fatherless and calls His people to love orphans.  We were simply trying to follow in the path of Jesus and it didn’t work out.  Why didn’t He show up and fix this?  I don’t think I’ll ever know.  But what I do know is that the world is more broken than I originally supposed.  There is darkness here that can’t be glossed over.  This world needs restoration.  I used to be satisfied with this broken world because my life was easy and comfortable.  All that changed in 2013.

Never again will I be satisfied with this world.  It’s broken.  Millions of people are hurting, lost, without clean water, without parents and love, without hope.  My prayer for 2014 is that Jesus would return and restore this broken place.  To be honest, I didn’t used to be terribly concerned about Jesus coming back.  I’ve always enjoyed life.  Now I realize how messed up this world is.

And until Jesus restores all things, may the Church rise up and serve and love.  May we represent Jesus well and may we work toward the restoration that is coming.  My hope for this year is that we would become more engaged in suffering.  That we, as God’s people, would become less comfortable and more mission-minded.  We are the agents of restoration in this world.  Let’s get to work.

 

A Spy Mission and a Broken Heart

Spies are so compelling.  Given the chance, I’d be a spy in a second.  All that intrigue, danger and secrecy—so good.

Last week I was in Ukraine on a little spy mission of my own.  A few weeks ago I shared the story of our failed adoption of a Ukrainian orphan girl.  You can read the story here.

Basically, some friends and I have fallen in love with a group of orphans who we met in a camp in Ukraine—my wife and I attempted to adopt one of these kids.  For whatever reason, she and the rest of the kids have been moved to a different camp in which we Americans are not allowed to visit.  We repeatedly pleaded with the director of this camp to be able to visit but he would not consent.  In fact, when we asked one final time he said he would never let us and then slammed the phone down on us.

The thing is:  I love that girl and the other kids who are with her.  So, we decided to throw down a spy mission.  My good friend Oleg who happens to be the director of Radooga was kind enough to drive us to the camp.  We contacted everyone we could and asked them to pray and then drove for 2 hours to her camp knowing full well that there was basically no chance of being let in.   On the way, we called one of the kids in the camp and let him know we were coming.   We were worried about the kids sneaking out and getting in trouble but we just had to try.

As it turns out, God opened the way for us because when we arrived the director of the camp was attending a camp-wide concert.  While he watched the show a few of the kids slipped out to see us, including the girl I came to see—the girl who was so nearly my daughter.

As we drove up to the gate the kids were jumping down with excitement and mobbed us as we exited the van.  It was a tremendous joy to see these kids that we love so much—especially the girl we almost adopted.  She never let go of me the entire time we were there.  We cried over the separation and laughed as we looked at pictures and took a few new ones.   We talked about our memories together in camp and bragged about how our team was the best.  And then, after what seemed like only a few minutes, it was time for the kids to go.

Before she walked back to her dorm, she pulled me and a translator away from the crowd and utterly broke down.  Through her tears she apologized for declining our adoption.  She said she decided to stay in Ukraine so that she could care for her alcoholic mother.  But, only a month after she said no to us her mother hanged herself.  It was horrible and now she is terribly alone, utterly abandoned and regrets everything.

I held her, wiped away her tears and told her how sorry I was.  And then, her counselors called her away.  I kissed her forehead, told her that I loved her and she was gone.

It’s been a week and I just can’t escape that encounter.  I just keep replaying it in my mind.  There is nothing we can do to adopt her.  It is too late.  She’s too old.  But, she doesn’t understand and frankly neither do I.  I usually appreciate laws that protect our country but in this case I hate them.

She has no one.  Both of her parents are now dead.  Her older brother is in prison for the next decade and the rest of her extended family has abandoned her.  My heart aches because she was so close to becoming our daughter—so close to safety, love and security.

And then I decided, “Who cares?  Who cares about laws, borders and language barriers?”  She needs a father.  For whatever reason God didn’t allow us to adopt her but I can be a father.  I can support her, love her and empower her from a distance.  And so, that’s what I’m going to do.

I’ll never understand why things have worked out the way they have.  It will always break my heart and I’ll always worry about her but I will never give up and I’ll never stop trying to be a father to her.  Why?  Because that’s exactly how God treats me.  How could I not attempt to do the same for her?

When Injustice Gets Personal Part 4

I believe the Devil is real.  Why?  Because I have experienced evil.

After winning legal approval to adopt, I contacted the girl we hoped to adopt in order to find out if she in fact wanted to be adopted.  As I mentioned previously, I had already developed a relationship with her through 2 mission trips and almost daily communication through Facebook.

After convincing her that we were actually serious, she exploded with joy.  She was so excited about being adopted and moving to America.  She called us mom and dad and constantly asked about her soon to be brothers and sisters.  We put our house up for sale in order to get a bigger house that would accommodate a teenage daughter.  We made plans for her schooling.  We all got passports and made preliminary travel plans.  And then everything blew up.

One day, out of nowhere, our soon to be adopted daughter sent me a long and formal message explaining to me that she was very sorry but she no longer wanted to be adopted.  She said that she was Ukrainian and belonged in Ukraine.  And that was it.  We were shocked.  I tried over and over again to convince her that she was making a huge mistake but she would not budge.  Her writing style was so different that I was convinced it wasn’t even her.

Desperate for answers I contacted a Ukrainian friend who regularly visited the orphanage in which our prospective daughter lived.  Through her, I discovered what had happened.  The director of the orphanage had somehow talked her out of being adopted.

In that moment I remember how a girl from the same orphanage had told me that when she was 4 an American couple wanted to adopt her but her orphanage director had told her that the Americans would take her away, kill her and sell her organs.  Terrified, the little girl said no to the American couple and 13 years later she still lives in the orphanage.

I learned that over the last decade the director of the orphanage had not permitted a single adoption—not even to Ukrainian couples.  Why?  Money.  He receives money from the Ukrainian government based on how many children are in his school and how many of those children graduate.

Fury can’t adequately describe what I felt.  We tried every method possible to change her mind but she would not budge.  She would not even discuss it.  Then our adoption appointment with the Ukrainian government came and went.  Somehow, in spite of all that God had done to open the way for us we had failed.  We did not get our precious girl.  Now she is too old to adopt and she’ll soon be released from the orphan school to the streets.

What do you do with that?  I don’t have many clear answers.  The best I can offer is that now I have glimpsed the pain God feels when His children reject Him.  Evil clouded our orphan’s judgment and she rejected a family that would have provided her with love, protection and opportunity.  In the same way, evil clouds my judgment on a daily basis and I reject God’s best.  Out of one of the most painful experiences in my life, perhaps that is the lesson.  I’m not sure.

I take comfort in the reality that as much as my heart breaks for this orphan girl, the love I feel doesn’t even compare to God’s love for her.  I know that His heart breaks for her too.  I trust that He is present in her story and that He will never stop pursuing her.

Somehow in the failure and the pain God is present and He’s not finished.

When Injustice Gets Personal Part 3

I don’t believe in closed doors.  I believe in smashing through them.  Let me explain:

Growing up in church I repeatedly heard phrases like these:

“I was going to become a [insert occupation] but God closed that door.”

“I am unsure what direction to go but God keeps opening up doors so I keep walking through them.”

“We wanted to get involved with [insert opportunity] but God closed that door.

I was taught that when an opportunity seemed to close it was a sign from God that I needed to move in a different direction.  If this is true, what we are saying is, “If it’s hard then it must not be God’s will.”  This doesn’t jive with the practices of the early church at all.  At the risk of offending people, I think the open/closed door concept is bad theology and a terrible way to make decisions.  If we had taken this approach in our pursuit of adoption we would have given up after a few hours.

Because we knew jack-nothing about adoption, one of the first things we did was call a large and reputable American adoption agency.  An agent explicitly told me that the girl we wanted to adopt was too old and it would be impossible to adopt her.  Disappointed, I called the branch of the US government that processes international adoptions and was told that the adoption was impossible because by law the adoption needed to be complete before the girl’s 16th birthday which was only 2 ½ months away.  There just wasn’t enough time.

The door had closed.  I was distraught.  I went for a run to process the news.  Was God telling us that adoption wasn’t His will for us?  I don’t think that’s how God works.  We already knew God’s feelings on injustice and orphans in particular.  We weren’t out of bounds in pursuing adoption.  I believe that sometimes God allows us to run into a closed door so that we can experience His power when He smashes through it.  And so we decided to do some smashing.

As my feet pounded out the last leg of my run, I decided that we would not take no for an answer.  If it meant flying to Ukraine and bribing government officials we would do it.  Be warned, this is the sort of crazy behavior that happens when injustice moves from abstract ideas to real relationships.

And so, I kept pushing and calling and eventually found the loophole we needed.  Because of the audacious determination of a pastor and his wife in Colorado, there was an addendum to American adoption law that would permit us to adopt an older orphan.  I guess that couple doesn’t believe in closed doors either.

So here’s my challenge: pay no attention to closed doors.  If you’re pursuing something that you already know God cares about and if your community is behind your pursuit don’t give up!  Smash through that door!  If you’ve recently smashed through a closed door I would love to hear about it.

Tomorrow I’ll finish this series by sharing how everything fell apart.

 

Photo by percivalsmithers

When Injustice Gets Personal Part 2

Crazy is uncomfortable.  We in suburban America like safe and normal.  There are social penalties to doing things that rock the boat.  You get talked about and people say things like, “Bless your heart,” which when translated from Christianese means, “You’re an idiot!”

I’ve discovered that when you tell someone that you’re going to adopt an orphan teenager they usually try to talk you out of it.  Go ahead, try it for yourself and see how people respond.   People will tell you that you’re putting your family in danger.  They’ll tell you horror stories of adoptions that were so bad that the parents tried to send the kids back.  They’ll tell you that you don’t have enough money.  They’ll tell you that older orphans are irreversibly damaged.

I understand that one of the key functions of good community is to help us process decisions and uncover blind spots in our thinking.  Our community and family helped us immensely in these ways during our adoption process.  In fact, every family member and close friend immediately or eventually supported our adoption which helped confirm our decision.  And yet, outside of our inner circle, I could sense immense skepticism and discomfort.

Christians in the West—specifically, suburban mega-church American Christians like me–have replaced normal with abnormal.  In the early church, crazy was normal.  The first generations of Jesus followers were known for extraordinary acts of compassion and love.

Throughout the ancient Roman world, human life was not valued.  Unwanted babies were left to die in “baby dumps” outside the city gates.  The early Christians opposed this practice and were known to rescue these babies and raise them as their own.

When plague struck Caesarea in the early 4th century everyone who could fled the city.  However, the Christian community stayed behind and put themselves at risk to care for the sick and dying.  The sacrificial love of the early Christians is well documented.  We could tell stories for days.

Throughout history, when Christianity has been at its best, it has been characterized by radical compassion and sacrificial love.  It has never been by any other influence that Christianity has spread and become stronger.  However, when Christians get comfortable we lose our influence (Andy Stanley has spoken powerfully about this phenomenon).

My point is this:  attempting to adopt a child who is at risk of sex trafficking should be considered normal behavior for Christians.  But instead, normal has become comfort and luxury.  We love to talk about sacrificial love but we rarely act in sacrificial love.  And please understand I’m talking about myself as much as anyone else.  It took 17 years of following Jesus before I ever acted on radical compassion and sacrificial love.  I’m not exactly the poster boy for my argument.

The thing is, stepping out in faith and actually doing something crazy in the name of Jesus has been exhilarating.  My faith has exploded and God has met me and my family in so many ways.  Maybe it’s because that kind of love can only come from the heart of God.

So if your faith is stuck, find a place to serve.  Give something away.  Get more involved in a ministry at your church or a local mission.  Support a child through Worldview or Compassion International or start looking into adoption.   By loving sacrificially your faith will grow and so will the influence of the church of Jesus Christ

 

photo credit:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/ihhinsaniyardimvakfi/

When Injustice Gets Personal

A few years ago injustice was transformed from an abstract word to a gut wrenching reality complete with faces, names and heartbreaking stories.  I’ve seen a lot of pain but nothing prepared me for how children neglected by parents and an entire society would change the trajectory of my life.

Two summers ago I found myself in a camp full of teenage orphans in rural Ukraine.  These orphans had been dumped in this camp by their orphan schools for the summer.  They were provided with beds, some of the worst food I’ve ever tasted and a handful of university students as their camp counselors.  There was no program, no activities, and no school.  You can imagine the outcome.

In this camp I found children desperate for attention and love because of years of neglect and rejection.   I found beautiful young women, the vast majority of which, either because of desperation or trafficking would someday find themselves enslaved in prostitution.  I found rambunctious teenage boys who would most likely end up as addicts or incarcerated.

And yet, in the midst of such hopelessness, despite my best intentions I fell desperately in love with the kids I met.  In the midst of overpowering darkness, love took root in my heart.  Somehow, in the span of a week I bonded with the kids.  And as I opened up my heart to them, I began to glimpse the incredible compassion that God feels for me.

Upon returning to the USA I fell into a deep depression.  I cried constantly.  I lost my motivation for my job.  I had nightmares about orphan children and I could not get them out of my head.

I struggled for a year.  And then I went back to Ukraine and did it all over again—the same hopelessness, the same heartbreaking emotions and the same disorienting reentry.

And so, as followers of Jesus, my wife and I decided to do something.  How, after experiencing something like that could I pretend it didn’t happen?    How could I pretend those kids didn’t exist?  How could I go back to normal?  That is the power of experiencing injustice.

While wrestling through these ideas, I heard Reggie Joiner say something like this, “Do for one what you wish you could do for many.”  Obviously, we couldn’t fix the orphan problem.  Nor could we change the fact that 70% of orphan girls are pulled into the sex trade.  But, we could offer hope to one.  What if we adopted one orphan?

And so we began praying and asking people for advice.  I repeatedly asked myself this question, “Is this God’s Will?”  But, in light of Bible verses like James 1:27, I already knew what God’s will is.  He’s already stated it clearly throughout the Bible.  “Care for orphans.”  God is for adoption.  He adopts people every day.

We didn’t need a sign or some sort of mystical confirmation.  It’s already there in God’s Word.  And so we acted.  We poured our hearts and souls into adoption.  We gave an astronomical amount of time, resources and determination into offering hope to one orphan girl.

Over the next few days, I’d like to tell the story of what happened—how God showed up, what we learned and how our hearts were broken.

 

photo credit:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/ihhinsaniyardimvakfi/