The Adoption That Already Happened

I think that this year is going to be a year of hardships, punctuated by highlights. Maybe I will cover some of those in another post, but one of the definite highlights of this year has been the successful adoption of Derrick. It kind of figures that the day we get the call for us to be in court in Mwanza the following day we would both be outside of Mwanza, not together, with Liz flying to the US in less than 48 hours. If you know much about our lives this just kind of fits into it. I was able to contact Derrick’s uncle, the Tarime Social Welfare Officer, and Liz in about 15 minutes and get everyone moving towards Mwanza, including sending money by mobile transfer for transportation for Derrick’s uncle. Personally I was heading 1 ½ hours out from the closest town towards one of our village churches with a 13 person volunteer team. Liz was in Tarime with the GBGM auditor showing him some of our recent projects. Long story short we all made it to Mwanza that night, me spending 3 hours on the back of a small motorcycle, 2 hours in a public shuttle bus, and 4 hours driving in order to do so. But it was all nothing more than a thought because this was the day we have been waiting on.

Liz and I have been married for 7 years and for 5 of those years we have been waiting to make our family legal on paper the way that we felt in our hearts. Derrick is the one that first made us parents, yet is the last one to be able to be recognized as fully ours. During the 5 years that we have been waiting for the adoption process to reach it conclusion we have had two other children, I finished my master’s degree, Liz has almost finished hers, we have had two different jobs, and multiple adventures. 

 

Yet Derrick’s point of view has really come out in the last year as we started to see true progress, first being approved to foster in April of 2014 and then finally approved as adoptive parents in May of 2015. What has been most touching in this process has been Derrick’s reaction to hearing that we are his foster parents and then his adopted parents. He NEVER once reacted with the idea that we were his parents…

When he heard that we could foster him he was excited that he no longer had to go to boarding school. When the judge said that we were granted the adoption order Derrick got this huge smile on his face and as he walked out the door he turned to Liz and said, “Does this mean I get to go to America?” The fact of the matter is that Derrick never once doubted that he were his parents. He understood in his own way that fostering meant he could live with us and adoption meant that he was now free to travel anywhere we as a family would travel, but never did any of that news ever make his ask if we were his parents. He already knew that, there was never any doubt. Through all of the ups and downs of these last few years we had already, unknowingly accomplished what we decided in our hearts in 2010...we had been a family. 

I wonder sometimes, especially during what is both a joyous and very hard time in our lives, what signs we often wait on in order to recognize that we are God’s children? God knows us as his children. What are we waiting on in order to be able to live with him in our hearts or invite him to travel with us in our lives? And how are we helping others to know that they are fully children of God? No restrictions, no more boarding school, no more staying home while everyone else travels, but fully adopted, faith-filled, children of God.

Activities Fade...Family Stays

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Today we filed in court to officially adopt Derrick. I long for the day when this process is complete, and the legal institutions of the world acknowledge what we already know in our hearts…that Derrick is our son, is Kaleb and Micah’s brother. Is a Soard. As I look forward to and anticipate that day, I already know what my reaction is going to be. I will be happy, I will be relieved for the anxiety and stress that this process has brought our whole family, I will feel complete as a father and as a family.

What we will not be doing is patting ourselves on the back and saying that today we completed our Christian duty. On that day that our family is complete it will not be a day of having done something nice for an orphan child, but a day of having our own hearts restored and our family made whole.

I feel like this is how God sees us and our relationship to Him. I do not think that God extends His grace out of sympathy for our broken state or the messes we make of our lives, but out of a desire to restore His family to each other and to make His heart whole.

“All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons and daughters. You didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to lead you back again into fear, but you received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children. With this Spirit, we cry, “Abba, Father.” The same Spirit agrees with our spirit, that we are God’s children.” ~ Romans 8:14-16

Adoption, being family, is a matter of spirit and heart, not of duty and obligation; a matter of love, and action flowing out of that love, instead of a desire for acknowledgement and thanks (just ask any mom). So what happens when we extend our family…what happens when we see the church body as our brothers and sisters in Christ and all of humanity as fellow creations of God? How does our role as a church change when we understand the extent to which we are all one as the human race? What does our outreach, our judgment, our mission trips look like when we see these actions not as duties, activities, programs, or experiences, but as family events, relationships to be built, and people to be loved? What happens when we stop looking for acknowledgement? Can you imagine with me a weekly short-term trip where we enter into someone else’s life, community, home and it because not a new profile picture on Facebook, but a catalyst for change in how we live our daily lives.

Think about what kind of childhood Derrick would have if we saw him as part of our Christian duty instead of part of our family? How do people view us as a church universal when we approach missions as a duty and not as a way to be reunited with our family? We all get tired of duty, and expect someone else to take over after we have served our term…but family is forever and love never fails. This is I think what Bishop Ntambo was trying to tell me when he gave me the advice as a missionary to stay in love with the people.

So what do you think? Are our challenges in living as one large, extended family a challenge of hear or action, faith or method? Can we love others as part of our family, and if we can how do we show that to them in a way that means something to them and not just to us?