Adoption

Phil 1:20-21

as it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. 21 For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain

The question I’d like us to ask ourselves is “What would it look like to live this life like dying is Gain?”

From my journal while in Congo, “We should live life like we're ready to leave. Simply and with clarity of what we desire to accomplish. We must be a people on mission, and get rid of everything that impedes our mission.”

This was a common theme in my writing during this season, Living life with a clear mission and a clear purpose.

The Call and the Why?

This is a story of a journey of faith but not perfect faith just an obedient faith.

We began our story with a desire to display our spiritual adoption in Christ through physical adoption. That, for me, was the clear call & purpose.

My calling to adopt came first (Calling = when the King calls you, you come)

I was experiencing a season of intense growth and had been reading a book by JI Packer called knowing God.

I reading the chapter called “Sons of God”, I was blown when Packers explained we can tell how much we know God by how much we make of the fact that God is our Father. He said this singular truth drives our lives and purpose.

So I found myself in training to be an elder. An almost year-long process and in that process I got in my mind an African boy. He was just there staring at me and he wouldn't go away.

I knew God was calling us to physical adoption but I was scared to say anything to my wife who had spent years, raising and homeschooling three kids.

So I submitted myself towards obedience but ask the Lord to call my wife separately.

Fast-forward 1 year to March 2012. Our church was doing a Ukrainian sponsorship.

Christina asked me, Why don't we do that? I said well, you know they want you to adopt those kids, don’t you? Duh!! She said

And So we gathered the family and together committed to begin a journey that would consume our family for the next two years.

We made a couple of upfront commitments.

To be open to adopting a siblings group because not many are.

No conditions (We still tried to but God ignored them!)

But where would we adopt? Well remember our principle; obey what God puts in front of you.

Enter a friend named Amy who went to our church and worked for an adoption agency and had just got home from DR Congo.

Christina and Amy went for coffee and as she described the Congo Christina's heart leaped and she knew this was the place.

The journey begins

So July 5 2012 we put in our application to begin.

This began 6 months' worth of intense paperwork which we expected.

What we didn't expect was a phone call two weeks later from Amy.

We have a sibling group and I emailed their pictures to you.

And so Christina sat in front of the computer for hours looking at these (Put on the screen) two sad, older beautiful children.

Accept them or reject them - What would you do?

This was not a hallmark moment but a call to battle and we knew it.

Laying in the bed later trying to go to sleep, we decided that it is God who chooses life not us and so we would say yes and entrust the journey to the Lord

6 months' worth of paperwork sat in and our children who were placed into foster care began to grow and we would see them growing in updated pictures.

December 26, 2012, We received from Congo the adoption decree. They were our children; one more form to complete.

We prepared ourselves to go get our kids when we get a brief notice from immigration. 6 months investigation for adoptions. Don't call us well call you.

More living on our phones and more watching our kids grow up in pictures

Sept 27, 2013, All paperwork is done & the investigation is complete and now were ready to go.

We took our family to the county fair before we left.

While we were there we get one many “dings” on our phones.

The Look Christina gave me said it all; A total suspension had been issued in Congo

What are we to do now?

We will go! We wanted to be there isd they lifted the suspension for even an hour we wanted to get our paperwork in

Arrival in Congo

And So Oct 2, 2013, we arrived in a country that would be our home for the next two months.

The airport was traumatic on its own, guns & barricades and the smell of burning trash greeted us.

We were taken to an apartment and it was long until the children arrives (pics of kids)

We lived 24/7 together from that point. They only spoke Lingala and a little french.

The lawyer came pretty frequently at first and would help us communicate.

The Picture book - What do you want to be called - Littlejohn

You see in Christ, We have been given a name!

We made the first of many trip to the DGM (Migration Dep)

Three days after the kids are brought to us the honeymoon wore off and the wailing and issues began to emerge

Life is hard in Congo and the future is bleak. But God!

A long Two weeks pass & one day the lawyer calls… get ready!

By the sheer miracle of prayer, the DGM takes our paperwork!

Every day the lawyer would say “maybe tomorrow”? Then the lawyer stopped calling as much.

We were not allowed to leave the apartment. We were seen as an enemy. Colonials who come to force themselves and their ways on African like those in the past or worse people who come over to adopt children and sell the organs for profit. (We were for the first time in our lives the marginalized minority)

Handing my passport to DGM & not taking it.

So we only left the apartment with our lawyer.

Remember we left with 4 weeks' worth of food. Food began to dwindle but every day could be the day.

Kids & progress

Older parents decided to be parents

Greatest need - Grace (There’s & ours)

Everything belongs to the Father & Father gives ( Papa Daddy & moma mommy)

Kids believed they had to take care of themselves

The rain jackets on the porch

Two weeks passes since our paperwork was received - Exit interview - interrogation

A few days - letter is coming - maybe tomorrow = 2 more weeks = 1 month in country

Food ran out - razor went dead

We got hungry no way to get food & we went to bed hungry for the first time

The Lawyer became impossible to get ahold of.

We began to live in that culture - getting what we needed (living as the marginalized minority - careful where we go, when we & with whom we go. But we began to live.

The waiting continued but trust began to form with kids

The compound & the courtyard & The ball to the head

Brushing teeth - grabbed my hand

DGM Deteriorates

One of the last conversations we had was clear - Go home - no exit letter

The picture book & laughing

Then it became official; a total suspension no kids go home

Families, one by one began to leave.

One of those families were the parents of Oliver Elvis

He was in the apartment with us nearly the whole time.

Oliver was very young and was never held and so was emotional. He would never cry, never play, never smile.

But one day after another we saw life begin to emerge in little ways only for one reason, love, tenderness, relationship.

We never rejoiced more than the day he cried! He cried for His Dad. He cried because he knew someone was there who cared.

And we were there when His Dad went home alone.

We expected a miracle, We had so many praying. God will deliver our kids!

Thanksgiving and coming home alone

Thanksgiving Eve, Lying on a futon I cried out to God for help. How can going home alone bring you glory?

I thought this was to reflect the gospel, How does us abandoning our children and traumatizing them again do that?

Thanksgiving day, we had one more shot. We were still hopefull.

The answer was NO! Not only that He said our visas were expiring and we must leave that day.

So we had three hours. Three hours to arrange foster care, plane tickets, pack and say goodbye

The Lawyer came over to help us tell our kids, that it was not a not ever but a not now.

She said these kids have been disappointed many times this is just another one, don't cry it will upset them.

We had one hour with our kids, how would you use that hour?

They came quickly and took our kids away… We watched them drive away not knowing if we would ever see them again.

We fell into each other are broken people but we still had to pack and a plane to catch. We found ourselves on the plane alone.

Meanwhile back at home, they had gathered around the table for Thanksgiving when they got the call, were coming home, alone.

I can remember covering my head up with the blanket and weeping, confused and broken.

Have you ever felt that way? How can this bring glory to God!

We came home to a growing church plant, a business, and children at home who were as broken as their parents.

Life went on and the outlook was bleak.

1 year maybe never.

We heard well you tried, at least you have your kids that are here…

You see adoption is a past tense experience, for now, there are only children.

Oh, how much do you make of that truth that you are a child of God now! We are not home yet, but we are His children now even as we wait!

That was our resolve that God would never abandon his kids, he will bring us home! And so would we!

Can you see the gospel in us coming home alone? For did not the disciples feel this way? Did not they want the kingdom to come then but God said you must wait?

So we began to make plans to get our kids home at any cost.

By God’s preserving grace on May 27, 2014, we get a message out of the blue that our two kids were 2 out of 15 that were allowed to come home.

Back to the Congo?

And again they brought our children to us empty-handed

We wondered, would they hate us? Did they lose all we taught them?

Two hours after they were with us it was as if they had never left. As if God had frozen them and thawed them out before we got there.

It was nothing short of miraculous, they had never lost hope, they knew we were coming back.

Do you see God gave us two months to train our kids in a way if they would have come home we would not have been able to? Being stuck and even coming home was both God’s grace and part of our God designed journey.

After some effort, we received the precious Exit letter.

To the Airport!

We arrive to the airport late and with multiple checkpoints to get thru.

We’re in baggage and looked at the clock. 15 minutes until our flight… were not gonna make it.

And for a little bit, our lawyer disappeared.

He finally comes back and says, your flight has been delayed you will make your flight.

We still had an interrogation to go thru.

They took us in a back room with a man behind a desk who only spoke french.

The interview went well but we were running out of time

Christina put together some broken French and he had us escorted to the tarmac

The Plane comes into View

We had to ride a little shuttle to get to the plane and we had sort of relaxed but the kids were excited as they saw the plane!

Then a welldressed African lady comes ontpo the shuttle with us.

She looks at us and our kids and asked Christina did you adopt those children.

Christian smiled and said yes we did.

The lady says, “you're gonna traffick those kids aren't you”? I know what your gonna do with them and begin to speak french to our kids.

In shock, we cover their ears and thankful it was a short ride as she lit into us.

Getting off the shuttle she looked at us and said, pedophiles!

She was irate and was hollering and pointing to us.

We still had two checkpoints to get thru.

We separated ourselves from her.

And as she spewed her hatred on us I prayed, Oh Lord you judge the heart of her and of us and if anything she says is true judge us, but if not God judge her!

When we walked in the plane we were elated to see her in first-class and our seats were the cheap seat in the back.

We hemmed our kids into the windows worried she may try something again.

The plane began to move and I wish I could explain the feeling after two years of fighting when that plane left the ground and we knew no one can take our kids away again.

It was June 4, 2014 our 20 wedding anniversary.

The plane’s seat belt light went off and I looked up and who was coming down the aisle? That lady!

She get about midway and I realize that some things wrong. She hobbling.

Her ankle is swollen up and she comes back to the back seat and lays across them wailing and crying and throwing up. They call for a doctor but no doctor was there.

And I realized the grim future for those who mess with God’s kids

It scared me and we began to pray for her but it was an 8 hour flight and she lay their in pain until the plane landed.

Well did Lottie moon say, we are inconvincible until God is finished with us!

And if this was a book this would be the end of the Introduction.

Chapter 1

Can I tell you one more story that happened coming hone that i think will help us close out.

I say on one of our flight beside a quiet Asain lady. Who kept to herself and never looked up.

We were flying into NJ and was getting close when the curiosity of this older white dude and little African boy just was more than she could take.

She looked up and said, “ sir why would you at this late juncture of your life choose to adopt?”

I said well maam, you see I’m a daddy, I know how to be Daddy and Shawn needed a Daddy. So If I am a daddy and he needed a daddy who wouldn't I want to be his daddy”

She sat back and said Dear God! My whole life my husband and we couldn't wait for our kids to leave so we could do what we wanted to do. Dear God, Dear God…

The plane landed she thanked me for the conversation and went on her way.

Luke 9:23-26 - could it be God has already made you who oyuo are so that you can display the gospel in a unique, costly, way in order to display Christ more clearly to those who are already around you.

Say yes to discipleship, say yes to sacrifice, say yes to obedience not knowing the future for our Father promises he will come and take us home and so be encouraged today that our Lord is alive, our adoption decree declared and our home prepared.

And if we dare to live like dying is gain we will spend our lives treasuring Christ above all things and longing for our faith to be sight.