"A Christian understanding of the world sees a child's character not as genetically determined but as shaped to a significant degree by parental discipleship and discipline." — Russell Moore, Adopted For Life
Many dear friends in my life have adopted, are adopting, or are in the process of bringing their child home. So many of you, dear readers, share in a passionate heart for adoption...and today, I want to give you an opportunity to support and be a part of the adoption stories-in-the-making of a few families I'm connected to. Be blessed by their stories:
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THE METZGARS
We are a family of 5 soon to be 6 with the addition of our new daughter, Joy. Words cannot express the gratitude we feel toward our heavenly Father for adopting us into His family. It is out of our love for Him that we are answering the call to adopt Joy.
Our precious 3 year old daughter is waiting for us in an orphanage in China, and we will be traveling to go get her in August or September. We can’t wait to bring her home and show her the love of a family, a mommy and daddy and a sister and two brothers. We are ready to receive her into our clan and claim her as our own. Ultimately, our deepest desire is that she will come to know and understand the love of her heavenly Father. Adoption is an absolutely beautiful picture of what God has done for us through His Son. He has claimed us as His own. He has adopted us into His family. We have been purchased by Christ's sacrifice. He has demonstrated His love for us that while we were still sinners He died for us. What joy we now have in Christ! JOY! That is the gift that God has given us.
We know that God gave us the name Joy for our little girl. It is our delight and joy to welcome her and accept her into our family. We are confident that God has a wonderful plan for what He is going to do in and through her life. We pray that her life will bring glory to Him! We are trusting God for His perfect timing and for the resources to complete our adoption. We can hardly begin to say "thank you" to everyone who is supporting us financially and holding us up in prayer. We have complete trust that where He guides He provides!
“I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” John 14:18
The Metzgars are selling Christian and adoption-focused apparel to help bring Joy home:
Please visit the shop Zoe Clothing Co. to purchase great clothing for the whole family!
During your checkout please type in "joy". 25% of all sales will go towards this adoption. $15 of each adoption shirt will also go towards their adoption.
You can read more about The Metzgars adoption journey at their blog.
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THE BYRDS
Our story begins with a little girl. Her name is Sydney and she was our second child and first daughter. She was born still in November of 2007 and then began our grief journey and fight for joy and God's purpose in death with His restorative love. Caring and loving the fatherless through adoption is a part of His restorative love plan.
In a perfect world, we wouldn't even need adoption because no child would be orphaned or neglected or left behind. But sadly, that's our reality. Yet, in His gracious and redemptive ways, God uses adoption to bring beauty from ashes, unity from brokenness and joy from mourning. We've felt the call to adopt for some time, as we went through our own mourning and knew He had a bigger plan for it all. Instead of trying again and again to grow our family on our own, we knew that pain and brokenness and grief was a part of the orphan's story, a pain that we could identify with and we began to see how God was weaving the two stories together. We knew that we wanted to be a part of His caring for the least of the these and the fatherless by praying that He would allow us to redeem not replace, restore not just fix, and most importantly allow Him to bring beauty from both sets of ashes and that He would receive ALL the glory.
We wrote a song, over four years in the making, about our Sydney Grace and it's our prayer that it not only glorifies God but encourages others to remember that "Jesus came to make the sad untrue"...We believe adoption is one of the ways He does that. It is our prayer that as people listen to our song, that they would feel moved to want to help others, in adoption, and in helping us bring home our second daughter, be a part of the redeeming process themselves. What a sweet blessing! From our family...our two sweet boys, who wait to meet their newest sister, me and my husband who long to see God get the glory in our story, our precious Sydney Grace and from so many other families that are walking this adoption journey, we thank you. WE pray blessings and joy upon you, as you join us in this beautifully restorative love journey!!
The Byrds are offering this original download to raise support for their adoption:
Listen and download "Sydney's Song" here.
You can connect with the Byrd family through their blog.
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THE JENSENS
We are in the process of adopting a 6 year old boy from Uganda. Both of his biological parents are deceased. God brought this little boy across our computer screens in the Fall, and immediately my husband Gabe said 'yes!' and I was much more apprehensive, but prayed. and prayed. After about a week, of God whispering 'of course I want him in your family' I agreed. So, now we wait. We have all of the paperwork completed, and it is in Uganda, we are just waiting for our court date to be set. We are hopeful that it will be this summer, but again we are waiting for the Lord's timing, because He knows whats best even when we are impatient.
The Jensens are selling these products to raise funds to bring their boy home from Uganda:
Magazine Bead Necklaces
The Karamojong women create these beautiful necklaces by hand and from re-cycled paper, with the goal of helping these women maintain sustainable income for their families. Learn more about these necklaces here. $20
Burlap Bag
$20
Brown Baseball Hat
$20
Please contact the Jensens at gelaine3 at gmail.com to purchase any of the above items.
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I trust you have been blessed by the testimony of these families. The Lord be glorified! Please consider purchasing one or all of the opportunities above and be a part of God's faithfulness through adoption!