Adoption is an amazing and wonderful thing. The need for adoption is a horrible and heartbreaking thing. But the idea that some child who has lost their family, or who was endangered in their family situation and needed protection can be more than just taken in and cared for (fostered) by another family, but they can become a part of that family is awesome and important. I understand the system is not perfect and has a lot of problems. It doesn't always work out, it's not always a good situation and or family, there are spiritual, emotional, mental, and sometimes physical problems that often come with the child (especially the older ones) that can make transition, trust and accepting love difficult.
But with all the flaws in the system due to it being filled with broken people living under the curse, yes both the adopting and the adopted, it is still a way to protect and help the little ones. They get a new name. Their rights of inheritance are guaranteed by law to insure that they are treated as family in inheritance issues. They are taken from danger and possible death and given a place of refuge. They gain family and yet keep family.
I am grateful for adoption, because without it I may never have met the wonderful, smart, interesting, pretty, messed up girl in junior high with me who would become my bride nearly 30 years later. I was friends with the oldest of her adopted brothers in junior high and high school and became friends with the younger during college. I saw Leah once after 1987, pretty close to exactly ten years later, and then we started talking over twenty years after that when God knew the time was right to put us in touch. It turns out she was even more interesting, thoughtful and thought provoking and had grown out of pretty into absolutely beautiful. She totally stole my heart.
But when we got married I gained more than just the family that I had known personally, or known of, for years. In addition to the brother and sister I had met about the same time I met Leah, I gained two more brothers and a sister from her biological family. I have tons of nieces and nephews. Some cool and interesting in-law spouses and aunts and uncles. I have an amazing mother-in-law, and the one person I can talk sports with the most in my family just happens to be my father-in-law. My life is enriched because of the people that Leah brought into it that she was born with and kept and those she had added to her when she was adopted.
I wish Leah and her three siblings had not had to endure what led to their being separated, and I regret that the situations were not ideal for any of them. I pray for complete healing and restoration in the hearts and lives of every person involved. But I believe it kept Leah alive, which of course led to her amazing daughter and son, who have also been made an important part of my life. There's a grandson now too, who might not have been able to light up the world with his smile had someone not adopted an older (grade school) child out of a messed up faster system.
A lot of healing has taken place in Leah, and she is one of the most amazing, compassionate people I have even known. I love her more today than when she stole my heart. It's beautiful and inspiring to see what God has done in her life. Her adopted Heavenly Daddy is perfect. He's also my adopted Daddy, and I fully believe that He brought us together to bless one another and help each other grow and heal and walk with Him. God does so much more than just save us from judgment.
He doesn't just make us servants. He makes us sons and daughters. He adopts us. We become legally His and are protected from the obligations and threats of the old master. He gives us a new name, and He provides for our needs. He restores and heals our souls. He tattoos our name in His palm (Isaiah 49:16). He promised to make us co-heirs with His only non-adopted child, His Son, Jesus. The King has pulled us from the dungeons and the gutters and the triage centers and made us His His children. We are truly and legally His. Adopted. It may take time to restore us, to heal the damage from our life before. The older we are when we start living like someone from our new family instead of like someone who hasn't yet been adopted, the more messed up we likely are. Even those who are adopted young can get messed up and hurt by their brothers and sisters who are adopted into the family but still broken.
But there is healing from the brokenness. There is comfort from the pain. There is joy in the promise that the work will be done. What an amazing process. What an awesome miracle. We become new people and part of an new family without having to earn it, or deserve it, or manipulate or buy our way in (that can't be done by the way). The only thing that we are asked to do in return for such lavish love and acceptance is to love each other. To love our new brothers and sisters, even when we disagree like family can do, and to remember our old family that hasn't been adopted yet. Love those who remain children of the curse. Daddy loves them and wants them to be family too, and they may not realize that if they think we deserted them, abandoned them, hate them now that we have a new family or any such nonsense as that. We are to love them even more and even better than we ever could have before and introduce them through the love of action to our new Daddy so that they can get adopted and rescued from the bondage and brokenness and misery and curse, just as we were.
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