Adoption

When I was a teenager my dad and step mom took in a mother and son.  The boy’s name was Corey.  I remember growing close to this little boy the more I got to know him.   Eventually our family parted ways, and it looked like Corey’s mom was headed back into hard times and a life that would not be fitting for them to stay with my family.  My dad had rules he expected people who were staying with us to follow.  To some of us adoption is an unfamiliar and unusual thing.  Adoption is bringing someone into your home on a regular basis and treating them like family.  I think that experience with Corey might have been the closest I will ever get to adoption--at least in my immediate family.  The Hanke’s have continued to do what I preach about at weddings:  one of the purposes of marriage is to be fruitful and multiply.

           

I have run into people who find that situation is not in the plans for them.  Sometimes this is a long and painful road, which ends with discussions of what they want their family to look like.  As this reality is perceived, many decisions result from it; but I have been there to rejoice with families that have chosen adoption.  The amazing thing is that they connect with all kinds of stories of people who have been adopted.  So often our first thoughts rarely consider the possibility of adoption.  I guess there is that truth that God’s original plan of having children was set up in a certain way.   But of course we know that sin has altered so many of God’s original plans for our lives. 

           

In the last two weeks I have been blessed to do two baptisms.  In every baptism, my favorite part is when I take the baby and baptize him or her, and then pray with the parents and sponsors at the altar.  Then I get to take the baby, present him or her to the congregation, which allows everyone to rejoice that the baby is now adopted into the family of God.  If we truly had God’s eyes we would see the sin that little cute baby struggles with, and then we would see the amazing gift as the child is adopted into God’s family.  The miraculous thing about adoption is that the child who is adopted now receives the joys of being part of that new family.  The image of our adoption into the family of Christ is often lost in our lack of knowledge of adoption.  Most of the time it is just because we don’t think about it.  This image of being adopted and calling our father in heaven “Abba,” or “Daddy,” is lost.  We lose the idea of being able to run to our new daddy who has blessed us with the greatest gift we ever could want--the gift of salvation.  This weekend we take a moment to reflect on this image of our adoption in Christ.