Welcome Pictures...Hard Realities

Today in my inbox was an email from another adoptive momma who spent a good part of yesterday at Chen Hui's orphanage and looked for him for us and took pictures and asked questions.

He's as beautiful as he was 3 months ago when we got the most recent picture.  His eyes are alert, his cheeks are full, but he is bone thin.  He appears to have almost no muscle tone and you can even see the shape of his heel bone in one picture.  

I was sobbing to see him, to know that just 24 hours ago he was fine, but I was also sobbing that he's so clearly hungry.  

This family took crackers to pass out and the children devoured them. What a special treat for all those sweet babies. But, again, how very sad. They are given a small amount of food at mealtime and that's it, no snacks nothing else.  This is such a change for us.  When we were waiting for Max every single picture we got was of a very plump, well fed little boy.  His tummy was round and full of parasites, but he wasn't hungry...ever.  Our guide told us he ate candy and drank Pepsi with the nannies every day.

I have so many thoughts swirling around in my brain. Concern, joy, frustration, weariness, excitement, anticipation, wonder. I could go on and on, but the biggest thing that comes to my mind right now is RANSOM.

I believe that these babies are stuck, they are locked away and the proverbial key has been thrown away, they are owned by the government, they have no voice, they have no choices, they are in darkness, in bondage.

Every time we look at our finances and there's enough to pay for a step in the adoption my mind's eye is watching our God ransom our son out of bondage, his son out of bondage.  Every grant I look at, every application I am working on I am praying for God to provide the ransom for our son.  We can't do it, we don't have 40% of our yearly income to give for our son, we would gladly do it if there were any possible way, but there isn't. But we serve a faithful God who can ransom Chen Hui.

Along the same line, God's provision, ransom, rescue, adoption I keep coming across negativity about adoption...which is interesting because I'm not really on any groups and I don't follow any blogs. One group for Thailand that rarely posts anything and a home school group. I have my little blog and I some how ended up on a FB adoptive parent page. Nevertheless, I keep reading about how wrong it is for people to adopt a child to "rescue that child" that the right reason to adopt is that you've always wanted kids. Okay, if they are saying that we Christians are adopting out of guilt and we don't want kids at all, then yes it would be wrong to adopt, but that's not the impression I get from these statements, posts, articles.  It's as if there's something wrong with adopting an orphan because you want to help a child, because they have a need you can provide. I can be a mom, I've been doing it for a really long time. Veldon can be a dad, he too has been doing it for quite a while.  (Okay technically the same amount of time, but I did have 9 months of actually carrying 3 of the 4!)  So it's wrong to adopt to help a child?  It's wrong to rescue a child because adopted kids don't want to be rescued!  Really?  I look a Chen Hui, he's malnourished, sitting in a hot room with heat rash and other sores on his body. His shirt is too big and, besides a rather large diaper, he's not wearing anything else.  His legs don't look strong enough to hold his weight for long and there aren't even many toys to play with. He shares a metal crib with another child and spends a good amount of his day there.  He would rather stay there?  When he's 15 he'll wish his parents had left him alone? (Okay well maybe 15 is a bad example.)  It seems to me that the world has it wrong. It seems to me that it's selfish and wrong to adopt a child to fill a need in your life or at least to believe that a child will in any way be able to fulfill a need for you, because they are greedy, needy, adorable little creatures!  Why can't we all just rejoice that a child, any child, will be in a loving home? 

We love children, we always have. We love being parents.  We love adoption!  We love it because we have been adopted, ransomed, rescued by our Father. We believe that to adopt an orphan and change his life is the gospel at work. We believe that we are commanded to be involved in the lives of orphans, that God loves the orphan and that we are to be involved and the very best way to be involved is to make a child an orphan no more.  

As I look over the pictures of our son and as I contemplate the future. As I hear the voices, yay and nay echoing in my head. I can't help but believe that any orphan would rather be in a home and that if they could they would say "yes please rescue me!".  I believe that those little children would want the naysayers of adopting because we love children, and because we believe it is a mandate from God for those of us able to adopt, to walk a day in their shoes, or lack there of, and then criticize the parents that love them enough to beg God to ransom them.