Our Maryland girls are giving back to their community, and making some new friends along the way.

Six girls from the Crossroads Transitional Living Program have formed a partnership with Genesis Healthcare Center, a nursing facility in Baltimore.

On their first visit a few weeks ago, they socialized with the seniors and played games with them, and residents enjoyed their company so much that the girls were soon invited back.

For their second visit, they decided to put on a talent show for the residents. The girls, sang, played piano and read poems for the residents, but the highlight of the show was a line dance the girls did together. One 90-year-old woman was inspired to get out of her wheelchair to join in the dancing.

Melody Baker, program director for Crossroads, said the girls benefit from the interactions, too. She said the girls genuinely enjoy spending time with the residents, and are excited to spread smiles and laughter at the center.

“The girls get affirmation from the residents,” said Melody Baker, Crossroads program director. “The girls are very talented, and they love to perform, so it’s just a good fit.”

In their two visits, the girls have already started to bond with the seniors. The Genesis Activities Coordinator was so impressed with the joy they brought to the residents that she scheduled them for monthly visits.

“A lot of the residents are older, and don’t have family, and some of the girls don’t either so, it’s a great opportunity,” Baker said.

Baker said one of the life skills girls learn at Crossroads is to give back to their communities, and volunteering at Genesis is a perfect way to teach the girls about service. In the past, they’ve also volunteered at local soup kitchens and the humane society, but the partnership with Genesis marks their first ongoing project.

“A lot of times people do volunteer work around Christmas and Thanksgiving, but there are people in need all year round,” Baker said.

The Arrow Crossroads Community is a home for girls who are “aging out” of foster care to learn life skills for successful independent living. At Crossroads, they receive individualized assessments and training, therapeutic services and multidisciplinary treatment planning. Through progressive goal achievements, girls are able to earn the privilege of moving from a dorm-style setting to the less structured life of a cottage before leaving for independent life as adults.

Arrow is proud to announce we’ve expanded our presence in California!

As of last week, Arrow is officially licensed in Riverside. Arrow team members have been working hard over a six-month period to get the new office up and running.

Pam Tarango, a family home developer in Riverside, said a need for foster agencies in the area drove Arrow to open the new office. Riverside County is home to more than 4,000 foster care children, she said.

Team members in California have hit the ground running. The Riverside office already has one certified foster family, one waiting for approval and several more being studied.

“We’re all very excited,” Pam said. “It’s been a long, hard process, but we’re excited to serve this county where there’s such a great need.”

Madison shows her donations at the Arrow office in Beaumont.

A special girl with a big heart recently used her birthday gifts to impact our Arrow kids.

Madison, the daughter of a couple who has been attending foster parent training at the Beaumont office, recently turned 10 years old, but instead of asking for toys for her birthday, Madison asked her friends to give her Bibles to give to Arrow foster children.

Madison stopped by the Beaumont office last week where she visited Jesse Lofton, a family home developer, who shared ministry stories with Madison, her sister and parents. When Jesse asked Madison why she wanted to give Bibles to our kids, she said “How else will foster kids find out God loves them?”

Thank you for your kind gift, Madison! It’s so encouraging to see the Lord working through young people like you!

Ken Keung presents Bethany Goodine with a surprise gift of a shadow box
containing one of his paint pallets. (Inset: Ken’s Scottish castle painting.)

Shortly after being rescued from an abusive home and placed into foster care with Arrow, Ken Keung was given two gifts that transformed his life—a safe place to call home, and a set of oil paints.

The paints, a Christmas gift from his new Arrow foster family, opened an outlet for him to express his feelings and communicate with those around him, which wasn’t always easy for the 16-year-old, who had recently come to the United States from China and wasn’t fluent in English.

But even with the language barrier, Ken’s foster parents recognized in him a gift for the fine arts, and wanted to encourage his talent.

“They provided a lot of help and were very patient with me, and they realized my potential,” Ken said. “After that, I couldn’t stop doing oil paintings.”

Ken’s first painting summed up his anxiety over the trauma his birth father put him through before moving in with his foster family. It was a mash-up of two famous paintings—Starry Night and The Scream.

“(My birth father) gave me a lot of really unpleasant experiences,” Ken said. “I didn’t really try to be social with people. I was reserved. At that time, my subjects were pretty dark. That first painting had lots of blues and lots of brush strokes, with this twisted figure in the middle.”

As Ken’s foster family helped him heal from those experiences, he transitioned into lighter subjects. Two years after entering foster care, he was placed with another Arrow foster family, but his new foster parents were just as supportive and encouraging of his art.

Soon, Ken began to think of art as more than a hobby. He kept in touch with Bethany Goodine, Arrow’s stewardship and communications coordinator and Ken’s former family ambassador specialist, who invited him to show some of his paintings at an event at her church.

One of the paintings Ken brought was a Father’s Day gift for his foster father, who loves Scottish culture. The painting is a landscape of a field with a Scottish castle. Ken didn’t intend to sell the painting, but a man who saw it at the event loved it so much that he offered Ken $1,000 to recreate one for him, which Ken did.

More recently, Ken used his painting skills to help Arrow. Last May, Ken sold four paintings at an auction and cocktail party that benefited Arrow’s Backpack Bash, an event which provides backpacks and school supplies to the foster and biological children of Arrow’s Houston-area foster parents. Ken’s paintings raised nearly $2,500 to go toward buying school supplies for the kids.

Ken, now 24, is studying art at Lone Star College with plans to move to Austin soon. His dream is to use his artistic know-how to restore old paintings for museums.

He said without the support of his Arrow foster parents and Bethany, he would not have had the same opportunities to grow as an artist.

“It’s not enough for me just to work hard myself,” Ken said. “My second foster family loves my paintings, and they encourage me so much. Right now they own four of my paintings in their house, and I will paint more because I feel like this is my home, and they treat me like a family member.”

Garrett and MaryBeth Culver with their daughter and two neighborhood friends.

When Garrett and MaryBeth Culver volunteered to take care of a little boy while his single mother searched for a job and housing, they weren’t exactly sure what they were getting themselves into.

As a Safe Family, the Culvers received training from Arrow to take care of children while the child’s parents or guardians get back on their feet. They learned about our Safe Families for Children program while at Lakewood Church, and were the first family in Texas to become certified, so they didn’t have much reference for what being a Safe Family would be like.

A year after their first placement, they describe the experience as life-changing and overwhelmingly positive.

The first child they took in, and one who remains close to their hearts, is 8-year-old Michael*.

Michael’s mother was struggling to find a job, and could no longer afford their extended-stay hotel room, forcing her to live in a shelter, and she didn’t want Michael to be in that environment.

That’s where the Culvers came in. Even though Michael was older than they’d agreed to take and went to school 40 minutes away from their house, they knew they were the only certified family in the area available to help him. When Alison Morriss, our Safe Families Program Coordinator, called asking if they would take Michael, the Culvers agreed.

Garrett, MaryBeth and their three kids instantly connected with Michael. He endeared himself to Garrett and MaryBeth, and became fast friends with their children.

“He was such a well-behaved, well-mannered kid,” MaryBeth said. “If the girls were bickering over a seat, for example, he would give up his own seat without saying a word.”

But caring for Michael was not without challenges, the largest being the distance to his school. Luckily, they had support from Alison, who arranged a pick up for Michael from school several times, and was always a phone call away when the Culvers needed advice.

Michael’s poor grades posed another problem. MaryBeth would drill him with math problems during car rides, but Michael would try to worm his way out of the work. MaryBeth and Garrett were adamant he stay on top of his school assignments.

Eventually, Michael started making better grades. According to his teachers, his social skills and eye-contact with adults also improved.

Meanwhile, Michael’s mother was also working her way towards success. She secured a job and an apartment, and a little more than a month after Michael arrived, it was time for him to go home.

It was difficult to say goodbye to Michael, but the Culvers knew he and his mother would remain in each other’s lives. Michael and his mom visit the Culvers on holidays, and the families even recently took a camping trip together.

“As far as we’re concerned (Michael and his mom) are our family,” MaryBeth said. “We don’t have family in the state, so we’re trying to build ours here.”

Besides expanding their family, the Culvers’ motivation for becoming a Safe Family grew out of their personal struggles while growing up. MaryBeth was a single mother at 19, and Garrett’s family was homeless when he was in middle school. They knew they wanted to help people through the hard times in their lives, just as they had been helped by family and friends.

“Some single mothers, I just want to shake and say ‘You can do this!’” MaryBeth said.

Since Michael’s stay with them, the Culvers had one other Safe Family placement that recently came to an end. They said the experiences have made them better people.

“Being a Safe Family brings out the best in us, and it brings us closer together,” Garrett said. “We’re just hoping this program will snowball.”

While receiving help from a Safe Family, birth parents or legal caregivers maintain full custodial rights of their child, and are encouraged to participate in decisions regarding their child’s care while the circumstances that led to the crisis are addressed. To learn more about becoming a Safe Families, visit www.arrow.org/safe.

*The name was changed to protect the child’s identity.

Arrow recently earned national accreditation, making it part of an elite group of foster care providers and opening doors for future opportunities to help kids and strengthen families all over the country.

Arrow became accredited through the Council on Accreditation, an independent, non-profit assessor of community-based behavioral health care and social service organizations. COA has accredited more than 2,000 organizations, and is considered the standard of accrediting excellence. COA partners with human service organizations worldwide to improve outcomes for individuals, families and communities.

The accreditation process took two years and countless hours of work by dedicated Arrow employees, but the payoff is well worth the effort.

Because of COA accreditation, Arrow now meets criteria to provide foster care in many more states, enabling expansion in the future.

Arrow’s accreditation also means Arrow’s Freedom Place is now the only nationally accredited domestic sex trafficking recovery program in the entire country. COA assessed Freedom Place’s treatment process for victims of sex trafficking as well as its residential services before accrediting the program.

“Achieving accreditation shows Arrow is committed to providing excellent care for children who have come from some of the worst circumstances imaginable,” said Arrow CEO Scott Lundy. “These children deserve the best treatment and services possible so they can begin the healing process, and accreditation shows Arrow is prepared to deliver that.”

COA provides an objective, independent and reliable validation of an agency’s performance. Based on their findings, COA’s Accreditation Committee voted Arrow met all criteria to become accredited.

Before accrediting the program, COA reviewed Arrow’s services to ensure we are well-coordinated, culturally competent, evidence-based, outcomes-oriented and provided by a skilled and supported workforce.

Since Arrow operates more than a dozen offices across five different states, a major part of earning accreditation was standardizing policies and procedures to ensure each office is providing the absolute best care for the over 4,000 children and families Arrow serves each year.

Additionally, Arrow increased its accountability to meet COA standards by centralizing and standardizing its continuous quality improvement process. The process allows Arrow to monitor outcomes and measure them against national statistics.

“We’re excited about achieving this significant mile stone, but we’re more excited that it allows us to bring a higher standard of programs and services to even more kids and families in need,” Scott said.

Jessica Bee was a foster parent for more than two and a half years before the adoption of her two children was finalized last month. In this post, Bee corrects some foster care and adoption misconceptions, and offers some food for thought about relationships, parenting and the similarities and differences between bio and adoptive families. You can read Jessica’s blog at adifferentyear.wordpress.com.

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Before adopting two awesome kids who came into my life through the foster care system, I had this idea in my mind that the whole ordeal would be kind of like what happened in Annie. We would just be handed a precocious, well-adjusted child that we would rescue from their dire straits through love and perseverance and possibly a few well-timed choreographic musical numbers. The truth is that it’s infinitely more complicated than that, although it is equally thrilling and wonderful – minus the giant mansion and, sadly, Punjab. We could all use a little Punjab in our lives.

So, if there is someone you know (maybe you?) who is going through – or considering going through – this glorious insanity, here are some things to keep in mind.

1. I am my children’s “real” mother. My husband is their “real” father. People, I know what you mean when you ask who their “real” mother is. I get it. In the minds of a non-adoptive parent, especially a woman who has birthed babies out of her own loins, motherhood means that your ovaries made an egg, which was fertilized and grew within your own womb, and then pushed out of your nether regions. But please understand that biology isn’t the trump card in motherhood. I didn’t give birth to my kids, although not a day goes by that I didn’t wish I could have had that experience. Instead, I met my children when they were toddlers. I worked at my relationship with them – not through biology, but through sheer determination. I became their “real” mother, and even though it didn’t happen at birth, it happened. I am real, we are real, this is real. Really.

2. Their lives and their circumstances are private. A lot of adoptive kids have stories that aren’t easy to tell. I may choose to share some of the details, in broad strokes, but this is their story to tell – if and when they choose to. Most of our close friends and family know the quick and dirty about what our kids’ lives were like before coming to live with us. We’re not ashamed of them and we don’t pretend they grew up in a golden castle with a snow leopard as a pet and had nothing but loving, magical experiences. On the contrary, we accept and recognize their past. We just don’t want to explain it to everyone we meet.

3. Sometimes, we need to do things a little differently. There is no such thing as one size fits all parenting, we all know that. What works for one kid or one family might not work for others. But, sometimes, kids who have come from really awful experiences may need things that kids who don’t come from really awful experiences may not. It’s that simple.

Yeah, you don’t let your kids graze for snacks between meals. That’s awesome, and I’m glad it worked for you. But my kids? Food wasn’t always a constant in their lives, and so providing it is a form of trust. Letting them know it’s always there is important. You put your kid to bed at a certain time and then don’t let them leave their rooms? Okay. But my daughter needs to know that someone is there, because she was left alone so much as a baby. She needs me to lie with her and rub her hair until she falls asleep, even if it takes an hour. And, so, that’s what I do.

At the end of the day, we all want our kids to be happy and healthy and safe. Adoptive parents sometimes take a different path to get there.

4. Kids adopted from foster care aren’t messed up kids. An idea exists about kids in foster care – that they’re completely and totally damaged. They’ll steal from you. They’ll hurt you. They’ll reject your love and ruin your life because they’re just rotten to the core. Someone messed them up, and now they’ll be that way. Forever.

Let’s get real for a moment here. A lot foster children have come from extremely difficult circumstances. Abuse of all kinds, neglect, exposure to drugs both in utero and during their daily lives, squalid conditions – it happened. And those sort of things have a profound effect on kids, even if they were very young when it occurred. Their minds may or may not have memories of what happened, but their bodies always do. Sometimes these circumstances lead to difficulties in their lives – difficulties in forming relationships, difficulties with trust, and, yes, as a result there are sometimes difficulties with behavior.

That being said, there is no such thing as messed up kids – there are just kids that come from messed up places.And that’s where we come in – their adoptive families, friends, communities, schools, churches, neighborhoods. We come in and we love them and we care for them and we do everything we can to make this part of their lives as amazing as we can. We show them their worth, help them learn to trust, and provide the stability that serves as a foundation for healing.

Love works, but not by itself. These kids with messed up circumstances need support, guidance, stability. Sometimes therapy. The road there isn’t always paved with gold and lined with daisies, but the road exists. They just need someone to follow them down it.

5.Nothing is different. Everything is different. Nothing is different. Adoptive families are families, and for the most part we operate in the same way biological families do. Sure, some things are different by design, but we just want to be treated the way we feel – like normal, everyday, crazy, complicated, normal groups of people who love each other. I don’t know of any families that have adopted who introduce their children as “my ADOPTED son….” or “my former foster child, now adopted…” Please don’t ever introduce us as such.

6. You can’t replace relationships. Not ever. This has been one of the hardest things for me to accept. Subconciously, I viewed myself as a replacement Mom to my kids. Oh, that lady who used to be your Mom? She didn’t do a good job, so I’m here now, and I love you, and it’s all good! But it’s not that simple. I can’t ever replace the woman who gave birth to my children, and I don’t want to. No matter what happened, no matter how things were, she is the woman they bonded to when they first entered the world. She is the woman who gave them life. I am not her substitute, I am not her replacement. I am the mother who continued to give them life, who nurtured them next, who will see them into their future. And that is enough.

7. Adoption is born of loss. As wonderful and beautiful and amazing as adoption is, it starts with a loss, especially in foster care. A mother and father lost their children. Grandparents lost their grandchildren. Siblings are separated. My children lost countless family members, most of whom they will never see again.

Early on, I let anger rob me of my empathy. It was their birth mother’s fault that she lost her kids, why should I feel sorry? If any of those family members wanted the kids, they would have stepped up to the plate and taken custody, why should I feel sorry? The truth is that it’s always more complicated than that, and assigning blame might feel good in the moment, but ultimately it will just crush all the good we’ve worked so hard to build up. As a mother, I feel like I want to claw the eyes out of anyone who has ever hurt my kids. As a human being, I know that forgiveness is about letting go, recognizing the loss, and working to heal it.

8. This is work. Imagine if the moment that you met a new person – literally, the first moment you laid eyes on them – you were expected to live with them, trust them, rely on them for your every need, respect them, bond with them emotionally, and follow their rules. This is what children in care go through when they’re placed in a new foster home.

As adults, we don’t build relationships that way, not even friendships. We start small – “Hey, let’s get a coffee!” and then we get to know each other before we care, trust, and love. Kids in care don’t get that luxury. They are thrust head first into new places, with new people, new rules. Sometimes they’re in a new town. They sleep in unfamiliar beds in unfamiliar houses and eat unfamiliar breakfasts at unfamiliar places.

I get chills when I think about how terrifying that must have been for my kids, the first night they spent our home. It takes work to build trust, especially with kids who are scared, alone, and confused. You are strangers, in a strange world. They have no reason to depend on you, and every reason not to. As new foster parents, our kids were just as foreign to us as we were to them. We didn’t know them. We spend so much time worrying about their health and safety, shuttling them to doctors appointments and therapy and speech evaluations. We introduced ourselves by our first names.

And so we worked. We worked on building a relationship. We got to know the kids; what they liked and didn’t like, what they needed, who they were. We continue to work – to iron out the kinks that hold them back emotionally, to prove to them that they are safe and loved. We will always work.

9. You are important in our children’s lives. Yes, you. You, and everyone around you are essential in the upbringing of kids who have come from care. Every single person they meet will have an impact on them, positively or negatively. See, when kids are just learning to trust and love and be comfortable again, every single person they encounter can have a profound effect. Thanks for being so awesome.

10. You can do this too. Promise. I can’t tell you how many people have told my husband and I that they admire what they do, but could never do it. And to each and every person who has said that, my response has been the same: sure you could. Being a foster parent or an adoptive foster parent is, at its core, very simple. Anyone who has ever parented has already done what you need to do. Can you make a kid feel safe? Provide for them? Care for them? Advocate for them?

There are over half a million kids in foster care across this country this year, and not enough families to take them in. Chances are that you have what it takes, you just don’t know it yet. Choose to make a child’s life extraordinary. Be a foster parent.

At the bottom of this post is a short article that describes, through a foster child’s eyes, 3 catalyst moments for a child in foster care.

Here a response to the article from Arrow’s own Carolyn Bishop, Vice President of Texas Programs.

I learned a very valuable lesson about the first item of this list, “Listen to my side of the story”.

When I was at Catholic Charities, we accepted an emergency placement of a teenage boy who lost his parents that day from a murder/suicide. The child had a middle class upbringing, never in care, etc. He had relatives that wanted a relationship, but none able to really have him come LIVE with him. He was at our shelter for about two weeks, and it was close to the holidays. He was the oldest we had at that time, so he was around a ton of little kids. This is difficult when you have been the only child.

We went to his Circle of Support, which was held at the court house. Anyways, he was going to be able to spend Thanksgiving with one of his aunt’s for the day, and then the option of respite came up with a foster family. I spoke up FOR him and said I did not think it was right to move him, put him in respite, let him go to his aunt’s and then have to come back to the shelter if it didn’t work out (he was close to his time up with us). A conversation ensued..

Finally, he sat up in his chair, and said to me “With all due respect, Ms. Carolyn… I don’t like the shelter. I want to be in a foster home”. I had not even ASKED him – just spoke for him. It broke my heart that day.. and I try so hard now to listen more.

Sincerely,
Carolyn

Here is the article:

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Three Moments That Helped Me in Foster Care

By Georgette Todd, May 29, 2014

I never knew a single kid who ever wanted to be in foster care. No kid is proud to be born into a broken home. Then you add foster care on top of trauma, which creates a litany of other problems such as: exposure of family secrets, a separation of siblings, lack of certainty or stability, disruptive family interruptions, spotty educational records, and a village of workers who don’t communicate with each other.

However, looking back, there were times when people made a significant difference in a positive way. These acts of kindness didn’t take a lot of time either. Big or small, those moments became memories that helped me cope in the midst of the worst years of my life.

1. Asked for My Side of the Story.

I was 14-years-old when I was crying my eyes out at some Dust Bowl courthouse. My absentee social worker had just threatened to separate me from my younger sister for a “failure of placement.”

We weren’t kicked out, but we asked to be removed from an unstable foster home at the time our biological father came back into our lives. I had a great school record and was on a sports team. All to say, I was virtually ignored by the passive court reporters and lawyers until I had a probation officer ask me what was wrong. I told her about how I was powerless against my social worker’s decision to separate my sister and me, and she suggested I write a thorough letter to the judge, explaining my side of things.

I took her advice,* the judge launched an investigation that concluded a separation was not warranted. Because someone asked for my side of the story being weaved in the courtroom, I felt empowered to explain myself. This act kept my sister and I together.

2. Took A Genuine Interest.

I was 15-years-old, slouching in sweats at a receiving home classroom, hating the world when Mr. Severson, the head teacher, asked me about my interests.

“Sleeping. Dying. That’s about it!”

Mr. Severson didn’t let up, and eventually……(read full article HERE)

Originally posted at showhope.org

GUEST POST: Why does God call people to adopt?

This might seem like a question with an obvious answer. But sometimes, stating the obvious is a good thing.

For us, the call to adopt was heard relatively late in life. In fact, it was about the time we’d decided we were done growing our family the biological way. Yes, we’d told God we were His, and surrendered our plans to Him, but no more kids, m’kay?

Adoption was not even on our radar.

Almost 10 years later, we have adopted 7 children from China. Our beautiful brood has grown from 4 to 11. The Lord has done a mighty big work in our little family.

But why? Why are some of us called to adopt?

When we accept Christ as our Savior, He calls us to join Him in His story of redemption. In fact, Jesus tells us to “Go…” For each of us that is a unique directive, and for some of us, that is adoption. And when God calls us to adopt, I can testify… He can use it to transform us in a big way.

5 Reasons God Calls Us To Adopt:

1. For the orphan. This might seem painfully obvious, but oh my, does the Lord do an amazing work in the life of a once-orphaned-but-now-beloved-child. And please don’t miss this: when we adopt, it’s God’s idea. It is God that’s going in – and He asks us to join Him. If we try to get into the driver’s seat, it can breed self-righteousness and back-patting. And God wants to use all things to draw us closer to Him, not elevate ourselves. The beautiful thing about being God’s assistant in this thing called adoption is that is you get go join in His work, get your hands dirty, see the way the Lord transforms and yet He holds up both ends. He begins the work – way before He invited you in – and He promises to finish it. And then He gets the real glory. There is nothing I have experienced in my 45 years that compares to witnessing a child bloom in a forever family. It’s a beautiful thing.

Continue Reading HERE

Originally posted on The Gospel Coalition Blog by Chelsea Patterson.

Apart from the gift of my salvation, earthly adoption is the greatest gift I’ve ever received. I was an orphan—both physically and spiritually. My story began in Romania with a 19-year-old unwed girl who wasn’t able to take care of me. The Lord sovereignly chose adoption for me. I am blessed that a man and a woman from the United States made a decision that radically altered my life forever when they traveled across the world and chose me as their daughter.

I was rescued from a life void of love and care and freely given a new life beyond my wildest dreams. Adoption is immensely personal, because I was specifically chosen, sought out, bought, declared to have all the rights and privileges of being a member of a new family, and most importantly, loved beyond belief.

As I pause to meditate on my adoption from Romania, I cannot help but meditate on an even greater adoption.

Greater Adoption

Earthly adoption, while incredible, must be viewed as a representing God’s greater adoption. My adoption was a result of sin—the fallen nature of man and the specific sin of my birth parents. The greater adoption redeems from sin.

Whom did Jesus intentionally seek out while he was doing his earthly ministry? The sick, the outcast, the children, the sinners—those whom most Americans shy away from, those whom most Americans build their perfect little lives in order to avoid. We don’t want to “get dirty,” we don’t want to love until it hurts, and we don’t want to sacrifice. But that is what Christ has called us to do.

The Great Commission is beautifully and accurately displayed in adoption. God commands his followers to go into all the world making disciples. The Lord has called his church and his people to carry the gospel to the ends of the earth. John Piper said it well when he taught, “The gospel is not a picture of adoption, adoption is a picture of the gospel.”

If the Lord chooses you for adoption, and you repent and trust in his finished work of Jesus on the cross to atone for your sins, you are adopted into his family. As a result, you receive the King of the universe as your Father, you are granted full access to come to him, and you are called his own.

Unconditional Love

God did not choose to adopt you because of anything you did, for we are completely undeserving of his great adoption. As a helpless baby in Romania, I could not do anything to prove that I was worthy of being adopted. I could not work my way into my earthly father’s heart. I could do nothing but accept and enjoy the gift of adoption. As God’s child, there is nothing you can do to make him love you more, for he has already given the greatest gift—his Son.

Delight in the greater adoption. Live as one who knows you have God as your Father. You were purchased by the precious blood of Jesus, redeemed from sin, and offered an eternal inheritance.

Every February, my family remembers my adoption day. We exchange flowers, hugs, tears, good memories, and love. Like other former orphans, I consider my adoption day a cause of great celebration. But how much greater and more worthy of celebration is our salvation and the greater adoption! Praise the Father that you are his own. Meditate on the implications of this great adoption for your life, the life of the body, and for those who don’t call God their father. Thank the Lord that he redeemed you, encourage your brothers and sisters with the truths of the greater adoption, and seek to share this redemption and love with those who aren’t yet God’s children.

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