back to indexFamily Retreat Seminar: Adoption
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If you decide to put up your coffee carrier in the wrong room, okay? 00:00:13.960 |
This is going to be more than where this is actually going to go for the full, maybe two hours. 00:00:18.960 |
It might be less, but I couldn't imagine just the format we're going to do this to do it less than an hour. 00:00:24.460 |
So I'll just, you know, instead of being rushed, I thought it would be better just to take the whole two hours. 00:00:29.460 |
So I apologize for some of you who want to take the other, but, you know, because of this, you're here. 00:00:36.460 |
But it is being recorded, so you'll get an opportunity. 00:00:40.460 |
But it is a very important topic, and the first part of it is just looking at some scripture. 00:00:48.960 |
More of this is going to be personal stories. 00:00:51.460 |
So I'm just going to share a little bit about, you know, Marion and myself, our personal story with our adoption, 00:00:56.960 |
some of the things that we went through, our process. 00:00:59.460 |
And also, the second half is going to be we're going to have those who are currently in the process of adopting 00:01:05.460 |
or in, you know, looking through foster care and wanting to get their story 00:01:11.460 |
and wanting to get some Q&A time for everybody. 00:01:16.460 |
So I think that would be a good way to really be blessed and encouraged about this topic. 00:01:22.460 |
The reason for myself, the reason why I was -- why didn't I -- why didn't I -- I don't know. 00:01:43.460 |
I just listed, you know, six passages, and there isn't going to be a lot of exposition, 00:01:49.960 |
Like Deuteronomy 10, 18, it says, "He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow 00:01:55.460 |
and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing." 00:01:59.460 |
And this idea of fatherless, if you type that up, in the Old Testament, 00:02:03.960 |
constantly comes up along with the widow and the sojourner, 00:02:07.960 |
just showing that God's heart is with the weak, 00:02:11.960 |
and you don't have the, you know, the fatherless is one of the weakest, you know, parts of society 00:02:18.960 |
in the sense that they are young, they're, you know, really don't have a voice, right? 00:02:24.960 |
They're not an adult, they can't speak, some of them, they're too young. 00:02:31.960 |
And in Matthew 25, 40, right, in that passage, that's the final judgment, 00:02:40.960 |
It says, "And the king will answer them, 'What did you do?'" 00:02:43.960 |
And I think everybody most of all is familiar with this passage. 00:02:46.960 |
"And I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these, my brother, you did it to me." 00:02:52.960 |
And I emphasize, okay, what you do to the least, you're doing unto me, 00:02:56.960 |
kind of calling the Christian body to look out for the weak 00:03:02.960 |
and be the voice for those who have no voice. 00:03:05.960 |
In James 1, 27, "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this, 00:03:11.960 |
to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world." 00:03:17.960 |
So this idea of caring for the fatherless, this idea of looking after the orphans, 00:03:22.960 |
is something that in the Old Testament, the New Testament, is a heart of God. 00:03:27.960 |
Psalm 68, 5, regarding kind of the idea of adoption, 00:03:32.960 |
it says, "Father of God, the Father of the fatherless and the protector of widows, 00:03:41.960 |
So that's who God is, and God is one who is a father to the fatherless. 00:03:46.960 |
And that is His habitation, that's what the passage says. 00:03:51.960 |
Ephesians 1, 5, "He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ, 00:04:00.960 |
And when Pastor Peter Chung was sharing his message today, 00:04:05.960 |
and what just dawned on me, and that was amazing, 00:04:10.960 |
was in Ephesians 5, he says this, right, "He predestined us for adoption." 00:04:16.960 |
Then the passage he read, right, in Ephesians 2, it says, 00:04:19.960 |
"In which you once walked, following the course of this world, 00:04:23.960 |
following the Prince of the power of the air, the Spirit that is now at work, 00:04:30.960 |
So we were once sons of disobedience to a wicked, right, wicked father, 00:04:39.960 |
in the sense of this world, who is against God. 00:04:45.960 |
He chooses, right, He predestines, even though we were sons of disobedience, 00:04:54.960 |
So just emphasizing to what extent that we've been saved, 00:04:58.960 |
we've been not frothed up, it's not just because He was neutral, 00:05:04.960 |
So I thought that was just, you know, meditating, and I thought that was amazing. 00:05:12.960 |
"For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, 00:05:16.960 |
but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons, 00:05:23.960 |
That the whole idea, "Abba, Father," He adopted us, 00:05:33.960 |
I see the image of the Father hugging the child and saying, 00:05:36.960 |
"You were my child, now you can call me 'Abba, Father.'" 00:05:43.960 |
but he calls myself, he calls me "Daddy," right? 00:05:48.960 |
And just that term, I, you know, he's an 18-year-old kid, 00:05:52.960 |
so I don't expect him to call me "Daddy" while he's with his friends, 00:05:55.960 |
but I still like the fact, because it's very intimate, right? 00:06:05.960 |
But in any case, yeah, the same thing with my daughter, 00:06:08.960 |
she calls me "Daddy," and I'd like for her to call me "Daddy" 00:06:11.960 |
as long as she can, because I want that relationship, 00:06:15.960 |
But that's what I see here, that's the kind of Father we have. 00:06:18.960 |
He wants to be the Father for the Fatherless. 00:06:20.960 |
He not only is your Father, He's "Abba, Father." 00:06:25.960 |
So, alright, I just wanted to show this video before I go to the definition, 00:06:32.960 |
adoption, I found this, I thought it was good. 00:06:36.960 |
My wife and I struggled for years to have children, 00:06:54.960 |
"We're very pleased to adopt you as an international country of cosmic stars." 00:07:02.960 |
And we were that process, and then the process ran, 00:07:06.960 |
and then an application to adopt a child, an adopted child. 00:07:19.960 |
No plastic, we're going to put it on a mammal. 00:07:26.960 |
There's a variety of things you can say to parents who are adopting, 00:07:30.960 |
but that can be, I think, at the top of the list. 00:07:32.960 |
So, we're walking through this adoption process, 00:07:37.960 |
We've been there, forms, paper, principals, studies, background checks, physicals. 00:07:41.960 |
We were trying to meet a particular deadline, 00:07:43.960 |
we had a physical at one point that we had to get checked off on, 00:07:48.960 |
we went to the doctor together, everything was going smoothly, 00:07:50.960 |
my wife was happy there, until we got to the eye chart deal. 00:07:53.960 |
And I still maintained the lighting was always dim. 00:07:58.960 |
But I went out first, and so she said, "Cover one eye, and start reading." 00:08:02.960 |
And I got maybe two rows down, and I started struggling. 00:08:10.960 |
I can't miss this, or miss her deadline, or miss that spot." 00:08:15.960 |
She could tell I was getting stressed out, a little flustered. 00:08:17.960 |
And she said, "Well, why don't you try the other eye?" 00:08:22.960 |
I decided, "Well, I took it off, everything was blurry. 00:08:28.960 |
And she said, "Sir, why don't you step aside, 00:08:36.960 |
And then finally, I did my eyes right, and my watch was still going. 00:08:40.960 |
And so I looked down, and my mirror on the left. 00:08:49.960 |
So I stepped back up, and this is just our basic thing. 00:08:54.960 |
And I'm like, "Hey, Mike, those are two eyes, I'm supposed to do." 00:09:04.960 |
I went through this whole process over a year, 00:09:09.960 |
I see this little girl in the picture, and I'm like, "Oh, little boy." 00:09:18.960 |
They walked into an apartment, into this small, obscure, 00:09:24.960 |
About a month later, I turned to my son, Caleb. 00:09:34.960 |
Adoption begins with a parent's initiative, not with a child's invitation. 00:09:40.960 |
Before Caleb was even born, before he was ever abandoned 00:09:46.960 |
not yet a mom and dad were planning to adopt him. 00:09:49.960 |
And while he was lying alone at night in the warehouse in college, 00:09:52.960 |
not yet a mom and dad were working to adopt him. 00:09:55.960 |
And one day, Caleb was placed in the arms of his mom and dad, 00:09:58.960 |
and they had no idea all that had been done completely apart from 00:10:04.960 |
This little boy, our cherished son, not because he pursued us, 00:10:09.960 |
because we pursued him before he was ever born. 00:10:12.960 |
So in light of that picture, I remind you of Jesus Christ, 00:10:15.960 |
blessed be the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, 00:10:20.960 |
with every spiritual blessing that has been placed on us, 00:10:22.960 |
as he chose us in him for the foundation of the world. 00:10:28.960 |
In love be predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, 00:10:34.960 |
according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace. 00:10:43.960 |
Some of you say, "Well, I don't know about predestination." 00:10:47.960 |
I'm not saying I can explain it, but I say I don't want to take it from you 00:10:54.960 |
Feel this right here sitting before the sun was ever born, 00:11:06.960 |
before any of that God Almighty on high set his sights on your soul. 00:11:15.960 |
And he had purposefully saved you from those things. 00:11:24.960 |
So nothing in the Christian life is born out of poverty. 00:11:48.960 |
So it's not -- you can disagree with it, okay? 00:11:50.960 |
But based on just reading about it and what he was saying, 00:12:05.960 |
That's why he said, you know, even before, right, Caleb, 00:12:11.960 |
Brothers and sisters who are going through adoption or foster care, 00:12:15.960 |
they have intentionally started the process even before they knew the kid 00:12:19.960 |
or know the kid right now, right, even before they were born, as is awesome, 00:12:32.960 |
And just the theme of it, and they have to say it, 00:12:38.960 |
but underlying everything is -- the amazing thing about it is the crying out of the fact 00:12:46.960 |
that these kids are made in the image of God, right? 00:12:51.960 |
And that's why they're precious, regardless of whether they're going to add anything to society, 00:12:56.960 |
whether they're going to practically add anything to a family, right? 00:13:00.960 |
Of course, you've got love and joy and emotions, 00:13:02.960 |
but maybe they're not going to add anything from a worldly sense, 00:13:05.960 |
but they're still made in the image of God by faith. 00:13:14.960 |
We don't know, right, who this kid is, what's going to come into their family when we adopt or do foster care, 00:13:22.960 |
what kind of background they have, what kind of, you know, 00:13:26.960 |
what kind of stuff that they have gone through. 00:13:30.960 |
We don't know how things are going to look like. 00:13:32.960 |
You know, here's a baby, but once they become older and adolescent and, you know, as they grow, 00:13:43.960 |
So you walk by faith for the purpose of reflecting the love that we receive. 00:13:48.960 |
And the reason why we do this is because we ourselves receive the grace of God. 00:13:53.960 |
But we ourselves have been loved tremendously by our Heavenly Father, 00:13:58.960 |
and we do it to the glory and praise of God, our Heavenly Father, as Pastor Peter's saying, right? 00:14:06.960 |
It's for God, right, for the purpose of, you know, to do His will, right, to glorify Him and to do His will. 00:14:14.960 |
And who predestined, and the Heavenly Father that, who is our Father, He predestined us for adoption as sons, 00:14:23.960 |
by whom we cry, "Abba, Father," which He's in 1 John 5. 00:14:28.960 |
So this is my definition of adoption and foster care, and it makes a lot of sense. 00:14:35.960 |
These are the reasons why our brothers and sisters are doing it, 00:14:40.960 |
why, you know, we really do it is because we want to obey and honor, you know, our Heavenly Father, 00:14:47.960 |
and the process of loving another reflects the heart of our Father. 00:14:53.960 |
Okay, so, about myself and Mary a little bit, more about myself, because I'm the one talking. 00:15:02.960 |
So in the beginning, so when we got married, when I was young, I had no, you know, desire, 00:15:09.960 |
or even came into my mind that I was going to be adopted. 00:15:12.960 |
So I remember when we got married, we had discussions about caring for orphans, 00:15:18.960 |
and maybe even the topic of adoption came up. 00:15:23.960 |
And the reason why I said, "No way," was because I really couldn't see myself, 00:15:31.960 |
I couldn't see myself loving a non-biological child as much as my own child. 00:15:37.960 |
So it was the fear of having that guilt when I adopted a non-biological child. 00:15:46.960 |
You know, we didn't have a child at the time. 00:15:48.960 |
I'm not sure. I don't think we had a child yet, or maybe Jonathan was about to be born, right? 00:15:59.960 |
If I thought through it more, there were probably more things that I could come up with. 00:16:03.960 |
Why it might not have been a good idea, or that there were plenty of reasons not to. 00:16:11.960 |
But God did a hard work, and I said, "Ah," because it does take a hard work. 00:16:17.960 |
But for myself, this was about the time where God was revealing to me and showing me my own Christian walk. 00:16:27.960 |
And I think Pastor Mark said it really perfectly, is that I was living in a way that I was diminishing God's command, in a sense. 00:16:41.960 |
Command, in a sense, because of my weaknesses. 00:16:45.960 |
So how I was reading Scripture is, I was taking the Word of God, 00:16:48.960 |
and I was trying to say, "Oh, I'm going to apply that to my life currently," without really thinking I need to change. 00:16:56.960 |
Here I am, I can't change, because I'm busy, I'm doing all these things, 00:17:02.960 |
so therefore I'm going to do my best to apply the Scripture, but I have to water it down, because my life will water it down. 00:17:09.960 |
And I think God did a hard work, He flipped that around and showed me that, wait a second, 00:17:14.960 |
the one who needs to change, not the Scripture, which is perfect, is that I myself needed to change. 00:17:24.960 |
Instead of saying, "I can't," I needed to say, "Yes," and obey. 00:17:29.960 |
So it wasn't just in the adoption, it was just in general of my life. 00:17:37.960 |
So once I started thinking that way, when I was reading Scripture, part of me was scared. 00:17:43.960 |
Because if you read Scripture with the idea of obeying, it is scary. 00:17:48.960 |
Because you're reading it, and you're like, "Oh my goodness, I can't do this. What if this happened?" 00:17:54.960 |
But at the same time, God is working in my heart saying, "You need to obey." 00:18:00.960 |
And this is where the joy of Christian life is, in obedience. 00:18:05.960 |
So that, in the process of God doing that, then what happened was, I met a friend. 00:18:14.960 |
At this point in our lives, Jasmine was born, we were actually trying, and Marianne had miscarried. 00:18:26.960 |
And we were trying, we were able to have a second, having a difficult time. 00:18:31.960 |
It wasn't that we really desired to have a second child. 00:18:35.960 |
To some degree, we were satisfied with just one. 00:18:44.960 |
But there was also a meaning of, we didn't want Jonathan just to be the only child. 00:18:52.960 |
So, there was a friend that I met, I haven't seen for a long time, and after years, met him. 00:19:03.960 |
And I don't know what happened was that, it was almost like a light that just clicked in my mind. 00:19:12.960 |
Because this child was, the mother and father, I think the father didn't even know. 00:19:21.960 |
And then here's a child that is going to come into this home, Christian home. 00:19:27.960 |
And basically, not only saved in the sense of physically, but also have the best chance to be saved spiritually. 00:19:35.960 |
Because it's a Christian home, they're going to hear the gospel. 00:19:38.960 |
And I looked at that and I said, wow, this is amazing, this is beautiful. 00:19:42.960 |
I can say that in front of his face, but inside my heart, it was just resonating. 00:19:50.960 |
And I talked to Marian, and you know, it was a talking process. 00:19:54.960 |
It was a journey. It really was a journey for both of us to get to a point of actually submitting an application. 00:20:00.960 |
When we got close, one of the things we wanted to do was our due diligence. 00:20:04.960 |
And part of that was for us to travel to China. 00:20:09.960 |
For one reason or another, we had the opportunity just to go to China in October 2008. 00:20:16.960 |
And then we visited some foster homes in China. 00:20:21.960 |
We learned a lot about foster care and how things work in China. 00:20:29.960 |
They're orphanages that are run by the government. 00:20:33.960 |
But it's one of those things, as long as they're okay with it, they're not going to say anything. 00:20:38.960 |
So a lot of Christian foster care, they would look for children with minor defects. 00:20:44.960 |
And they would get them from orphanages that can't care for them. 00:20:48.960 |
They would give them the medical treatment, and then they would put them up for adoption. 00:20:53.960 |
And they would be adopted through the orphanages. 00:20:55.960 |
So they'll get the credit, they get the money. 00:20:58.960 |
So it was kind of a mutual benefit kind of thing. 00:21:01.960 |
So we went through that, so we learned a lot. 00:21:04.960 |
And I think God was further working in our hearts. 00:21:07.960 |
One interesting story, that girl right there, Mary is holding with the two ponytails or whatever. 00:21:15.960 |
Her name is Xiao Hao. I still remember her name, Xiao Hao. 00:21:24.960 |
She kept following us and saying, "Zhou le, Zhou le." 00:21:27.960 |
"Zhou le, Zhou le." I don't know who's speaking. 00:21:40.960 |
We found out that we could, at least at that time. 00:21:42.960 |
And Mary called the owner, the one who runs it. 00:21:47.960 |
But the problem was, she either was adopted or the one who was running it really liked her. 00:21:57.960 |
But anyway, that's a side story. That's her, her name is Xiao Hao. 00:22:04.960 |
Okay, so that led us to then, in December of 2008, we submitted our application to HOPE. 00:22:10.960 |
And obviously, there are many other adoption agencies. 00:22:14.960 |
We could have gone local, you know, foster care. 00:22:18.960 |
And again, I really didn't open myself up for foster care. 00:22:23.960 |
Because the scenario where I could see myself bringing a child into the home. 00:22:30.960 |
Basically, thinking of adopting them as my child and then losing them. 00:22:35.960 |
So I didn't think I, at least for the first one, could handle it emotionally. 00:22:41.960 |
That's how it ended up being an international adoption. 00:22:47.960 |
But for one, it just worked out that we submitted an application to HOPE International. 00:22:54.960 |
And we went through that process in December of 2008. 00:22:58.960 |
Okay, so, and then in March of 2009, Ellie was born. 00:23:05.960 |
So we submitted our application even before she was born. 00:23:09.960 |
The whole idea of what Pastor David Platt was saying. 00:23:17.960 |
I believe God ordained Ellie to be in our house. 00:23:20.960 |
We didn't know who she was, but we submitted our application. 00:23:27.960 |
So her home is Taeyin, Chungnam, which is a fishing neighborhood. 00:23:36.960 |
And from the description, her mother's father was a fisher. 00:23:44.960 |
And I put Seoul so you kind of get an idea relative to Seoul where she was born. 00:23:50.960 |
And in May of 2009, we submitted our home study. 00:23:55.960 |
And our brothers and sisters are going through that. 00:23:57.960 |
Some have submitted, some are waiting to submit home study to HOPE. 00:24:04.960 |
Obviously, we visited there, and that's where Ellie was. 00:24:10.960 |
I'm going to type "seek" here because you hear that word all the time. 00:24:21.960 |
And this is the picture they sent us with the paperwork. 00:24:29.960 |
So I see this picture, and I remember thinking to myself, in my flesh, I was going, 00:24:48.960 |
Because she came in, and they said it was a girl. 00:24:55.960 |
But anyway, with the paperwork, and we decided, okay, we're going to love this child. 00:25:03.960 |
And then two months later, in August, in October, they sent us these pictures. 00:25:12.960 |
So once I saw these pictures, I said, "Okay, they did this on purpose." 00:25:17.960 |
They put the ugliest -- they made her look as ugly as possible so that when the item -- 00:25:26.960 |
when they were choosing her, right, that it's not because of her physical appearance 00:25:43.960 |
So not many days, I think, after we submitted -- or even before, right? 00:25:48.960 |
So that goes to my theory that they intentionally did it. 00:25:57.960 |
And just for reference, this is part of our paperwork. 00:26:01.960 |
They kind of describe her, or they give you her physical -- little background about her physical. 00:26:09.960 |
And also they give you some information about her appearance. 00:26:18.960 |
Was born prematurely at 34 weeks, weighing 2.74 kilograms. 00:26:25.960 |
Hospitalized and treated March 20 to April 10. 00:26:29.960 |
So she was in the hospital for, what, 12, 13 days due to prematurity. 00:26:34.960 |
At the initial checkup, her weight and height was average compared to other children of her age. 00:26:39.960 |
Also her elimination -- I don't know why it doesn't make sense, but elimination, feeding, and sleeping are all good. 00:26:48.960 |
So she is expected to grow up well after placement at her foster home. 00:26:52.960 |
Autumn is a gentle baby who hardly ever frets, except when her diaper is wet or she feels hungry. 00:27:00.960 |
So she doesn't get angry because her diaper is wet anymore, because she's out of diaper. 00:27:06.960 |
But she still gets angry because she is hungry. 00:27:12.960 |
Or other things that they can put in here that she gets angry about. 00:27:22.960 |
We sincerely hope that Autumn is adopted to wonderful parents who raise her with love as soon as possible 00:27:29.960 |
so that she can grow up happily and healthily. 00:27:33.960 |
I'm tempted to write this lady and say, "Yes, she was adopted by wonderful parents." 00:27:46.960 |
The information is there about her biological parents, some information that they have. 00:27:51.960 |
One interesting thing -- I think it's only Korea -- that one of the descriptions is that her parents had creased eyes. 00:28:00.960 |
All the things that put them down, double eyelids. 00:28:07.960 |
So anyway, so we can look at this, read it, before we accept. 00:28:12.960 |
There's a contract that we sign, basically saying that once we agree to this, 00:28:16.960 |
that we are financially responsible for this child. 00:28:19.960 |
And then we have to write a check and everything and send it over with her matching. 00:28:24.960 |
The other thing is they also said -- and this is kind of something that we got monthly -- 00:28:31.960 |
They would go in, I think once a month or so, and they'd get checked up. 00:28:37.960 |
So some of the information, her weight, so you see her progressing as she's growing. 00:28:46.960 |
There's some check-off things on how she's doing, prone to lift her head, chest up, arm support. 00:28:55.960 |
I couldn't find it, but there were other descriptions like where there would be, 00:28:59.960 |
"Oh, yeah, she's connecting well to the foster mom," 00:29:07.960 |
You know, try to be as much -- a little bit descriptive. 00:29:10.960 |
So anyway, after we signed up, they gave us like a monthly update of what's going on. 00:29:18.960 |
So -- okay, and then so on April 24th, we departed. 00:29:30.960 |
And I had white hair, but that is my white hair back then. 00:29:44.960 |
And then, okay, when we got there, they asked to foster her parents for Ellie. 00:29:51.960 |
First, what happens when you go there -- so the process has changed. 00:29:54.960 |
So whatever we're telling you regarding Korea, I think the process has changed now. 00:29:59.960 |
But when we were adopting, then first what you do is you fly in, you set up a meeting, 00:30:06.960 |
and they will bring the adopted daughter, Ellie, with the foster parents. 00:30:11.960 |
You see them, and they give you a few days, basically a tour. 00:30:17.960 |
You tour Korea, and then before you leave, you come back. 00:30:20.960 |
So the bottom picture is the day that we actually got Ellie. 00:30:25.960 |
We came back, we did the tour, and then a few days later we got her. 00:30:32.960 |
The reason I think they did that, which is good, is some bonding before she gets in the airplane. 00:30:38.960 |
Basically, you're taking her away from, you know, what she knows. 00:30:42.960 |
And then that's -- Jonathan was really happy. 00:30:48.960 |
So you can see in his face that he was very happy. 00:30:56.960 |
Not an apartment, but a hotel room, a kind of ghetto hotel room. 00:31:03.960 |
And then this is actually the bus that we took to go to the airport. 00:31:10.960 |
So we flew back on May 1st, and this is a picture of us getting off. 00:31:21.960 |
But, I mean, the whole thing, I mean, she did cry. 00:31:24.960 |
When we were back in Korea, when we took her that night, she was an adventurous girl. 00:31:30.960 |
So when we actually took her from Holt, she was smiling. 00:31:34.960 |
And they said she was the first child that they had seen that she would actually be smiling and laughing as we were getting into the taxi. 00:31:42.960 |
So how they did it was they had us get one of those carriers, and they would turn her face out. 00:31:49.960 |
So she wouldn't be able to see or something from getting in. 00:31:57.960 |
But when we got to the hotel that evening, she cried. 00:32:01.960 |
So I had to hold her, and I was up with her for a long time. 00:32:14.960 |
So Jonathan there, he's happy, and there you go. 00:32:28.960 |
I like things like this, so I'm putting it in. 00:32:41.960 |
Okay, so the other thing before I end this portion is that there's Berean adoption assistance for you to be aware of. 00:32:50.960 |
This is something recent, and we thought through the process. 00:32:56.960 |
We just thought, hey, this would be the best way to do it. 00:32:58.960 |
First is, one, each applicant family will receive $3,000 in adoption assistance. 00:33:03.960 |
The financial assistance is subject to availability, which is based on the number of applicants in the calendar year. 00:33:09.960 |
Applicants will receive funds at the completion of the adoption process when legal documentation is finalized. 00:33:16.960 |
So instead of just budget, the church will help support once the adoption is finalized, and there's some practical reasons for doing that. 00:33:27.960 |
And the qualification needs to protect the family must complete an application, which will be reviewed. 00:33:35.960 |
It's not long, but we ask that they fill it out, turn it in to us, let us look at it. 00:33:42.960 |
Second, an applicant must be a good standing member of the Berean Community Church. 00:33:45.960 |
Applicant must adhere to the 10 Commitments of BCC membership. 00:33:50.960 |
So you're a good member and in good standing. 00:33:55.960 |
And if anybody is interested or, you know, of that, then you can contact Pastor Mark or any of the leaders, and we'll forward you an application and fill it out. 00:34:05.960 |
It's not going to cover much, but it's a way to promote and help, you know, in some regards that it will be helpful. 00:34:18.960 |
Okay, so, all right, so this portion will end. 00:34:25.960 |
The second portion of it, I asked actually our brothers and sisters who are doing foster care in Dean and Helen. 00:34:32.960 |
They're certified, but I think they can share. 00:34:35.960 |
And then, you know, Leah and Esther and, you know, Jason and Jen and also Kat and Deborah. 00:34:44.960 |
And I wanted to really, you know, have them share their -- where they are. 00:34:52.960 |
And because for me, you know, I think for me it was -- yeah, so I mean -- okay, you can stay there. 00:35:17.960 |
So, yeah, I'm going to just keep it that way. 00:35:20.960 |
And, you know, we'll have some open discussion. 00:35:23.960 |
But I asked them to fill out some questions, and based on that, and because, you know, we don't have a lot of time, 00:35:30.960 |
I'm going to direct certain questions to certain people to answer. 00:35:34.960 |
And hopefully that will give you a flavor of, you know, some of the things that they went through, 00:35:40.960 |
what convinced them to adopt where they are, and maybe, you know, hopefully that will encourage you as well 00:35:48.960 |
I don't know where you are as far as this whole process. 00:35:51.960 |
I'm assuming you're here because at some level there's an interest, at some level, 00:35:56.960 |
I think even for informational purposes, or you're actually thinking maybe -- I don't know how close you are, 00:36:02.960 |
but hopefully this will help you in wherever you are in the whole process. 00:36:09.960 |
And in saying that, obviously, you know, not everybody is called to foster care or called to adoption, 00:36:16.960 |
so no one should feel guilty, right, if that's not the direction God is leading you. 00:36:22.960 |
But also there's beauty, and, you know, my prayer for our church is that there be a culture, 00:36:28.960 |
that we would see more and more people adopting and having an open heart in care of the father, 00:36:45.960 |
Okay, so first I wanted to just open it up and, you know, I would ask one person from each household 00:36:57.960 |
kind of describe and explain how, why, what got you to the point of submitting the application 00:37:10.960 |
So maybe we could, you know, you could designate whomever, the couple, and maybe you could share from Jason 00:37:19.960 |
Kind of share what was the process and what brought you to the point of actually submitting the application 00:37:34.960 |
I think for us, we'll be in the very 9 1/2 years, and we've been open to having kids probably 00:37:43.960 |
So I think just throughout the waiting period, we just were praying, like, maybe there's something else 00:37:53.960 |
And then just even like Medicaid, everything seemed normal for us, and so we just felt like, 00:37:59.960 |
I just felt like, well, I've been in a trouble, I should not be inviting him, that he, it wasn't his type 00:38:08.960 |
So that was one of the reasons that caused us to start thinking about it more. 00:38:12.960 |
And then for myself personally, my biological mom, I guess you would say, she passed away when I was 00:38:20.960 |
three and a half years old from cancer, and my dad remarried. 00:38:23.960 |
But I had a really positive relationship with my mom now, and then my sister as well, and she really 00:38:33.960 |
raised us as her own kids, and not only just her, but her whole family, all my relatives, my grandparents, 00:38:39.960 |
So just personally, I had a really positive experience, I guess, growing up that it is possible to love 00:38:46.960 |
other people who aren't blood-related to you. 00:38:49.960 |
So that also made me more open to adoption, and then I think we become, Elder Goldstein mentioned 00:38:58.960 |
the Dropbox, but we saw it when it came out of the theater, and that was the first time I kind of 00:39:03.960 |
thought about Priya, and I was like, oh, it's kind of like they're doing it for adoption in Priya, 00:39:07.960 |
and then we actually saw it in a film-ish event at our church, like maybe a few months later, 00:39:11.960 |
and the second time I saw it, I really felt just more like, just hearing the pastor's testimony, 00:39:18.960 |
I just really remember being like, oh, he was just a normal person too, like just a guy who got married 00:39:25.960 |
and had kids, but then his son ended up having a lot of medical conditions where he needed to be 00:39:30.960 |
in the hospital a long time, and he ended up having a lot of needs for orphans needing adoption, 00:39:37.960 |
and then later he saw a gang of babies, but for me, I think the takeaway was like, oh, well, 00:39:41.960 |
I mean, he was no different, or like he never had this grand vision when he was a reaper, 00:39:46.960 |
so for us too, I just felt like maybe God will give us what we need if we choose to go for an adoption, 00:39:53.960 |
and then both of us separately, without really talking about it, were open to adoption, 00:39:58.960 |
so we were kind of meeting with our spouse and mother, like, okay, like we should really agree about it, 00:40:02.960 |
then since God kind of saw both of us today, adoption separately, and then I think the last part 00:40:09.960 |
that I remember is, all of last year, we were praying about, you know, it's really take this year 00:40:13.960 |
to really agree about adoption, and we went to Japan with our church, like in September-ish, 00:40:19.960 |
and then we decided at the beginning of that year, like, okay, after Japan, then we'll really seriously 00:40:24.960 |
think about applying, and then, but during that trip in Japan, we met two families there 00:40:29.960 |
that had adopted early, right before we got there, and just being able to talk to them 00:40:33.960 |
about their experiences, and a lot of other things that, but I think, ultimately, we were like, 00:40:39.960 |
you know, I think this is what we want to do. 00:40:43.960 |
I think it helped that when we saw you go through the process initially, and you got exposure to it, 00:40:50.960 |
so we weren't closing it for you. It was just like, oh, that would be a very option for us to 00:40:57.960 |
very openly consider, and then I think for me, I was just kind of praying about, like, 00:41:03.960 |
what is it that we want? We're saying we desire a family, we're saying we desire certain things, 00:41:09.960 |
plus evaluating, a lot of things with everything, but I think God was saying, I can give you a family, 00:41:15.960 |
you know, and the question became, well, a biological child or not, is that the matter for us 00:41:21.960 |
when we're saying we want a family? And so we, like, prayed over these things, and it helped a lot 00:41:26.960 |
because you guys went through the process. We were going on missions trips, meeting other 00:41:31.960 |
missionary families that had adopted, and then her best friend adopted, and, you know, everyone 00:41:37.960 |
who was, became normal, and that's what we want. Let's pray about it, and let's see, you know, 00:41:45.960 |
what it means to us, and I hope it's what it does. We love kids, so let's see what happens. 00:41:53.960 |
Once later after the trip, I'll practice this. Thank God, when I answered the prayer, 00:41:59.960 |
for the first time, I was like, oh, this is, I'm going to have a second child, but at the same time, 00:42:05.960 |
I want to be grateful about it, and just kind of keep our reasons in check, too. 00:42:13.960 |
Where are you in the process right now? I mean, where are we? 00:42:18.960 |
We finished our home study. Oh, she doesn't look in the words. 00:42:25.960 |
I have a general idea. The Children's Timeline, we submit our application end of November, 00:42:31.960 |
and we just finished our home study, so they notarized it for us, and we mailed it out, 00:42:37.960 |
so we're waiting. And so, it seems like that she will be later, possibly next week. 00:42:58.960 |
So, for both of us, Kat and I had already come to kind of, we wanted to adopt, even longer, 00:43:07.960 |
dating, even before we started dating, from two different angles. For Katarina, she grew up, 00:43:15.960 |
also, first and foremost, that before her, as she's growing in her faith over the years, 00:43:22.960 |
adoption just made sense when you look at the Gospel itself. It's intertwined throughout all the Scripture, 00:43:30.960 |
and so that's always been a very big issue with her. Wherever we spoke of her, she has cousins 00:43:38.960 |
that are adopted. So, her whole life, she's known that to be a normal part of life for adoption. 00:43:46.960 |
For me, it would probably be, starting in 2009, I started Bible Formation, and you can see me 00:43:50.960 |
die. At the church there, the pastor had started doing a series on orphans, and from that, 00:44:00.960 |
the people are a little less sophisticated there, where they just heard from the Scripture, 00:44:08.960 |
it's like, true religion is this, they can take care of the orphans, and so they just go and do it. 00:44:15.960 |
So, hundreds of families just started fostering two dogs, and I have no bearing on biological children 00:44:24.960 |
or not, one of them had to be adopted, and already started adopting, so that's why three, four, five 00:44:30.960 |
adopted kids were there, and then suddenly another biological kid would show up somewhere in there. 00:44:36.960 |
So, it had no connection to biological or adoption. It was really great to see that, 00:44:44.960 |
because that was so much of the gospel fleshed out for myself. So, for me, the order has never mattered, 00:44:52.960 |
because it's all the same, in the sense that it's going to be my child. So, there's less distinction there, 00:45:02.960 |
in the sense that, in the years that we've been together, we've talked about names for our children, 00:45:08.960 |
and what we want for our children, but that's the same, whether it's adopted or biological. 00:45:14.960 |
And so, I think that's, and so when we came together, we even talked about it during our dating phase, 00:45:20.960 |
and now being married, and having started two years ago, so we started praying through it, 00:45:27.960 |
and we prayed through it for a year, and then went forward with adoption first. 00:45:34.960 |
We haven't tried it with biological kids yet, because we really love how clear and how rich 00:45:44.960 |
of a gospel narrative adopting a baby child first really shows the world. 00:45:52.960 |
So, for us, it's been so great, in the sense that we start telling our coworkers, our friends, 00:45:58.960 |
and when they're on the phone, we're not wavers against, like, "Oh, why would you adopt first?" 00:46:04.960 |
And so, for us, like, we're always not in a good place, because the adopted child is our home. 00:46:10.960 |
It doesn't matter where the child comes from. And from there, though, we are able to go into sharing 00:46:16.960 |
the gospel with so many people so far, because it wasn't, it wasn't more so for us. 00:46:24.960 |
It's always been, adoption has been a first class citizen in our minds. 00:46:30.960 |
It hasn't been something, like, in the back of our minds. It's just such a beautiful gospel narrative. 00:46:38.960 |
The cool thing about this church community back in Simian Valley was that there was such a culture 00:46:45.960 |
of adoption and foster care that the government would actually reach out to the church first 00:46:52.960 |
to see if there's any foster homes available, because most of the foster homes in that community 00:46:57.960 |
were people who went to that church. And we were just so challenged by that, where it was, 00:47:02.960 |
it was adoption care, where, like, they don't go for any life insurance or anything, 00:47:08.960 |
so there's, like, benefit to that, but they were just using their lives to, like, act out their feelings. 00:47:19.960 |
Okay, so, my, actually, fostering was kind of a normal thing I was growing up, because my, 00:47:28.960 |
before my parents had children, they actually were foster parents for a whole, whole period, so. 00:47:34.960 |
It just so happened that after their foster child was adopted, they had never been intending on adopting. 00:47:47.960 |
It was just in the end of that time, my mom was a teacher in Korea, and both reached out to people 00:47:53.960 |
to foster her at the time, so they knew she was being adopted, and after she was adopted, 00:47:58.960 |
actually, when she was graduating from high school, my father ran home and called her adoptive parents 00:48:05.960 |
and I was just to find out how she was doing, and then immediately he, he said, "Is this Mr. Lee?" 00:48:11.960 |
And then, so, actually, our family got reconnected with that family, and then we ended up actually 00:48:17.960 |
having a relationship with her through her health line. 00:48:21.960 |
So, it was just kind of normal, I guess. I don't think I ever really considered fostering actively, 00:48:28.960 |
even though I, like, for our mantle, it would be, like, "S3, biological kid," in her picture, 00:48:34.960 |
she was like kind of normal. She wasn't really looking like a doctor or anything, but, um, 00:48:40.960 |
so, about eight years ago, when we were living in New York, um, the only way I can say it is just 00:48:49.960 |
God kind of lays it on my heart to consider fostering again, and for me, I just, I felt like, you know, 00:48:56.960 |
what is a very solid way, an actual way to be able to share a love with friends, right? 00:49:03.960 |
Is to bring somebody, me, into your home, love them, share the gospel, and, you know, 00:49:11.960 |
just hope, earn the gospel to do its work. And, um, yeah, so, at that time, I shared with me, 00:49:18.960 |
and at the time, because we were living in a very small apartment, it wasn't something that we were able, 00:49:24.960 |
that we were able to do, but then when we moved back to California, and had the resources and the means, 00:49:32.960 |
we both were led and convicted that, you know, you can give them a lot, so, we're not meant to 00:49:40.960 |
work for ourselves, we're meant to share and use it for God's kingdom, and so, so, yeah, 00:49:46.960 |
so this just started our process when we moved back, and it's actually been a very long process. 00:49:53.960 |
We started pretty soon after we moved, which was four years ago, and, um, we technically are not 00:50:00.960 |
certified yet, because there have been pauses along the way, some that were on our part, 00:50:06.960 |
and some do the process, but typically, the fostering process can be quick, and you can become 00:50:13.960 |
certified resource family within a relatively short period of time. But, yeah, so, I feel like, um, 00:50:21.960 |
from my own experience growing up, and then just, um, just from that time that I've been on the ground, 00:50:30.960 |
eight years ago when COVID hit, it just so happened that I was having conversations with people, 00:50:36.960 |
and one friend finally said, "Did you know that in Southern California, there are zero Korean-American 00:50:42.960 |
foster families in this town at that time?" And so it became kind of a campaign to go to, like, 00:50:50.960 |
Southern California churches and really, um, promote and advocate for Korean-American families to do 00:50:57.960 |
something. And I was like, "Oh, wow, that's really, like, it wasn't rolled into us because we were 00:51:01.960 |
living in New York at that time." So, um, so actually, yeah, we ended up, um, ended up in the end, 00:51:08.960 |
um, being connected with that particular agency that was in that article, and we went through our 00:51:16.960 |
trial and process. So right now, we're right at the end. We're pretty much certified. We're just waiting 00:51:31.960 |
Um, for us, it's, uh, I had, my doctor was not on the matter at all, but, uh, when he began dating, 00:51:43.960 |
he very quickly let me know that that woman has been his dream woman. So, um, you know, it just, uh, 00:51:52.960 |
strangely enough, I just, my heart just seamlessly took that in. And, um, since then, it's been really 00:52:00.960 |
growing in my heart. And I, you know, just the idea of it, the desire for it, it's all been growing. 00:52:07.960 |
And over the years, lots of research, lots of documentaries, lots of, you know, many types of resources 00:52:15.960 |
I've talked to. I've invited families over with the doctor. And, um, just many things. And, you know, 00:52:23.960 |
supported organizations that did different things. But, uh, we didn't have a clear idea of what type of 00:52:33.960 |
adoption, whether it be international, domestic, or programming. But, uh, what we did have was somewhat 00:52:40.960 |
of a timeline. We thought, we have four children that are very young. So, at one, I mean, and I'm the 00:52:46.960 |
primary caregiver at home. So, uh, we have, uh, once my youngest goes to elementary school, I'll have, 00:52:54.960 |
be able to catch my breath a little bit and, and drive the, the, the energy and the, the tension 00:53:00.960 |
of the child. But we had no idea to what extent this was going to work. But the idea of it was just 00:53:06.960 |
becoming more and more of a bio-child. And, um, and then at the same time, that idea of fostering, 00:53:13.960 |
of not fostering, foster adoption. So adopting out of the domestic, uh, county children that are 00:53:19.960 |
going to be aging out. That became something that I started just embracing. Looking into it, uh, 00:53:25.960 |
just working with organizations to support, learning about, like, you know, uh, just all of it. 00:53:31.960 |
And, and I started to really pray about foster adopting and looking into it and, and thought, you know, 00:53:38.960 |
why go overseas when there's so much need here? And the more I looked into it, I just loved it. 00:53:44.960 |
And I couldn't wait to do it. But I didn't know, um, when, uh, or, you know, what it's going to look like. 00:53:53.960 |
But I kind of knew I wanted to allow my, my biological children, or children to just kind of grow up 00:53:59.960 |
where they're a little more self-sufficient. So that was our timeline. And then, um, and we had been, 00:54:07.960 |
um, we had our fourth child in 2015. And, uh, a couple years later, my husband had a procedure shot 00:54:14.960 |
because we were like, we're done, done. And we're getting old. So we're done, done, done. 00:54:19.960 |
Um, so we're like, okay, now we are going to strategically plan for that time when we're going to allow, 00:54:27.960 |
you know, surrender to this call. And then, um, fast forward, uh, November of last year, uh, we had the, 00:54:37.960 |
uh, our church put together an adoption summit, which is, I'm so blessed by that event because, um, 00:54:44.960 |
so just to preface that is, uh, Korea has, um, our, yeah, Korea, amongst other countries, 00:54:52.960 |
have age-limited, as far as how old adopted parents can be. So last November, he, a week before my husband 00:55:00.960 |
turned 49, um, was when the Orphan Sunday was. And we were, we walked right past Holt to go to Olive Crest 00:55:12.960 |
and Bethany. And we were sitting there talking and, you know, putting, I'm putting my email address, 00:55:18.960 |
I'm talking to Bethany and Olive Crest, and, you know, my children are coming out, 00:55:22.960 |
are you signing up to have more kids? And I'm like, get out of here. And then, and then we're walking back, 00:55:32.960 |
and just as we're passing Holt is when the social worker there, she was Korean, she's, she's looking at me, 00:55:38.960 |
and I'm like, I've met Olive on our long tour. And then she's like, how old are you? And I said, 00:55:43.960 |
oh, my husband's about to turn 49. And we knew the limit was 45. And, um, he said, wait, she said, 00:55:49.960 |
wait, are you guys both Korean? And, um, we said yes. And so she said, no, no, no, it's not too late, 00:55:56.960 |
you're not too old. There's an exception if you're both Korean. And we said, what's this? 00:56:01.960 |
And he went, we had no interest in Korea. To be honest, I looked into the whole Korean thing, and, you know, 00:56:09.960 |
my heart personally was that there was not much of a need, that more people were wanting to adopt 00:56:15.960 |
than the demand or the supply was available, is, is what I came to the conclusion of, 00:56:21.960 |
especially because about nine years ago, a lot of adoption laws had changed. It became so political, 00:56:26.960 |
so difficult to adopt, and it cost so much. I said, why do that when we have all this money here? 00:56:32.960 |
And, um, so when she kind of draws in, we're like, tell us more. And she just started telling us, 00:56:40.960 |
and then she's like, how many kids do you have? And we have four. They're like, great, because that's 00:56:44.960 |
the maximum you can have. So we were like, by the skin of our teeth, we just kind of made it. 00:56:51.960 |
She actually was disappointed. She said, we have up to 51, but that's untrue. We have 49 and a half. 00:56:58.960 |
So we had a good six months to get our application, and the thought is you have to have a home setting 00:57:03.960 |
approved by 49 and a half. So basically, even though our timeline was such, um, after that interaction, 00:57:13.960 |
we went home, turned the TV off for the children, and we sat down, and I literally, like, had my head in my hat. 00:57:23.960 |
I was just, because conviction was so strong, and I didn't understand. I wasn't ready. I wanted my child to go, 00:57:36.960 |
like, I needed her to go. Not ready to turn in an application, but then we, we hope the Lord will 00:57:44.960 |
hear what she says. She's like, if you register this month, you get $100. Just kidding. 00:57:54.960 |
But, you know, and then, so my husband and I talked, and without skipping a beat, we were all on the same page. 00:58:01.960 |
We're like, this is a clear call from the Lord. He's opening up a small window, and so let's do it. 00:58:08.960 |
And so, I was so scared, because I wasn't ready, and I, like, banged, and so we're like, okay, let's do it. 00:58:17.960 |
Let's see what it's going to be like. So the next working day, which is one day, we call the director, 00:58:23.960 |
the bachelor director, and we told her our story. She said, great, let's get you started. 00:58:27.960 |
Just to make sure we're on the same page. And she's like, no problem. 00:58:31.960 |
Well, actually, we thought we had, like, a year and a half, and she's like, we're actually at 29 and a half. 00:58:35.960 |
Ah, so good. You can't do it any quicker. Rush, rush, rush. 00:58:39.960 |
I'm like, okay. So this whole thing was just, like, out of the blue, and, but one thing clear was that 00:58:46.960 |
our condition was solid. We were, like, we knew this was from the Lord. So we said, let's do it. 00:58:52.960 |
She was like, equip us with what we need. So, but all along, you know, I, my heart was towards foster care, 00:59:01.960 |
and we, you know, our children were raised with the word adoption in mind. And so it was never a matter of if, 00:59:08.960 |
it was when. So all our children, you know, we'd be driving, and you'd look at a homeless person, 00:59:14.960 |
and you're like, oh, can we adopt him? And they're like, no. Like, grown person, we can't adopt him. 00:59:20.960 |
And then we'd just be like, oh my gosh, he looks like my brother. I don't know. 00:59:25.960 |
But, so it was always a matter of when. And so the first person I wanted, the first child I wanted to talk to 00:59:31.960 |
was our oldest, who was eight. And so I sat down, and I showed her the brochure of the whole family bond, 00:59:37.960 |
and I said, hey, remember what we talked about, like, possibly adopting, like, a person that doesn't look like us, 00:59:44.960 |
you know, which, we always kind of imagined a black child, you know, a little less adoptable. 00:59:49.960 |
And then, and he said, yeah. And I said, how, what do you think about us going to Korea and adopting, like, 00:59:55.960 |
someone with something that looks like us? And then, and then he said, he looked down at the brochure, 01:00:01.960 |
which had two Asian boys. And he said, all right, we can get him. We can get him. 01:00:08.960 |
So, like, we can get the sweetie, you know. And then, so, and then, so that's that. 01:00:13.960 |
And then just started the process of mountain work, of paperwork, and just, they want to know everything, 01:00:19.960 |
and just, you know, with Madison's schedule, and the four children, it just, since then we've been doing it. 01:00:24.960 |
Many times, you know, we realize that this is what people go through. There's so, so much paperwork. 01:00:34.960 |
And you have to pay all along the way. And financially, we weren't, you know, we weren't, we trusted with sort of our finances, 01:00:43.960 |
so we never really prepared financially, $50,000 spent on the side, you know, because we kind of just thought it was going to be domestic. 01:00:50.960 |
So, all of it was kind of a surprise to us. And so, we've been at it, and we are currently at, we submitted our home study paperwork, 01:01:01.960 |
and we're just waiting for the final approval. And, but, so. 01:01:12.960 |
Well, they seem to not be worried, so we're okay. I keep my insurance, because if he's 50 soon, and then, so, so I, 01:01:23.960 |
and then another thing was just, you know, so far it's been under, I like to mention, a couple of weeks ago, we were surprised. 01:01:36.960 |
And we were done, done, done with biological children, and holy school, we were really surprised with the pregnancy. 01:01:45.960 |
And, so, we found out we were pregnant at his turn 45, and at 46 seconds, we're in the thick of this adoption, 01:01:56.960 |
and her cause equals his cause, and a pregnancy equals a drug overdose. And I was devastated. 01:02:04.960 |
My first aunt, I was going to adopt, we were going to pay for our adopted child, we were really excited about it, and then, 01:02:12.960 |
that was pretty bad, you know. And so, so this is very recent, and so a lot of pain, and searching scripture, you know, 01:02:24.960 |
seeking God's comfort through this, and trusting him, and so long story short, we, you know, chose to shun our adoption, 01:02:40.960 |
and, you know, embrace this pregnancy, life that it's given us, and so we started getting excited about this child. 01:02:51.960 |
We didn't even tell our family, we didn't tell our children, we didn't even know how to break it. 01:02:56.960 |
And then a few days later, I started, you know, having, having, and then eventually I miscarried, and that was actually very recent. 01:03:07.960 |
So, it's been a rollercoaster of a life, but through this, all of it, what I'm so grateful for is that it reminded me, 01:03:19.960 |
as someone who kind of adopted his dream to adopt, and it became my dream, and I think in my flesh, I continue to try to make this out of my timeline, 01:03:31.960 |
and once it kind of looks good, I'm like, I try to take control, and the Lord continues to teach me to surrender, 01:03:37.960 |
whether it be my adoption, or my pregnancy, or my timeline, or finances, he just keeps teaching me this way. 01:03:45.960 |
And, you know, just all these verses came to my mind when this was happening. 01:03:51.960 |
I was still trying to get the kids ready, out, a few years, when I started, and I talked to her, and I said, 01:03:57.960 |
"I think I'm miscarrying right now, and I can't get them out of the house, and I'm just, you know, praying, and asking God." 01:04:05.960 |
And my initial thing is, "If you're going to give me this child, why don't you just give the kid a child?" 01:04:11.960 |
And very quickly, you know, I was humbled with the fact that she is God, she is God, and that he doesn't have to explain to me why, 01:04:29.960 |
But through it all, I think just, excuse me, but through it all, I felt so intimately close to the Lord, 01:04:41.960 |
because, you know, we were seeking comfort, you know, through prayer, and through scripture, 01:04:48.960 |
I just felt so intimately close to the Lord, because I felt the wanting to draw me closer to Jesus Christ, 01:04:55.960 |
and the surrendering he wanted to draw me closer, and that's all I kept feeling. 01:05:00.960 |
And so rather than being angry, I just said, "I just think you are God, and you want me to go closer to your image, 01:05:10.960 |
you want me to understand what true love is." 01:05:15.960 |
And it, you know, it forced me to examine my own part of this God's will, my intentions are. 01:05:29.960 |
It's actually only been like a week or so since he was carried, so we're, you know, kind of grieving the loss of a child, 01:05:43.960 |
And God's teaching us that we're not trying to rescue a child, but he's teaching us whether to call for it. 01:06:04.960 |
One more thing, like I said, I always had a vision of adoption. 01:06:09.960 |
I had a vision of my family, and even as a child, it was always multicultural. 01:06:16.960 |
And I just wanted a free ticket to some kind of sporting event about to be held in the fall. 01:06:23.960 |
And blindside owes me money because they stole my story. 01:06:27.960 |
So, and you know, that's her seamlessly, and she challenged me, because in, I don't know how long it's been, 01:06:33.960 |
but she challenged me, she said, "You know, who doesn't want a perfect little boy or a little girl helping go to college?" 01:06:38.960 |
And I said, "You know, God adopted us when we were nine and a half years old, 01:06:42.960 |
so why don't we put our hearts and our homes into a station?" 01:06:50.960 |
And then, you know, the Lord led us back, and adoption through divinity is a leap of faith for me and for us. 01:07:01.960 |
She asks me all the time, "You know, where am I going to get the money?" 01:07:06.960 |
And I don't, it's the only one thing that keeps me up at night. 01:07:09.960 |
The only one thing that keeps me up at night is money bombing. 01:07:13.960 |
And I refuse to go and make another snatch, make another thing to do, do the thing I want to do, do this thing I want to do, 01:07:23.960 |
I want this entire process, beginning and everything, to be an act of faith. 01:07:30.960 |
So even for the whole being in our lives, where is the money going to come from, I want it all to be provided by God. 01:07:38.960 |
Because honestly, I want to be that story that you read about, this miracle missionary that's like, "Oh, my gosh, he has all these kids. 01:07:46.960 |
He has no food to feed the kids, but they get together, they give grace, and they get a knock on the door, 01:07:51.960 |
they open the door, and somebody's giving wafer because it's hard to go back." 01:07:57.960 |
And when there's a payment, I don't know what to give them. 01:08:05.960 |
And it's a check for my niece-in-law from Ventura County, and there it is. 01:08:15.960 |
And then next time I think, "Hey, this bill's due." 01:08:25.960 |
And there's -- I get another check in the mail. 01:08:30.960 |
And I want it all to be a story of God's provision and our obedience to His calling. 01:08:40.960 |
So even this recent miscarriage, it's an act of miracle. 01:08:59.960 |
You're going to have to give her an offer, right? 01:09:09.960 |
And, you know, when I felt like He changed our path again, we had to surrender. 01:09:19.960 |
And then the only one we did is when she miscarried. 01:09:32.960 |
Are you going to obey only when it works, but then obey all the time without question?" 01:09:41.960 |
Are you going to be posing out and chasing after a woman? 01:09:50.960 |
And as a herself, she said, "I'm not going to call anybody. 01:09:57.960 |
And the reason I'm doing this strictly is me. 01:10:00.960 |
And only then is when God says, "Okay, then take my understanding. 01:10:08.960 |
I don't know where you guys are going to lie. 01:10:11.960 |
But somebody told me every test is a testimony. 01:10:19.960 |
I want every part of this process to be a testimony of God's faithfulness. 01:10:29.960 |
And I want my family to embrace that faith and forgive us for something great. 01:10:51.960 |
All right, so we'll have a chance to open that up for some questions. 01:10:59.960 |
Just in certain areas so that we can learn a little bit more on certain topics. 01:11:04.960 |
This is based on some of the things that were shared. 01:11:10.960 |
I know there are different challenges with fostering a child. 01:11:13.960 |
Did you have some concerns, fears about fostering? 01:11:17.960 |
And if so, how were you able to deal with it? 01:11:32.960 |
I mean, I have to read it, but I'm going to read it. 01:11:34.960 |
Yeah, so Helen shared about how originally she got the conviction about fostering children. 01:11:44.960 |
As she shared that desire, I agreed about it. 01:11:48.960 |
Like many things we've done in our life, we've been moving to a place where we can do that. 01:12:00.960 |
It's funny because Helen is much more of the -- she'll jump in. 01:12:11.960 |
I'm the planner, the warrior, the contingency. 01:12:15.960 |
So even in the story that Helen shared about how her father called -- her foster sister's name was Hope. 01:12:36.960 |
So I'm more of the -- I think about a lot of these with detail. 01:12:39.960 |
So there are many worries or many contingencies that I think about on possibilities of things that could happen. 01:12:48.960 |
We bring so much into our home because we are planning -- we are not certified yet. 01:12:59.960 |
And it's too long a story to tell it all here, but I can definitely share with you at other times. 01:13:05.960 |
But we're planning on being qualified for a child that's probably anywhere from maybe 4-ish up to 18. 01:13:16.960 |
We said most likely a boy would be best because we're a boy household. 01:13:21.960 |
I mean, I would love to have a little girl, but it's probably for her to be a little bit more uncomfortable. 01:13:28.960 |
Or if it's like siblings, yeah, like a sister and a brother, yeah, we'd be good if we had to come in. 01:13:33.960 |
And, you know, who said ethnicity? No, it doesn't matter. 01:13:39.960 |
But I know that, okay, this person's in the foster care program for a reason, right? 01:13:45.960 |
So most likely there's been some kind of trauma or abuse or neglect or something that's been going on. 01:13:52.960 |
And so the person that's going to be coming to our home may not be the most well-behaved. 01:14:04.960 |
They may have some psychological, you know, different things that are going on. 01:14:09.960 |
We have some good friends from New York who were just here visiting us. 01:14:18.960 |
And they did their first couple-week kind of respite foster care with these brother and sister young kids. 01:14:28.960 |
The YIM sent two of their boys out, and they have three sons of their own. 01:14:32.960 |
And they said, "Man, having those seven boys under our household"—we said, "You're saints for doing that. Thank you so much." 01:14:38.960 |
They said, "Having the seven boys for the whole summer was a lot easier than the two kids that they had for two weeks." 01:14:46.960 |
And so, yeah, so I do think about, you know, like what if this child is a danger to himself or herself or could be a danger to us? 01:14:59.960 |
Because when we had to do our home study, you know, we had to install magnetic locks so that all the sharps are locked up, 01:15:05.960 |
all the chemicals are locked up, medicines are locked, you know, all that kind of thing, in addition to, you know, a whole bunch of other stuff. 01:15:12.960 |
So, you know, so I do—I did have a lot of concerns, you know, and I do still have a lot of concerns. 01:15:21.960 |
You know, we also, you know, we're very sentimental people, I think, in many regards. 01:15:30.960 |
So I do think about how if we bring someone into our home and, you know, get very attached, right, then how will we say goodbye? 01:15:41.960 |
But I think that's part of—you know, as we've been kind of going through this process of praying, 01:15:50.960 |
you know, I pray for, to me, the unknown name, but I think God knows who it is, that, you know, 01:16:01.960 |
there's people who I've talked to that have been told that the need is really great. 01:16:06.960 |
I mean, like cute little infants, you know, they're very adoptable. 01:16:10.960 |
But the kids, as they get older and they have problems and things, that's a very hard to find hope of. 01:16:16.960 |
And I know there's a lot of people at church who are involved in like these teen foster camps and that kind of thing, 01:16:22.960 |
and they're in these group homes, you know, because there are no homes for the kids to go to. 01:16:27.960 |
So, you know, that's also another aspect to this, you know. 01:16:32.960 |
There's, you know, there's just different things. 01:16:36.960 |
Like one of them that I think about a lot and pray about a lot is a lot of the kids that are in the foster care system, 01:16:43.960 |
they say that a much higher percentage of them identify as like LGBTQ, right? 01:16:49.960 |
And then, you know, I feel like, you know, the Bible's very clear, you know, on how God views that. 01:17:00.960 |
But, you know, I really wrestle with that and weigh that and still, you know, and still that's a big burden on me 01:17:08.960 |
because whoever comes into our home, I want to love. 01:17:13.960 |
And it's not like, you know, our biological kids are 20, almost 18 and 12, right? 01:17:19.960 |
None of them are allowed to, well, not that the older ones are not allowed to date, but they're not really supposed to date, right? 01:17:26.960 |
So a young kid, I mean, it's not like we would, you know, let them or whatever, like date or anything like that. 01:17:32.960 |
So I feel like from that standpoint, you know, it's like, I feel like God would provide wisdom day by day. 01:17:42.960 |
But yeah, I think it's just being as a person who needs to plan and likes to control and has had to surrender, you know, 01:17:52.960 |
many things, you know, and God's still working on that aspect of my personality and my character. 01:17:58.960 |
So I just think about like every day, like the challenges that we have. 01:18:05.960 |
But it's, you know, it's just really lifting that up to the Lord and realizing that, yeah, in many ways, 01:18:11.960 |
I know that we're going to be unprepared in that as much as we try to prepare and get training and pray and whatnot. 01:18:18.960 |
I know that there are so many things because every chapter of life, you know, whether it was getting married or having, you know, 01:18:23.960 |
biological kids or whatnot, you know, moving, it's like there's so many things that came out that were unexpected that God used. 01:18:31.960 |
And so I guess, you know, it's just knowing that there is going to be a lot of stuff like that that I can't, you know, foresee. 01:18:42.960 |
That's going to be just kind of hit us and we're going to be like, wow, I never expected this. 01:18:47.960 |
That's scary, but I feel like it is, you know, like Lee said, exercising of that faith like a muscle. 01:19:02.960 |
The next question I actually wanted to ask Kat, because, you know, when we were talking, you shared, you know, 01:19:09.960 |
the international adoption is very expensive. 01:19:14.960 |
And you shared with me how you dealt with it as far as the finances that you kind of grew in this area. 01:19:26.960 |
For me, I think when we got married, I think I just had a lot more simple, like, expectation of what he would want life to look like. 01:19:40.960 |
Whereas I had like higher expectations that aren't necessarily wrong in and of itself. 01:19:46.960 |
I desire to one day buy a house, I move out right off the bat, and we'll probably rent an apartment. 01:19:53.960 |
And I think I pictured like a baby, a newborn child, like with my parents and his parents, and we'll go somewhere there. 01:20:03.960 |
But I came, like, initially, like, well, do you feel like you have to have a house? 01:20:12.960 |
And I was like, yeah, like, I feel like at some point, like, everyone says that it's very unwise to keep pouring your money out and living in an apartment. 01:20:23.960 |
Like, so why is it a financial decision to invest in a home? 01:20:27.960 |
So I think that's the right decision, is that everyone says that. 01:20:34.960 |
And I think I like really held on to that thought that I really wanted this house. 01:20:44.960 |
I wanted it to be like in Irvine or Huston if we were going to live down here. 01:20:49.960 |
And God, as he moved my heart for adoption, he didn't like right away give me like clear green lights to pursue adoption. 01:21:09.960 |
There were some roadblocks along the way, one of which I think, like, between the two of us, I was more ready to like fill up my work and stuff. 01:21:23.960 |
And so, like, I think because he didn't give us green lights for adoption right off the bat, I would pray to pay God, like, what exactly do you need me to give up? 01:21:40.960 |
And like very clearly he showed me like this adamant desire to like have a house and have this comfortable lifestyle. 01:21:48.960 |
At our kids' sort of college, Everest always challenges me, like, well, what if like our kid were to have a normal life? 01:21:54.960 |
Will you feel like they have a very fulfilling life? 01:22:04.960 |
And so, for the first time, I think over time, God really opened my heart and showed me like, and I would pray these things where it's like, Lord, like, you can have a house. 01:22:17.960 |
Like, Lord, you can have the lifestyle that I ever wanted if you let me pursue adoption. 01:22:27.960 |
So it was kind of like an almanac scene, right? 01:22:32.960 |
So it's like a very clear, what I wanted and what I expected, God took away for something better. 01:22:45.960 |
And realizing that our finances can't be spent building up my kingdom here, but it has to be something more worthwhile. 01:23:00.960 |
But even so, Everest reminds me, this child who turned 18, leaves the home, never looked back, never became a Christian. 01:23:11.960 |
Will you feel like you gave up your house for nothing? 01:23:15.960 |
Will you feel like you gave up your life for nothing? 01:23:18.960 |
And my prayer is constantly that it will be that I can only be faithful because he's given us this conviction to be faithful in pursuing this for now. 01:23:53.960 |
It would be good to answer them so we could all be educated. 01:23:58.960 |
And then we'll wrap up with actually praying for our brothers and sisters. 01:24:02.960 |
Because I'd like for us to pray for them and also pray that our church will have this culture part for foster care and adoption. 01:24:15.960 |
But actually the next question is, someone asked what are some considerations for domestic versus international adoption? 01:24:22.960 |
And I asked if Jason and Jen, how you went through the process between the two. 01:24:28.960 |
I think for us, to be honest, we didn't necessarily do a ton of research before. 01:24:37.960 |
I think we had a general idea about whether it was foster care, adopt, or if it was straight, infant, domestic adoption, or international adoption. 01:24:48.960 |
But I think our idea was kind of, we just kind of felt we needed to adopt a pre-up. 01:24:57.960 |
I don't know if those drop-offs are being associated with the other partners at that time. 01:25:02.960 |
Just looking at the criteria, we were thinking it was possible. 01:25:10.960 |
I think some things that we thought about was, it would be super comfortable with most domestic adoptions are relatively more open. 01:25:22.960 |
Which we weren't necessarily really close to, but those are things we obviously consider. 01:25:29.960 |
I think we were open to not necessarily adopting an infant, so we were okay with that. 01:25:39.960 |
So Maria, you know, a lot of you choose age or gender and have to be open to certain much moderate medical conditions in general to apply. 01:25:50.960 |
So I think that was a lot of things we were doing. 01:25:56.960 |
But I think later on, we started learning a little bit more. 01:26:00.960 |
Yeah, we realized there are really good options for domestic adoption too. 01:26:05.960 |
We definitely want to be more educated in and be careful of. 01:26:10.960 |
I think fostering should always be a more practical thing. 01:26:15.960 |
We were thinking about it initially, but then realizing a lot of people do domestic adoption for a pregnant mom, 01:26:25.960 |
which means a baby for their child on the floor. 01:26:29.960 |
I realized that pregnant moms and people do more by putting on them to the cost for awareness. 01:26:40.960 |
It could be similar for international adoption, but domestic adoption as well. 01:26:50.960 |
I think with domestic, there's an aspect to it where you can see that people can change their mind, 01:26:58.960 |
versus international where it's kind of set along the back line. 01:27:02.960 |
Thinking about certain aspects of that overall, just kind of came down to what we were comfortable with too. 01:27:14.960 |
A lot of it, like what I mentioned earlier too, we were more exposed to and heard a lot about the cult already from the get-go, 01:27:25.960 |
We heard a lot about how well they could fix the process and take the procedures involved in fostering parents, 01:27:35.960 |
even going through and competing with the doctors and doctors and evaluated physical, mental, and social. 01:27:49.960 |
It just kind of reassured me too that we were comfortable with the service. 01:27:55.960 |
I think overall, I think I have a strong bias for one necessarily. 01:28:01.960 |
It's just, it just came down to what we were comfortable with at the time we made the decision. 01:28:09.960 |
I have a question about what are some considerations for deciding between fostering versus adopting, 01:28:17.960 |
and kind of the response to that, what were some of the thought processes that you guys have been through? 01:28:25.960 |
Yeah, so we're just on the very last stage of the process of fostering parents. 01:28:34.960 |
I mean, it's not that we wouldn't be open to fostering adoptions at that point. 01:28:39.960 |
That was the initial, but for now we are just being certified to be fostering parents. 01:28:46.960 |
I think in terms of whether you're choosing to go the route of adopting or go the route of fostering, 01:28:57.960 |
I think the initial sort of conviction comes from the same place where you saw a lot of the verses that Paul and Hillary both shared. 01:29:05.960 |
I mean, those were things that prompted our hearts and convicted us. 01:29:10.960 |
You know, we just thought, I mean, I try to live a golden code as a Christian. 01:29:18.960 |
Our children have us, and they have family, and something would happen to us, but if they didn't, 01:29:24.960 |
wouldn't we want someone who is a person of faith to take them in so that they would be brought up in that kind of environment? 01:29:33.960 |
So, you know, that's why we kind of, you know, one of the motivations of why we wanted to foster. 01:29:41.960 |
But as far as like going fostering versus adopting, just as we were learning about the need and just how things work in the system, 01:29:54.960 |
it seemed like, as we were talking to our social worker and going through various steps, that there is a very large need of children that are in the system 01:30:05.960 |
that have not had their rights relinquished by their parents, right? 01:30:12.960 |
And so they are in need of a home, but they're not necessarily in need of adoption at this time. 01:30:20.960 |
And, you know, we thought, and I shared about how, okay, what if we bring someone into our house and they stay with us, 01:30:26.960 |
you know, because it's indefinite in their fostering. It might be a few weeks, it might be years. 01:30:30.960 |
And, yeah, we think about how, you know, of course you're going to want to love as much as you can until you grow to have, 01:30:37.960 |
like how can you say goodbye to someone if you have that kind of attachment? 01:30:42.960 |
But, you know, I thought about how, you know, even our own children, they're not really ours, right? 01:30:51.960 |
They don't possess them. God has given them to us as a gift. 01:30:56.960 |
And, yeah, at some point they will, you know, they will leave the home and hope that, you know, they will have a saving faith 01:31:04.960 |
and that they will live in a way that's a little bit more. 01:31:07.960 |
But the thing that people hope for, the best outcome that people hope for, even from a humanistic standpoint, 01:31:14.960 |
is that the children, you take care of them while their biological mother or father or, you know, families 01:31:22.960 |
resolve whatever issue they're going through, right? 01:31:25.960 |
So whether it is, you know, a homeless or whether they have drug addiction or whether they're in prison or whatever it is that they're going through, 01:31:34.960 |
that they can get beyond that, that they can be healed of what it is that they're going through. 01:31:41.960 |
And then the child can be restored back to that family. 01:31:45.960 |
There can be that, right, that healing and there can be that reconciliation. 01:31:49.960 |
And so, you know, again, for just a humanistic example, that's what the agency is hoping for. 01:31:54.960 |
But as Christians, you know, our prayer really is that, yeah, that that can happen. 01:32:00.960 |
That there can be healing, not just healing of a psychological or emotional nature, 01:32:05.960 |
but in the time that we have a child, that we can pour out our love and share the love of God. 01:32:11.960 |
And then, you know, if that's the only avenue that they have, they can take that. 01:32:19.960 |
And then if God works in mysterious ways, that can be one avenue through which the gospel is introduced. 01:32:33.960 |
It was, I think it's a common question that people, I think, and fear is, 01:32:40.960 |
is it a common problem that some of the parents face in treating their biological versus adopted children differently? 01:33:02.960 |
Yeah, I mean, for me, that was one of the things I shared was a big concern. 01:33:07.960 |
Can I love my non-biological child just as much as my biological child? 01:33:14.960 |
The simple answer is yes, I can and I do love Ellie. 01:33:18.960 |
But the interesting thing is, you know, out of the flesh, there are days that I love Ellie more than I do Jonathan. 01:33:27.960 |
There are days I love Jonathan more than Ellie. 01:33:30.960 |
And there are days I don't like either of them. 01:33:35.960 |
So, it doesn't matter if they're biological or non-biological. 01:33:45.960 |
And to be honest, I don't know if everybody's like that, but for us, it's been, I just don't think about it. 01:33:54.960 |
It just doesn't become because here's a child and every day I wake up and I tell myself, she's my adopted child. 01:34:04.960 |
I wake up and she's my daughter and she's annoying. 01:34:10.960 |
And I say, "She won't dad." Or there's times that she comes and she hugs me and we cuddle and tell stories and she reads. 01:34:21.960 |
She's very different than Jonathan, obviously, she's a female. 01:34:36.960 |
I don't know if that's the case for everybody, but for me it hasn't been. 01:36:08.960 |
I think one of the good things about having a child, a biological child, is I can kind of describe. 01:36:19.960 |
There were times when he was going through some awkward stage that I wanted to keep my distance in the front end. 01:36:36.960 |
And it's like, there was an awkward stage that I, you know, I had a hard time with my own biological child. 01:36:45.960 |
And so, you know, she's given me some of those things too. 01:36:51.960 |
But I think because I felt that with my own biological child, it's really not that important. 01:37:02.960 |
And those days when she acts up and I feel like, oh, I need to pray for love. 01:37:07.960 |
So I think for us, I think you and I are pretty much on the same page that if there are those days where I struggle loving this child, 01:37:17.960 |
I mean, first of all, it's my own fulfillment, and it's not because she's adopted. 01:37:27.960 |
I know what's great, and I need to deal with this with the grace of God providing. 01:37:31.960 |
I think that part, I feel the same with my biological child and my non-biological. 01:37:37.960 |
I need God's grace to bring both of them up in a way that isn't blurred. 01:37:41.960 |
But that's how I feel about, you know, my own heart towards my children. 01:37:53.960 |
Okay, so there are some common themes that came up, and I certainly, hearing their story and why, and, you know, 01:38:03.960 |
some messages and preaching right here, brother. 01:38:06.960 |
You know, very encouraged, and you see their love and sacrifice, and, you know, it's encouraging. 01:38:13.960 |
So let's end it by maybe, you know, let's split up, and then maybe you guys come, and we'll go to different, let's pray for them, you know, 01:38:26.960 |
through the process right now, and also pray that God would give our church this culture of adopting and foster care. 01:38:34.960 |
And I think they are, you know, pioneers here. 01:38:38.960 |
You know, we kind of, you know, did it, and then we have our brothers and sisters here who are pioneers, 01:38:45.960 |
and we hope that, you know, they will be an example to other brothers and sisters in our church, and we'll see more of that. 01:38:53.960 |
So why don't we do that, maybe, can you guys go in different places, and then if you can kind of balance yourselves, 01:39:00.960 |
and we will pray for where they are right now in their process, their child who has not been set yet.