New Purpose, New Focus

“We slept on little beds of trash.” His words, the words of a four year old Ugandan orphan, played over and over in my head. His name is Derrick; he and his sister were adopted by a friend of my sister’s a little over a year ago. As his language skills developed, he was able to tell his family the things that he and his sister experienced before coming to America. His words haunted me. Little did I know, his story would change my life.

The sights and sounds of the Christmas holidays surrounded me but all I could think of was this child and others like him. As the days passed, my heart broke again and again for the orphans of Africa and around the world. The conditions they live in, so different from the luxuries that you and I experience everyday. True, I have experienced poverty. As the second daughter of a single mother, we struggled to make ends meet, there were days we didn’t have heat, water or food. We struggled for many years but with a lot of hard work, we pulled ourselves up and carried on. I’ve never experienced the bone-crushing poverty that these innocent children face everyday. And so I prayed.

I prayed that God would show me the next step in his plan. I prayed that I could be of service in some way, shape or form to these children. The burden that he laid on my heart for them couldn’t be ignored. He was calling me to adopt.

My family was apprehensive. I have lived the majority of my adult life as a single person. I don’t have a family of my own or a mate. Until this point, I had always been undecided on the topic of children. I loved my nephews as if they were my own and delighted in the children of my friends but I was never certain that children were in the cards for me. It only made sense that my Mom and sister would be confused or conflicted about my announcement. They were full of questions, as they should have been. I had questions of my own but my answer always returned to God’s calling for me.

As I began doing my research and attending meetings with adoption agencies, my sole focus was on helping these children. In honesty, it hadn’t dawned on me that someone would one day call me “Mama.” It sounded so foreign. I was going to be a Mom. A Mom! And now there is nothing more important to me, everything else in my life has taken a back seat. Every selfish impulse, every doubtful thought has given way to this singular goal– bringing my child home. The paperwork, the training classes, the fund-raising, as challenging as it might be, all gets me one step closer to meeting my child.

I’m adopting from Ethiopia. My request is for a boy ranging in age from 0-3 years. I pray for him every night. I pray that God will keep him safe until I can reach him. I pray for his care givers and his birth parents. Their jobs can not and will not be easy.

I am not a person of great financial means. I’ve been working since I was 14 years old and have always been a hard worker. I am financially stable– my bills are paid on time each month and I put as much as I possibly can into a savings account. Since I began the adoption process, I have saved every nickel, dime and penny that I can squeeze out of my budget but sometimes things come up. Sometimes portions of the adoption fund are used to buy a new washer when the 25 year old model I used breaks down or to repair the plumbing when the toilet starts to leak. It’s discouraging but I press on. Nothing will keep me from my son, certainly not something as surmountable as money.

It is my belief that God will provide everything that is needed to make this adoption successful as long as I keep saying “yes.” “Yes” to things that I can not foresee or plan for. “Yes” to things that will push me out of my comfort zone. “Yes” to things that will challenge me. I know I will be challenged. I will have to turn to others for help when my greatest fear is being viewed as helpless. It’s won’t be easy but no one promised it would be.

This adoption will grow and change me, as much as I will help grow and change the life of this child. But I know, beyond the shadow of a doubt that I was made for this, and this child, this boy half a world away was made to be my son.