Chosen and Dearly Loved
What being an adoptive mom has taught me about God
I’ve been interviewed on podcasts many times, but never by my own son. It was a breezy summer afternoon and Joseph was home from college for a visit. Everyone else in the house was elsewhere and he suggested it might be a good time to record that interview he wanted to do for the new video podcast he and his friend are working on for YouTube. He gave me a few questions in advance so I could think about my answers while we rearranged part of the backyard as our outdoor studio. As the camera started rolling, the child I once held in my arms took charge and a man sat across from me. He was confident, well-spoken, and direct with his questions. I settled into my role as interviewee feeling like it was a practice run or a school project. Yet, he rolled out one deep question after another, uncovering thoughts and feelings I hadn’t spoken in front of a camera before. Then, he asked this one, “How did becoming a mother – especially to me – change the way you saw God?”
Suddenly, the toddler I held in my arms and heart during a two and a half year heart “labor” was peering into two of the most intimate spaces of my soul, my faith and my motherhood. With the camera rolling, I paused while my heart caught up to my head, took a breath, and attempted to deliver a calm and composed answer. You’ll have to watch the interview someday to see how it came out, but this is the longer answer, the one I’ve had weeks to ponder.
Becoming a mother to Joseph and Duane through international adoption had some similarities to birthing our four biological children. We had prayed before we started the process, mulled over whether we had the resources or not (some would argue with us on our answer to this LOL), asked a lot of questions, and then made the leap. We met them at Amani Baby Cottage in Uganda while serving short-term with another organization and held them in our arms. After that, the process of them coming home felt a lot more like the gestation of an elephant. Two years crept by with highs, lows, doubts, and fears similar to the four other pregnancies I had been through. As we navigated piles of paperwork with our Ugandan lawyer from afar, we prepared for their eventual arrival. It felt risky and our emotions were raw. Are they healthy? Will this process end with them being in our arms? What if it doesn’t?
When Joseph asked what I had learned about GOD through becoming his mom, I took a dignified pause and answered honestly. I said something about them being chosen, even though they had physical needs, when they had done nothing to earn our love. That’s what God did for all of us. The verse that was on my mind as I answered was Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
The next part of my answer focused on the fact that their adoption into our family gives them all of the rights and privileges our biological children have. Joseph and Duane truly entered our family with all of the struggles, sacrifices, and challenges that brought, but they’ve also received all of the benefits. They are heirs to the same inheritance, however large or small that is. That picture of inheritance comes from Romans 8:15-17, “For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.”
Paul’s letter to the Ephesians (chapter 2, verses 3-9) communicates the way God pursues us and saves us, even when we aren’t “cleaned up” or worthy.”
“…Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. ”
The hardest seasons and circumstances of my life have taught me the most about God and His love. When I was at my lowest, cloaked in shame, He sought me, forgave me, and gave me a new life. Similarly, there was nothing Joseph or Duane did to prove themselves to us on that day we held them for the first time. As a matter of fact, they both had physical challenges that were visible and others we didn’t even know of. We’re all like that before God. He doesn’t require us to DO anything but receive Him. He scoops us up, redeems us, and gives us new life in Him and an inheritance in His eternal Kingdom. Whew! That’s good news!
There are many other examples of what I’ve learned about God through being Joseph’s mom, but I’ll close with this. I’d do anything for that kid, just like I’d do for any of my kids. My heart longs to be connected with them and when they’re in distress, I yearn to speak the truth to them, set them on a right path, and heap grace on them. Granted, they’re humans just like the rest of us and I recognize I need to allow them to walk out their own journey to God just like I did myself. Now that they’re all adults, I see God’s love for me even more clearly. He pursues me. He loves me no matter what. He’s there for me even when I don’t call on Him. He created me to be in relationship with Him, not because He needed me to do anything for Him. Most of all, He loves me more than I can understand or fathom. The heart-wrenching, painful, deep, and rewarding love of being a mom only scratches the surface of God’s love and I’m beyond blessed to have tasted a drop of it.
