Why Adopt?

 I recently read through a sermon from John Piper about adoption. It pretty much sums up why we made our decision to grow our family through adoption. The following is a summary (along with a few thoughts of my own) of the parts of his sermon that really apply to the decisions that we have made. You can find the entire sermon here.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. - Eph 1:3-6

Adoption is part of God's plan and for His glory (Eph 1:5-6). God's rescuing us from our sin was not an afterthought. In the same way, adoption has always been a part of our (God's) plan for our family. We are not adopting because we can't have our own biological children (obviously); instead, we feel that it is something that God has called our family to do. This isn't because we are great and extraordinary people. Andy and I are not adopting because we are wonderful or because we are seeking the praise and approval of others. We are adopting for God's glory; just as our adoption into God's family is for God's glory.

Adoption is through Jesus Christ. "We were not cute little orphans that God was attracted to; we were enemies in rebellion against God" (Rom. 5:6; 5:10). Our adoption into God's family is not based on our being worthy or cute or attractive. "It is based on the free and sovereign grace of God planned before the world and bought for us by the blood of Christ." We love because we have been loved. Following God's example, our adopted son is loved freely without meeting any conditions. We will not wait to love him until he obeys us; we will not wait to love him until he responds to us; we will not wait to love him until he loves us; we love him now - before he even knows us or even realizes that we exist.

"We are adopted by God that we will rejoice that God made much of us." Again, it comes back to God's glory. Every believer knows that without Christ our best is merely filthy rags. We do not accomplish things in our own strength but through His. Similarly, in adopting our son, our aim is not to "take a child's low views of self and replace them with high views of self. Rather our aim is to take a child's low views of God and replace them with high views of God."

Finally, adoption must occur with our eyes wide open. (This really relates to adding children to your family through whatever means because certainly problems with children are not unique to adoption.) We understand that there will be pain but there will also be joy. We know that "the grace of God is sufficient for every new day no matter how difficult. . . . His mercies are new every morning and there will be mercies for every weight and wonder on this new path in our lives."