Special Needs Adoption Journey

For whoever wants to save his life will lose it,

but whoever loses his life for me will find it.

~Jesus~

Special needs adoption is a broad description of a whole slew of various situations. Vlad was our first realistic look into special needs adoption. Because his particular special situation is Down Syndrome and so he would possibly never leave home, I remember thinking, "This may cost me the rest of my life." Gasp! Did I really just think that? What have I been doing the last 15 years as a Christ follower if I am just NOW giving up my life???? Whatever happened to, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." (Galatians 2:20)

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship." Romans 12:1

I remember asking God, "Is it still faith if I'm scared to death when I step out of the boat or do I need to have it all figured out first?" That VERY afternoon, I received an e-mail that included 1 Corinthians 2 from the Message in which Paul states about his ministry in Corinth:

"I was unsure of how to go about this, and felt totally
inadequate—I was scared to death, if you want the truth of
it—and so nothing I said could have impressed you or anyone else. But the Message came through anyway. God's Spirit and God's power did it, which made it clear that your life of faith is a response to God's power, not to some fancy mental or emotional footwork by me or anyone else."

Paul himself was "scared to death!" I never noticed that before.

Obviously, we came to the conclusion that we would not be adding Vlad to our family, but we celebrate with such joy that his family has found him. He opened our hearts to special needs adoption and for that we are thankful. We do not intend to seek out difficulties for the fun of it, but we don't intend to run from them for the sake of our comfort either.

"I know, O LORD, that a man's life is not his own;
it is not for man to direct his steps." Jeremiah 10:23