A Clear Sign

Sometimes when you hear of world happenings, it so affects you that you dwell upon it long after the time you first learned of it.

It was back in high school when I first became aware of China's one-child policy. When I heard of the ways in which this policy was enforced, I felt devastated. Combined with the Chinese cultural preference for boys, my heart truly broke for the women and girls of China.

When Matt and I got married, we both knew we wanted about three kids, maybe four. We were first blessed with Madison in 1996 and then Brevin in 1999.

The idea of adoption came along in an unexpected way. One day I was sitting on a park bench watching Madison play while nursing Brevin and admiring a little Asian girl who was playing and laughing nearby. I commented to Matt about how cute she was, and he responded, "I would be happy to try to give you one of those, Anita, but I just don't think we can make one. I'll be glad to try for the rest of my life, though!" In my attempt for a rebuttal to that, I blurted out, "Well, we could adopt one!"

I'm sure Matt didn't think about it again, and he had no idea of the flood of thoughts he had just loosed within me. All my feelings towards the situation in China came back to me. And I knew that China must have an exorbitant amount of female orphans. I realized that adopting an orphan from China would be a great way to do something to help the social crisis there. I knew I would probably never be a missionary to China nor be able to change the policies there, but I could make a difference in the life of one child.

One day I said to Matt, "You know, we really could adopt a baby from China." To which he replied, "Yeah, right!" As I got him to realize I was serious, he agreed to at least pray about it. I prayed about it as well.

One day I remember in particular, I had spent the morning praying about adopting from China and asking God to show us His will. Afterwards, I took Madison (approx. 5 yrs.) and Brevin (about 2) to the park to play. And there at the playground was a Caucasian woman with her three children: two caucasian and one adopted from China. I was stunned. How many times had I asked for God to just tell me what to do, just send me a FAX or a burning bush? This time He had. This was A CLEAR SIGN.

I continued to pray and think about it as Matt did. When we came back to discuss God's will for our family, we both had to admit that while being open to adoption, we still wanted to have one more biological child. What's truly amazing is that now we know that at the time we weren't even old enough nor did we have enough annual income for an adoption from China.

In 2002, we were blessed with Elijah. I remember that once I had my second boy, I knew that I also wanted another girl. And I began secretly researching China adoptions when Matt wasn't looking. (At this point in our lives, we were living in a 2 bedroom apartment and the idea was totally implausible) When Elijah turned one, we both agreed that we were done having biological children. Matt especially felt that if we were to have more children, it would be better to provide a family to one of the millions of orphans already in the world rather than to bring another child into the world. Though the definite decision to adopt had not been made at this point, I knew Matt was on board and it would only be a matter of time....

Labels: china adoptions