Where it All Began

“There are about 100,000 children in foster care that are currently waiting to be adopted across America, and there are over 100,000,000 professing Christians in the same area. Why aren’t Christians opening more of their homes to these kids when God clearly calls us to care for the widows and the orphans? Where’s the disconnect?” This was the statement that first made me consider fostering about 5 years ago. I had been listening to Francis Chan preach while driving from job to job working as a technician, and the rebuke hit me like a ton of bricks. The truth is, I had never even considered foster care. I honestly would have been happy stopping at the one girl we had at the time. On top of that, I was going to school full time and working anywhere from 45-55 hours a week, so taking on extra responsibilities was not at the top of my list. But God had other plans. The sermon stuck out to me, so I brought the idea back to my wife Rachel. After a few days, I basically forgot about the sermon, but Rach was actively looking at agencies, and so while I brought the idea home, it was Rach who did all of the leg work. She found an agency in town, and within about three months we were trained and certified. Not even 24 hours later, we received a call for our first placement, which we accepted.

It’s been four and a half years since we were first certified. Throughout those years, we have adopted four children, have two biological children, had a teen-mom who briefly made us grandparents at the ripe old age of 27, had a number of kids come through for respite, and we currently have one sweet girl as a foster placement. Altogether, we currently have seven kids in our home. While most of the time it’s utter chaos, there is something about foster care that teaches our kids that people are important, and they’re worth it.

Rach and I have wanted to start a blog on this for a long time. We’ve finally realized that there will never really be a time when everything settles down, so we’re going to try to just resurrect Rach's old one and see what happens by each writing about it from our different perspectives. We want to give others a view of what fostering might do to your family (both good and bad), or how one might help even if they can’t take in a child as a placement, and lastly, how God has provided for us over and over again, prepping us for each next step we were about to take.