from hope to reality

From Laura Christianson, author of The Adoption Network:

Hope you’re having a wonderful summer! I’m taking a break from publishing Adoption World e-zine until September, but to celebrate my wedding anniversary, I’m having a 1-day book bash on August 21. 

Here’s how it works:

1.  Buy The Adoption Decision: 15 Things You Want to Know Before Adopting on Amazon.com.

2.  Send me your Amazon proof-of-purchase, dated August 21, 2008, and your mailing address.

3.  I’ll mail you an autographed copy of The Adoption Network: Your Guide to Starting a Support System, absolutely free!

This is a $10 value, plus I pay the shipping on The Adoption Network.

Is there a catch?

Nope. Dozens of people who have received free books from me during my periodic specials will attest to the fact that I’ll send your free book promptly, and I won’t hassle you with a bunch of unsolicited emails.

Both my books have a 5-star rating from Amazon reviewers.

Tell everybody about this special, 1-day offer, so they can stock up on free books:

• Tell your adoption agency, social worker, or attorney.
• Tell others you know who are considering adopting.
• Tell your clergyperson…these books give any church that’s considering starting an adoption ministry a jump-start.
• Tell people who are looking for a gift to buy you.

Please place the One Day Sale Ad on your own blog or Website, or forward this e-mail to others who might be interested. If you have an Amazon Associates account and people buy The Adoption Decision from your Associates link, you’ll earn up to 15% in referral fees for book you sell on Amazon!

To copy the ad:

1. Right click on the ad in the upper right corner of this e-mail, and choose “Save Image As.”
2. Save it to your hard drive or storage device.
3. Insert the image into your own blog post.

Where to send your Amazon proof-of-purchase:

E-mail it to me (or send it as an attachment) with “1-Day Sale” in the Subject line: laurachristianson@hotmail.com.

OR

Send it via snail mail to Laura Christianson, PO Box 1254, Snohomish, WA 98291-1254. I’ll honor any Amazon proof-of-purchase for The Adoption Decision dated 8-21-08, as long as I receive it by 8-31-08.

Hope you enjoy your new books and please, write and tell me what you think of them.

Michael Monroe, leader of Irving Bible Church’s adoption ministry Tapestry, believes that the church should be “the safest place on earth for adoptive and foster families.” Unfortunately, it often is not. Read Michael’s two-part series on this important topic: The Safest Place on Earth - Part 1 and Part 2.

Check out Tapestry’s many other adoption resources.

As many of you know, in honor of his daughter Maria Sue, Steven Curtis Chapman wrote a CNN article entitled, “Our Tragedy and God’s Love for Orphans.” It is a great example of how vertical love (God’s adoptive love for us) can move horizontally (our adoptive love for an orphan). Steven’s article about Maria and God’s love for orphans moved me deeply because of the two adoption stories God wrote in our family through the illness and death of our firstborn son, Daniel.

God used our son Daniel’s untreatable illness and untimely death at three years old to send our family on two wonderful adoption journeys. Ten months before Daniel died the Lord brought Isaiah Owen into our family through adoption. A year after Daniel’s death God gave us Noah Daniel (Noah means rest). We named our second adopted son “Noah Daniel” to remind us of the “rest God had given Daniel.” Since then, we have come to see God’s gracious provision of adoption within Scripture’s story of redemption as the story of God’s gift of rest to His afflicted children. It is through the consummation of our adoption—the redemption of our bodies—that God gives us rest from all of our affliction (see Romans 8:23). Our family sees a strong connection between the affliction and death of our first son Daniel and the treasure of the gift of adoption. So in honor of this wonderful connection, I share the tribute I wrote for Daniel’s memorial service in November 2002.  Click on the article image link below to read the entire tribute.

Steven Curtis Chapman and family were interviewed on Good Morning America today about the death of Maria Sue Chunxi Chapman. Watch the interview here (Note: Interview begins with a short clip of the interview, moves into a commercial, and then shows the full seven minute interview).

Carolina Hope invites you to join us for an Ethiopia Orphan Benefit Dinner & Auction at Furman University (Greenville, SC) on Saturday, September 6, from 6:30-8:30 p.m.

In addition to dinner, the fundraiser will feature…

• » live musical entertainment
• » a silent auction with jewelry, rounds of golf, clothing, home interior pieces, purses, spa treatments, a girls night out package, and more

Read more at our Relief Dinner page.

:: posted by josh ::

Registration for Together for Adoption Conference 2008 is now open! Please join us for this unique event as we explore what our adoption in Christ means for us and for orphans.

Conference Speakers: Rick Phillips, Russell Moore, Carl Robbins, and Tullian Tchividjian.

See conference schedule here.

The Texas Christian University Institute of Child Development is conducting a study to validate an attachment measure for their research. They need families who are willing to take about one hour of their time to complete a questionnaires about their adopted children. The set of questionnaires would include two reports of your child’s behaviors and one brief demographic questionnaire.

The study hopes to provide further insight and support for children. For more information go to the website linked to above.

(Karen Purvis, who wrote the excellent book, The Connected Child, is a faculty member at TCU. She provides much counseling and advice to adoptive parents. See this post about her book.)

:: posted by josh ::

Carolina Hope Christian Adoption Agency now has a Kazakhstan adoption program. Read more about it on our Kazakhstan page.

Here’s a little information about the children in need of adoption from Kazakhstan:

Kazakhstani children in need of families are in that situation for many of the same reasons children around the world need to be adopted: birthparent relinquishment, termination of parental rights, and abandonment.

Most Kazakhstani children in need of adoption are over the age of one. A newborn released for adoption will remain in a maternity hospital for the first 3 months of his life. After that, he must go through the process below, which applies to all Kazakhstani orphans. At the time of adoption, infants are at least 9 months old, usually older. (more…)

[[NOTE: A FAMILY HAS BEEN FOUND FOR THESE CHILDREN.]]

A South Carolina family is needed to adopt Caucasian - African American twins. Both birth parents have a history of bi-polar disorder. If you are interested and have an approved home study, please call our office and ask for Lisa.

Please pass this information on to families you know that might be interested.

:: posted by josh ::

This is a reworked and reformatted article. To read the article, click on the image below, and you will be able to download the article as a PDF.

To read the article, click on the image below, and you will be able to download the article as a PDF.

Helping Your Adopted Child: Understanding Your Child’s Unique Identity by Paul David Tripp

Publisher’s Description: Long before you decided to adopt, long before your child was born, God planned to put your adopted child into your home. Your child is an amazing gift from God, but nurturing an adopted child also brings unique challenges.

Understanding your adopted child from God’s perspective will allow you to address those challenges by faith and with hope. Learn from counselor and adoptive father Paul David Tripp how to help adopted children understand their identity and place in God’s world.

Check out Jason Kovacs’ excellent post on adoption at Desiring God’s blog. It is entitled “Glorifying the Father of the Fatherless.”

We’re pleased to announce that Dan Cruver is now the Director of Together for Adoption (T4A), an organization that he co-founded. Although we’re sad to lose Dan as our Director of Ministry Outreach, we are excited about the new ministry opportunities he will have through T4A — and we’re also happy that he will continue to contribute occasional posts to our blog.

You can read more about T4A at Dan’s blog profile, and also here and here.

We wish God’s blessing to Dan as he continues spreading the word about God’s passion for big-a Adoption (theological adoption) and little-a adoption (horizontal adoption), and we look forward to continuing our close partnership.

:: posted by josh ::

In a post two days ago, Dorothy Bode wrote in answer to those who ask the question, “Am I making a terrible mistake by adopting transracially?”:

The main thing I help them question is their motivations. “Is God building your family or are you trying to do it in spite of Him and in your own strength and wisdom” Outside of God, I think there are mistakes made in adoption plans. With him, I trust there are not.

The same basic question can be changed to cover many different adoption situations — it can apply to children who are older, disabled, in foster care, abused or neglected. If our answer to the question is “Yes, we are following God’s lead and planning in this,” then we can rest in Him because he makes no mistakes.

Although I typically concur with Dorothy’s insights with a hearty yea-and-amen, in this case I felt like saying, “Yes, but…” (more…)

Back in March I asked you to consider donating to the Ethiopian Group Home that we’re helping out. Well, I’m asking again. We’ve made some good progress, but there are many items that are still needed. Please take a look at the needs and consider making a donation.

Thanks!

:: posted by josh ::

Jordan and Jessa Anderson, two of our Caedmon’s Call benefit concert sponsors, have both just come out with their own albums.  Check out their music!

Jordan’s album / Jessa’s album

This is one of the hardest questions that adoptive parents ask me. It is layers deep and generations long. It goes into the big issues of acceptance and love, guilt and anger, and the ever-present fear of being wrong that plagues so many people. The best answer I have for these parents is to ask more questions and lead them into their own answers. The main thing I help them question is their motivations. “Is God building your family or are you trying to do it in spite of Him and in your own strength and wisdom?” Outside of God, I think there are mistakes made in adoption plans. With him, I trust there are not.

The same basic question can be changed to cover many different adoption situations — it can apply to children who are older, disabled, in foster care, abused or neglected. If our answer to the question is “Yes, we are following God’s lead and planning in this,” then we can rest in Him because he makes no mistakes.

:: posted by dorothy ::

I wanted to make you aware of the new Gospel Coalition website. One of its great new features is links to audio sermons by TGC council members. I was pleased to discover that it devotes an entire page to council members’ sermons on adoption. There are sermons on adoption by John Piper, Mark Dever, Ligon Duncan, Scotty Smith, and others. Let me encourage you to make use of this great new resource, particularly the sermon links it provides on adoption.

Commenting on Ephesians 1:3-6, Dr. Michael Barrett writes:

“The adoption of children is specifically defined as being accomplished through the agency or mediation of Jesus Christ (v. 4).  The Lord Jesus as the Second Person of the Holy Trinity is the eternal object of His Father’s love.  Christ testified to this eternal love in His great intercessory prayer: ‘Thou hast loved me before the foundation of the world’ and thou ‘hast loved them, as thou hast loved me’ (John 17:24, 23).  To be the objects of God’s love, displayed in His predestinating us unto the adoption of children, is to be loved in the same way as and with the same infinite dimension with which the Father loves His only begotten Son.  God does not treat His adopted children as second class members of the family; He loves them as He loves Christ. This defies explanation but demands belief” (Michael P.V. Barrett, Complete in Him: A Guide to Understanding and Enjoying the Gospel, 173-174).

It is our knowledge and enjoyment of this incomparable adoptive love that should move us out as the church to visit orphans in their affliction (James 1:27). As John writes, “we love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

:: posted by dan ::