What if 2013 was the year…

What if 2013 was the year that: 

• Every waiting child in the US and Canada was adopted into a Christian family
• Every child waiting for their family through international adoption was united with their family
• Every Christian globally realized that they are called to care for the fatherless
• Every country decided that they must do something to provide permanence for their orphans
• Every country closed to international adoption opened back up
• Every family waiting got the phone call or email they have been praying for
• Every church developed a culture of adoption
• Every orphan has a chance to hear the gospel

What would you add to the list? Will you join us in praying that this would be the year that God does more than we can ask or imagine for the fatherless! 

 

 

 

Reclaiming Adoption Study Guide

The primary focus of Reclaiming Adoption is on our adoption by God but we don’t want to leave it at that. We want to also help people think about and discuss its implications for and applications to horizontal adoption (our adoption of children) and orphan care.

That is why we created a free study guide. Each section walks through the chapters of the book with questions for discussion and concludes with quotations for meditation. The aim is to grow deeper in understanding and awe of our adoption in Christ while moving towards the outward implications on our lives.

We also encourage you to check out our orphan care and adoption resource page for suggestions on practical ways your church or small group can care for the orphan.

What Orphans Need

Dan Cruver has a must read post over at the Gospel Coalition Blog titled: What Orphans Need: Christians Who Live in the Joy of Their Father’s Delight

Here is a choice section, but please take the time to read the whole thing:

What orphans need are churches that are full of people who wake up each morning hearing and rehearsing these amazing words that are declared over them. “You are my beloved child, in whom I am well pleased. Yes, you were once without hope and without God in this world, but I have brought you near by the blood of Jesus. I have embraced you in the Beloved. Live in my love as you move out in mission.”

If you are a Christian, God declares these amazing words over you. He doesn’t speak them over you because you have earned them. You could never do enough to earn these words of love. God speaks these words over you because of who Jesus is for you.

You Were Made for Global Missions

One of the most powerful sections from Piper’s first message at Advance 09. Listen to the whole message here.

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Let the Nations Be Glad!

I sat up late the other night here in Uganda listening to John Piper’s second message from the Advance09 conference last month in Raleigh, NC (listen here). These messages have moved me deeply. They have brought back so many emotions and passions that God had put in my heart over the years. It is bringing back memories of college when I first heard that there people in the world who have never heard the name of Jesus. I remember sitting in Missions 101 and thinking that simply could not be true, and if it were true that something must be done, immediately. When I did realize there really are thousands of people groups, millions of individuals, who today have never heard the Gospel, the sense of urgency and need to go overwhelmed me. I almost quit school that day to go overseas.  I feel a taste of that now. The need still remains twelve years later. There is an urgency that will not go away, should not go away, until every nation, tribe, and tongue has been penetrated by the gospel!

One thing the Lord has been using to re-awaken my global perspective and passion is the plight of the orphan worldwide and our own adoption journey to Uganda. Though Uganda is far from being an “unreached” nation (praise God!) being in Africa and in a different culture altogether reminds of those people groups that have yet to even hear the name of Jesus, let alone have a Bible in their native tongue.

God’s heart burns for these peoples. The bible screams with God’s call to all tribes and tongues to bow down before Him and experience everlasting joy! We have been commanded and called to “go” to them. We have been given the mandate and model by Christ and the apostles to make disciples of every ethnic group on the globe. When we do that and local churches are established in every people of the world the end will come. Jesus will return (Matt 24:14). He has a mission for us to accomplish first. What an awesome task. What an incredible joy and privilege to go as His instruments to the lost of the world and be a part of God’s global mission. We were made for this!

Check out Joshua Project for more information on how we can reach the unreached.