Foster Care.

For numerous reasons, I have grown up afraid of it, afraid of them. They were in it. 

They were kids at school, siblings in church, and the people who lived down the street from my best friend in elementary. They were always around, but sadly, I never found myself entering their world. It was unknown. And unknown is scary. Since I am one to cry when fish or turtles die, I am NOT one for unexpected goodbyes. They could just leave; they could disappear with absolutely no explanation.

There has been a day or two during work when I can hear my dad’s voice repeating what he said to me when I told him and mom I planned to major in early childhood education...

“Madison, you can’t take them all home with you.” 

A small part of my heart said, “Why not?” 

The other part of my heart said, “Dad, do not worry. I’m too scared to enter into THAT world. I always have been.”

Nearly two years in the classroom, I can say I have only experienced one moment where my heart broke into a million pieces over one of them. The fear of the unknown and the goodbye kept me from investing in, caring for, and loving on them before. Until an unexpected goodbye happened…a goodbye I did not even know about until it had already taken place. I had told them I would see them tomorrow, but I would not. I did not know my goodbye would be forever. Tears flowed for weeks on end. I cried for months at the mention of their name. I cried myself to sleep for a week straight because I could not figure out what I could do for them. Then, the Lord told me to be still. I finally made myself still and He gently whispered, “You introduced My kind of love. You did your part. Continue on.” What I feared the most was over. Though it deeply hurt, it was the first time I allowed myself to not ignore their situation as a whole, but enter right into their mess and distress.

“We can’t let the fear of loving a child that might leave us deter us; we must let the fear of a child never knowing our love drive us.” ~Jason Johnson

Adoption is not always the answer for them. No, it is usually always more difficult of a process than that. If it was a simple process, I can assure you my husband and I would already have a house full. Unfortunately, foster care is much more complicated. After several months or years, sometimes one party says reunify; another says terminate rights. What the system sees as a success can quickly become a failure that begins the entire process all over. These poor children are stuck in a limbo for a large portion of their lives. They move from home to home. They did not ask for it. They find themselves in the system because of others' poor choices. Situations are nasty. Stories are heartbreaking.

Children in the system, though, should not be what I had made them out to be. A little girl who calls me “My Nadi” is opening my eyes to all things foster care and has been for roughly four months now (I am by no means close to an expert). Ryan and I are not her foster parents. We are just two people that bounce in and out of her foster parents’ home because they happen to be my sweet family that live 8.2 miles up the road. If there is one thing I have learned by knowing this precious princess and her brother, it is that a person does not have to become a foster parent to be involved in foster care. You just have to care; you wholeheartedly care for the children in the system. (If you feel at all interested or led to foster care, though, please check into Oklahoma Fosters or the child protective services in your state).

Why enter into their mess and distress? Why not run for the hills out of fear? Why not remain indifferent? The main reason—Someone entered directly into our distress 2,000 years ago to offer hope. Except our messy situation was our own fault. We had been living in an open rebellion against God for thousands of years. Jesus came as the Redeemer. Jesus rescued us. The cost? Giving up His life on the cross as the ultimate sacrifice for all of humanity’s sin. Jesus came to heal what was broken—the relationship between man and Almighty God. He invests in, cares for, loves on, and enters into the world of all those who repent.

Foster care brings hope.

Foster care exists to mend relationships. 

Foster care helps rescue children from danger. 

Foster care begins the healing of what is broken. 

Foster care reflects Christ's love.
Foster care is a sacrifice. 

The sacrifice can be great or small.

The sacrifice can be giving up your comfortable life to foster.
The sacrifice can be saying goodbye unexpectedly.

The sacrifice can be offering babysitting or grocery shopping to foster parents. 

The sacrifice can be granting extra patience to the foster child in your classroom.

The sacrifice can be laying down all pride to ride a motorized cow around the entire mall with a 3 year old. 

Whatever the sacrifice, it is indeed worth it. Jesus thought we were worth entering into the world for. I know He thinks foster children are worth entering into their world, also. 

He showed me by introducing a princess named “Z.”

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after widows and orphans in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." James 1:27. (emphasis added)

Happy 50th Birthday, Daddy!

The Super Bowl is not the only thing turning 50 this week. My amazing father turns 50 today! I wanted to celebrate the monumental day with a few words about my daddy. 

My mom would say it was love at first sight. And she is probably right. I have thought my dad hung the moon as early as I can remember. I was “Daddy’s girl” from the very beginning. Even though he has only known me for 26 years, I have known him my entire life. He was the first man to hold me in his arms, he was the first man to tell me he loved me, and he was the first man I ever loved. 

Dad made me chocolate milk every single morning until I was about 8 years old. He left for a men’s retreat once, which was probably the first time I remember him not being at home with Mom, Mack, and me. Truth is, Mom could have made it better than Dad, but I was not drinking it. That was our thing. I have not had a glass of milk since. I am telling you, our bond is tight. One non-Dad-made cup of milk and I have never looked at milk the same again. With our strong bond, he shared his passions for sports, the farm, and Jesus with me. 

My love of sports came directly from Kerry. Well, not all sports are created equal. There is football, basketball, and track, but mostly football. NASCAR and golf are used strictly on Sundays to create a better environment for a nap. Saturday afternoons were spent watching college football and playing basketball on our gravel driveway. He was my biggest encourager all through school with sports—spending extra hours in the gym to teach me how to shoot in the trees (tall girls—I sometimes played post at 5’3”), taking me to run and jump at the track on the weekends, and always making sure I remembered sports were not the most important thing in life.

Despite what some may think upon meeting me, I take the title “farm girl” seriously thanks to Ol’ Kerry. We checked cows together nearly every morning that I did not have to go to school. Dad let me steer the truck in neutral while he kicked hay off the back, and he never made me open a fence. Given the opportunity, I would gladly choose to sit on the arm of a tractor chair just to hear him hum as he worked the ground or baled hay. My most cherished memories come from riding in the farm truck with him from Grandma and Grandpa’s house back to ours, listening to him sing songs from his Promise Keepers soundtrack that was always in the cassette player: “If the Lord had not been on our side, all our enemies would’ve swallowed us alive. They would have swept over us. If the Lord, if the Lord, if the Lord had not been on our side.”

That leads me to my most favorite part about Kerry Gillham—he is not just my dad. He is my brother in Christ. He is the one who told me who Jesus is. He is the one who showed me how to live life as a follower of Christ. Dad is so gracious—even in the difficult times of growing up, he showed me Jesus's love, grace, and mercy. He seriously is the most humble person I know. He showed me what it looks like for a man to love his wife as Christ loves the Church. He set the standard high as a tangible example of a man after God. As I grow older (and he does, too, like 50 years old), I see the blessing of him being my earthly father become sweeter and sweeter. I thank my Heavenly Father for such a blessing.

Dad, thank you for everything you have done for me. You are seriously one of my most favorite people on the planet! Thanks for being your goofy self. Most importantly, thank you for sharing the Gospel with me at a young age and living it out as an example for all to see. Your influence on my life and others’ lives for the last 50 years is incredible. I am thrilled to watch how the Lord will use you in the next 50 to come. I am SUPER grateful to call YOU mine! 

Happy 50^th birthday, Daddy! I love you forever!

Adopted.

I use the phrase “life-changing” on a daily basis. I would be extremely embarrassed to hear the number of times I say something along the lines of “It changed my life,” in a single day. Honestly, there are few things that have actually affected my life. In even more honesty, I have seriously claimed moments as “life-changing,” not realizing what would continue taking place deep down in my soul.

In my freshman year of college, I found myself in the dreaded Intro to Public Speaking course. We had to give three speeches during a semester: an informative speech, a persuasive speech, and a special occasion speech. I did a horrible job presenting the informative speech. It may come as a huge surprise to all who know me well, but I am not very confident speaking in front of a room. If I am sitting safely in my chair among others, I can talk to anybody, but put me in front of a class and I get emotional (I will blame that on Kerry’s genes). When we discussed the persuasive speech, I knew EXACTLY what I was going to speak over. It was something that interested me for several years before, and I had recently become extremely comfortable talking about it often: adoption.

I gave the speech—I was probably the most confident I had ever been speaking in front of people—and scored a 99 percent (Using my hands got a slightly bit out of control on that speech. Hey, I was extremely passionate, or so I thought).

Prior to this speech I had read a few books about orphan care. I could quote and share my opinion and views with the best of them. Looking back, I would only classify this as “head knowledge,” but there was a true life-changing moment right around the corner.

A year after I presented my persuasive speech over adoption, I found myself on a trip to Zambia to work in an orphanage for two weeks. After all, is that not what someone who is interested in orphan care does? They go, they come back, and they talk about it for the rest of their lives. That easily could have been me.

I tried to write this “life-altering feeling” off as exhaustion, culture shock, or an emotional high at the beginning. But there I sat after two weeks beside the most beautiful children I had ever known, having stories that made me hurt down to my bones and smile through tears of relief thanks to what God had done through New Day. We were leaving the next day. We had been in a village all afternoon and this was our last time to see the children before we were supposed to say goodbye. It was during the Wednesday night prayer meeting. A little girl came to sit on my lap. She soon fell asleep against my chest. One of the older boys sat right next to me, holding my hand. Another small boy sat in the floor with his arm wrapped around my leg. Even though I did not realize the full extent of it then, I knew I was experiencing a life-changing moment. I cried and cried as I thanked God for rescuing these children. When it was time to leave that place, I stood up and stared at where I sat for a long time. I knew I would never be the same.

Months and months later, I found myself broken every time I read the growing number of orphans in the world. Do not get me wrong, it always stopped me dead in my tracks before, but I would soon forget and go on like normal. However, I could not do that anymore. See, I had held one of those 153 million children in my arms as she fell asleep. I held the hand of one of the 153 million orphans as he prayed to his Heavenly Father. That staggering number with six zeroes behind it was no longer only a statistic to me. No, it had been made real. 

The world tells the orphan they are worthless, burdensome, and unlovable. That used to be me. I was a spiritual orphan. I was a sinner separated from the Most High God. I had nothing to offer. I was dirty, poor, and without a Father. But God in His great grace…

 “In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ.” Ephesians 1:4-5.

“…You have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” Romans 8:15.

…adopted me through Jesus. He tells me my worth. He takes my sin and burdens away; He chooses me and loves me. He is my Father. He rescues. He redeems. He restores. He makes me apart of His family, forever.

Like I found out, we cannot make this identification and then simply stop. Throughout scripture God identifies Himself as a Father to the fatherless. He hears and sees the earthly orphan, the same as He hears and sees the spiritual orphan. (Watch! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQXGRwR4N2Q)

“Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation. God settles the solitary in a home...” Psalm 68:5-6.

And God calls His adopted children to action.

"Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause." Isaiah 1:17.

I may read countless books over adoption, fly across the country for conferences, watch thousands of adoption videos, and talk about the doctrine until my face becomes blue, but until my head knowledge turns to heart knowledge and I am moved into action, it is all in vain.

I can hear the arguments now: “Madison, I am not called to care for the orphan.”

Please let me point you to James 1:27.

“Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” James 1:27.

James 1:27 simply does not come with asterisks. We are all showed this grace by God adopting us so that we can show it to others.

“Well, I know I am not called to adoption.”

Too often we think that is the only way to care for the orphan. Adoption is one way; there are COUNTLESS other ways to fulfill this commandment, based on what the Holy Spirit leads you to. (Examples: Pray, advocate, sponsor a child,  give to orphan care ministries, families on the adoption journey, etc., volunteer your time at orphanages and children’s homes, for adoptive/foster families, etc, adopt, foster care, mentor…Oh, and I will just go ahead and throw out a few websites that I know a bit about and give you a start: here, here, and here)

My prayer for this post is that someone sees orphan care in another light. Whether that be to see it is a command in scripture, the picture of the gospel it portrays, or ways to get involved.

We are all called to care for the orphan in some form or fashion. I pray that you will have that life-changing moment, realizing your adoption through Christ into God’s family, and that it will sink deep down into your soul, leaving your head and settling in your heart, and move you to obey.

Lord willing, one day I will be able to sing these words over my child. I can assure you, it will be another one of those few, true, life-altering moments for me.

“I've never felt this way before. 

Funny how you found your way to my door, 

and suddenly my prayers are coming true. 

These arms are not letting go of you.

This love, this love is the deep kind. 

You’re my baby; you’re my sunshine. 

I’ll hold your hand, be your biggest fan, 

and I’ll love you all of the time.

Our eyes are not quite the same shade, 

and your hair blows in the wind a different way.

But I am your mother, and I love you just the same.

so I'll take your hand, honey, and you can take my name.

My heart has been redeemed, adopted, 

and now I know my Father. 

This grace that I’ve received, 

I want to show you, I want to show you.

This love, this love is the deep kind. 

It hangs on through the storm and the sunshine. 

I’ll hold your hand, be your biggest fan, 

and I’ll love you all of the time.”

Nicknames.

As a teenager, I grew very inquisitive about who my parents were in high school. I took to searching tirelessly through their old yearbooks each evening to decide if we would have been friends, had I lived in the same generation and went to the same school. 

One could understand my astonishment when every classmate who signed my dad’s yearbook addressed him as ”Killer.” I was slightly alarmed at first, and after asking my mom (who just told me to ask my dad), I found it was only a nickname that a teacher had given him. According to my dad, “The name just stuck.” I am hoping that the English teacher chose that name based on dad's killer writing skills in his English classroom or dad's superior athletic ability in the gym and on the field. We may never know.

Anyone on my mother’s side of the family calls her one of two things. The first is Lynnette, which is her actual middle name. I do not consider that a nickname. I consider that confusing for “Lynnette’s” kids. I was always quick to correct each extended family member by telling him or her that my mom’s name was in fact, “Leigh.” I thought I was doing them a favor. Do they really not know who she is?! Probably after being embarrassed by my outbursts on several occasions, she explained to me that because there was a “LeRoy” and a “Lee” already in her family, “Lynnette” helped keep it straight. 

The majority of her family calls her by something else, though. A nickname that describes something that she may or may not have repeatedly done at inopportune times as a toddler. I would assume most people outgrow names given at the age of two. However, to this day, I will still answer my mom's phone to hear, “Poo, is that you?” Yes, I'll stop right there on that one. 

Webster’s dictionary defines the word nickname as: “a usually descriptive name given instead of or in addition to the one belonging to a person, place, or thing.” A nickname usually describes a person’s personality or something the person may do. It usually tells a little more about who a person is.

Personally, I do not have a nickname, as I’m not sure a shortening of my actual name counts. Other people can relate to that, while others have several nicknames. Some nicknames that often slip my mind are the ones we hear each and every day: Husband, Wife, Dad, Mom, Sister, Brother, Grandma, Grandpa, Grammy, Grampy, etc. These nicknames are obviously titles, but very much describe a person often by telling others who they are, whose they are, and what they do.

The first person that comes to mind in having countless nicknames and titles is God. And unlike my dad’s nickname, God’s nicknames all have specific meanings. Everyone knows why He is called by each name. They tell of His character—who He is and what He does. 

God’s nicknames are also very different from my mother’s. A person does not know my mother better by hearing her called, “Poo.” Every title of God’s tells more about Him. A person learns something different about Him with every name they hear. His nicknames, or titles, come directly from Scripture and there is an endless amount. I would like to just share a few:

Abba, Father.

“For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” Romans 8:14-15.

Through trusting in Christ as Savior of our lives, God adopts us into His family. We become children of God. He becomes our Abba, Father—a devoted, loyal, and trustworthy Father--who we share an intimate relationship with.

Sustainer.

“Cast your burden on the LORD, and he will sustain you; he will never permit the righteous to be moved.” Psalm 55:22.

To sustain is “to provide what is needed for someone to continue to exist, to hold up the weight of, to deal with or experience something bad, to give support or relief.” God is our ultimate Sustainer. He is with us in the everyday, the best days, and the worst days. He provides for us, He holds us up, and He gives us relief.

Shepherd.

“The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.” Psalm 23:1.

Shepherds guide their sheep. They care for them by giving them what they need and keeping them from danger. God is our Great Shepherd. He guides us, cares for us, protects us, and keeps us.

“He’s the Great Shepherd, the Rock of all Ages, Almighty God is He!”

Father of the fatherless.

“Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation.” Psalm 68:5.

Several places of Scripture refer to God caring for the wanderer, the poor, the widow, and the orphan. Sojourner or not, in poverty or not, losing a spouse or not, fatherless or not, these references also represent where every one of us stand, apart from His saving grace.

Promise Keeper.

“Not one word of all the good promises that the LORD had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass.” Joshua 21:45.

My dad attended many “Promise Keeper” conferences when I was growing up. (which is why I do not drink milk anymore, but that is a whole different story). I was and still very much am enthralled by that title. God keeps His promises—every single promise that He makes. He will never fail. 

Rock.

“He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be greatly shaken.” Psalm 62:2.

“Rock of Ages, cleft for me. Let me hide myself in Thee.”

Think about a mountain. Mountains do not tend to move. They do not tend to shake. They are sturdy. It is an illustration of safety--the place to go when all is falling down around us. God is our rock, our safety, our refuge, our help.

Redeemer.

“For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.” Isaiah 54:5.

My mother’s favorite hymn is “Redeemed.” This passage from Isaiah has many names of God, but “Redeemer” tells of one thing He does. He redeems. He redeems us from sin. He redeems us by the blood of the Lamb. He redeems us to Himself.

“I think of my blessed Redeemer, I think of Him all the day long: I sing, for I cannot be silent; His love is the theme of my song.”

Creator.

“Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable.” Isaiah 40:28.

God is Creator. He created everything. Just look around for a moment and let that sink in. God is the one who formed you in your mother’s womb, put the stars in the sky and called them each by name, built mountains, filled oceans, striped zebras….the list could go on forever.

“Almighty Father, Master and Lord,

King of all kings and Redeemer,

Wonderful Counselor, Comforter, Friend,

Savior and Source of our life without end.

You are worthy, Father, Creator.

You are worthy, Savior, Sustainer. 

You are worthy, worthy and wonderful;

Worthy of worship and praise.”

Those are just a handful of God’s “nicknames” that do exactly what nicknames should do: describe. 
Please, feel free to share others, as there are countless more.