Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me.
These words have always held a very special meaning for me. Many of you know that I am adopted. What many do not know it that I was 4 years and three months old before I was adopted. When I was adopted on November 3 1964 (my gotcha date), no one really understood the significance of having spent my first four years as a foster child. It was not until my adoptive parents died 10 months part in 1998 and 1999, and I was thrown into the most painful experience of my life, that I came to understand the long term negative effects of being a foster child. I had read about the dark night of the soul, but as the 21st century began I was living it. And it would take several years, a good spiritual director and a good psychologist for me to truly understand and find that peace of God which is beyond all understanding.
Now I can wake up ever day of my life with a smile because I know in the deepest recesses of my heart that I am never without family, I am never alone. I can now see that, while I may never know who my biological mother and father are, God has blessed me with other mothers, fathers, brothers, and sisters,to paraphrase the scriptures, and my adorable baby sister. But I am one of the lucky few.
At any given moment there are over 400.000 children in the US in foster care, children who feel adrift in the world, without secure attachments, anchors. And for the children who simply "age out" of the system the statistics are horrendous. Many end up in on the street, in jail, or worse. In 2015 20,000 children simply aged out of the system.
In summer of 2013 I was asked to be a part of the statewide leadership team for Virginia Adopts. Our goal was to move 1000 children from foster families to forever families. It was during these events that I realized that we former foster kids, whether we were adopted at 4 or 14, share a commonalities that it is difficult to express to others, and we who found our forever families must speak out for those who have not.
Virginia Adopts was an incredible success. Now Janet and Ryan Kelly with others have taken this mission to a whole new level with America's Kids Belong. And they will be the first to tell you that adopting a child who is not an infant is not easy. Yes, we come with baggage. But nothing that cannot be healed with love and the grace of God, and the support services now available. Go to their website and check out what there are doing. Get involved on a local level.
Jesus tells us that whoever a receives a child such as this, receives him. My parents not only adopted me and two other children but served as foster parents for dozens of others. They were good foster parents. But there is something about the bond of adoption that changes a child's life forever. I know the security that came when I went from Wayne Patterson (the name given me by the Department of Social Services) to Wayne Lee Ball the son of John and Marcia Ball. Today I pray for every one of my more that 400,000 brothers and sisters in foster care. And I pray for those who are contemplating adoption and those who should be contemplating adoption. These children are waiting. They are waiting to be received by you or someone you know.
