Default to Yes

Many of you reading this are not aware of how or why our second adoption started. So let me tell the story for those of you interested.

AWAA has a “waiting child” list for Ethiopia. This is a list of orphaned children who need to be adopted and are waiting for homes because they generally have some sort of special need (medical concerns, older in age, sibling groups, etc.) We look at this list from time to time and pray for the children to find families and homes.

One day I was looking at the list and came upon a sibling group of two children, one of which was HIV+. For some reason, I felt immediately compelled to go upstairs to Matthew, even though it was very late at night, and ask what he thought of adopting them. We prayed, and decided to pursue it.

Now, just to clarify, we will not be adopting these children. Before we could even get far enough into the process, the children were pursued by another family- praise God. But I bring it up to share our hearts and what God has taught us.

You see, when we prayed, we both said that we felt like God was NOT saying “these are YOUR kids, pursue them headlong!” But rather, He was saying “default to yes.” He has commanded us to care for orphans and widows. And when the opportunity to do so presents itself, He wants us to default to doing so. So rather than praying “should we care for this orphan?” we pray “is there a reason NOT to care for this orphan?”

I do believe that every big decision should be bathed in prayer, wise counsel, and consideration. And I know that not everyone is called to adopt, or foster. Just the same, not everyone is called to go overseas for missions. But we are all called to participate. So for us, we will default to yes.