I am adopted. I don’t remember ever being told this, it was just something I always knew. I remember asking my mom one day when I was in seventh or eighth grade, when they had told me. She replied, “Since the day we brought you home. “ I rocked you every night and told you how special you were to us because we had adopted you.” Perhaps that is why I always truly felt special. Special, but not different. I had a mom and dad who loved me, a brother and sister who played and fought with me, Grandparents who gave me cookies for breakfast, aunts and uncles who were my second set of parents, and cousins that I cant imagine not having in my life. Someone kissed my boo boo’s and spanked my bottom when I was disobedient. I was just like everyone else. But I also felt like I was hand picked by God and placed exactly where he wanted me. I wouldn’t know how true that was until years later.
You see a few months ago I was reunited with my birth family. What an incredible gift! Their story, my back story, was beautiful and heart wrenching at the same time. As they shared their heart with me, I was deeply touched by the thin threads that God had chosen to weave together in my life. My “birth” grandmother has prayed for me every day of my life. My birth mother prayed over my bassinet that God would take care of me. Perhaps this made all the difference. On some level God reached down into this girls heart and directed my thoughts and I just knew, God had me.
So it got me thinking about how God feels about adoption. I opened my bible. Adoption in the bible contains both a legal aspect and a spiritual aspect. Legally it is simply having a new family. Spiritually it is a beautiful picture of our salvation.
As I dug deeper I discovered that there were people in the bible, people chosen by God, who were adopted.. The story of Moses is the first time we see adoption mentioned in the book of Exodus. Moses was born at a time when being a baby was a dangerous thing. The Pharaoh of Egypt made a decree that all baby boys would be killed. Moses’ mother put him into a basket and placed him in the river. Moses could have died, but instead God orchestrated it so he would be saved. Moses was found and adopted by Pharoahs daughter. I want to point out that Moses was not seen as “adopted”. The Pharaohs daughter took him in as her own and he was royalty. There was no question of his worthiness or his heredity. He simply belonged. Perhaps this was a foreshadowing of God making us an heir to Him. Moses went on to be an instrument of God. I have heard that story all through my life in church. What never struck me before was that adoption was God’s solution to mans killing of babies. What a beautiful illustration of our loving God, and how He feels about adoption.
Another person we see in the bible that was adopted, was Ester. Ester was adopted by her older cousin, Mordeciai, and he raised her as his daughter after her parents were killed. Ester went on to save her Jewish people from being destroyed. Again, God had a plan for her.
But here is the one that really gripped my heart. I had never even thought about it before, but the discovery was an incredible jewel.. Jesus, Gods own son, was adopted by Joseph. I cannot help but think that God finds adoption so beautiful that he wove it into his own son’s story!!
“Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me,” Such a simple verse, but it truly reveals the heart of Christ. Accepting children and regarding them highly was always at the core of His message.
“But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption. So you are no longer a slave, but God's child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.” – Galatians 4:4-5 & 7. The bible is full of verses about being adopted by God as our road to salvation. God chose Israel among all the other nations to be a Father to them. And God refers to us as his children. He is our Father. God chooses to adopt us into his family through His son, Jesus.
I am adopted. I am no different than anyone else. Because honestly, we are all adopted. What it really comes down to is this. We are God’s. He simply entrusts other people to care for us.