Thoughts on Adoption

Our family had gone out for an early dinner yesterday and as we sat in local Taiwanese restaurant and waited for our food, we couldn't help but listen to the news on the TV in the corner of the restaurant. Although the entire news broadcast was in Chinese, I didn't need Air Boss to translate what the news was about.

There were video clips of earthquake survivors talking to news reporters. The backdrop was always the same. Piles and piles of rubble. Dirt, mess, newly homeless people sifting through the aftermath of China's worst earthquake in 30 years.

I have seen photos of sobbing mothers laying next to their deceased children. Pictures of distraught family members searching desparately for lost relatives. Wordless captures of shock and disbelief on the faces of countless Chinese. I've read accounts of how teenage boys survived for three days in the rubble.

Somehow even having seen and read those accounts, I was still blown away by the film footage and the Chinese newscast in the restaurant. Air Boss translated the reporters questions and the responses from the local survivors. One man lost everything. His wife, his two kids, his house, all his belongings. The only things he had were the clothes on his back and a cooked piece of meat that was carried in a bucket.

Survivors were trying to decide to stay or leave. With no means of transportation, any "leaving" would be on foot. The young reporter spoke a few minutes and then wished the few survivors the best on their journey of rebuilding their lives. As the camera panned to the backside of the newly widowed and childless man carrying his bucket of meat, the young female reporter broke down and started crying. It difficult for me not to cry.

I had just read that the Christian singer Steven Curtis Chapman had lost his five year old daughter in a tragic accident. The fact that she was Chinese and adopted again brought my thoughts back to the topic.

Although I don't know if we'll ever adopt, or if we do, from which country our child will be, my heart totally goes out to the millions of people in Myanmar and China who are struggling to survive these monstrous natural disasters. We'll have to wait to see what God places in our hearts to love and parent other children.