Written by an OBI staff member
I recently talked with one of our Chinese students about his plans for his future. In our discussion, I asked him about his past in China and now his life in the United States. He has a story like a lot of our other students. He was adopted by an American family. He told me that he was in an orphanage and his American family adopted him to give him a better life than he would have had in China. I asked him what he would have done after he was too old to be in the orphanage. He said he didn’t know.
I came from a very loving, secure and safe family. I knew who my father was and who my mother was. I knew my true last name. I can’t imagine not knowing or being cast out when I turned a certain age. I have worked with teenagers for 20-plus years, and I have noticed the growing trend of more and more fatherless children. Children with no identity. They don’t know who they belong to or who their real family is. I seriously felt like I couldn’t relate, that I didn’t have anything to offer him as far as encouragement. I could see the expression in his eyes saying, “You have no idea what it’s like.”
This got me thinking about adoption and the many scriptures that talk about our adoption into the family of God, joint-heirs with Christ, children of God, etc. Romans 8:15 says, “For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, ‘Abba! Father!’”
One of the biggest things Satan accomplished in the Garden of Eden was for our identity/relationship with God our Father to be broken. Ever since Adam was tricked by Satan and cast from the garden, all of humanity has been groaning for that relationship to be restored. Through Christ that relationship has been restored in that we can now cry out, “Daddy (Abba) Father!”
I can imagine a child living in China in an orphanage having a spirit of slavery leading to fear. I know that at times in my adult life based on my current situation, I have felt that spirit of slavery leading to fear. Suddenly a big light bulb lit up in my head … I am adopted also! I was adopted by a Father who wanted a better life for me also. I was an orphan, but now I belong to a family. I thought I had identity in my earthly family, but I found my true identity in Christ. I don’t need to worry about where my life is headed or what my future holds. He has it all planned out for me, and I will do my best to share this truth with as many Oneida students as possible.
Larry Gritton