All right, so I have three clips from Boney Bachum as we start here. The first one introduces us to a little bit of his family, and then he talks about the importance of what adoptive parents do. For me, adoption has helped me, both as an individual Christian and as a pastor, until I became a father to adoptive children. and was able to look at my children and know these are as much my children as those children who are related to me biologically. Until that moment, I wasn't able to fully just understand and grasp what it means to be a child of God. Because we are His children by adoption. When you understand adoption, you get that. are his children. And he's not going anywhere. Adoption is about the gospel. For me, adoption is important because it's just a beautiful picture of God's grace in my life. I was really the forerunner in doing something to prevent us having more children biologically. I was insane. I was wrong. I wanted to be in control, and I didn't allow God to be in control. God is so faithful to give us back what the locus to be. I just get a chance to love on some kids who are actually my kids and raise them. It's just been a blessing. I did not think that I would be almost 50 years old with seven kids, seven little kids. But I tell you, I wouldn't trade this for anything. When we started this journey, You know, we had two kids, they were 14 and 11. We were just a few years away from an empty nest. And now, we're, you know, almost 50. And, you know, we're looking at 10, 8, 6, 5. I can't think of anything. I like to know that even Vodibachan needs his wife's help remembering the ages of his kids sometimes. But I really like what he said there at the end, just talking about the There's nothing more important than we can do with our lives and investing in the lives of others. And so that kind of sets up where we left off last time, where he's going to give some encouragement on what's most important in our parenting process. If a child somehow learns to attach to me better, but they never come to a place where they grasp the reality of sin and brokenness, that I have satisfied my own sinful desires, my own selfish desires. So he talks about it's possible for us actually to be thinking about our own selfish desires. My own idolatry, and I've fallen short when it comes to parenting this child. Children come into this world and they don't know a whole lot, but what they have is parents. They have a relationship with us, and that relationship is designed to protect them, that relationship is designed to teach them about God and His authority, and that relationship is designed to shepherd them through the process of coming to know these things more surely and more personally. Ultimately, I'm shepherding my children to the cross, and I'm shepherding my children to a relationship with God. So, the most important thing with me and my children is not necessarily to me, but then finding their way through me to God. That's what my parenting relationship is ultimately all about. All right, and then the next clip kind of picks up where that left off. Let's begin with task one. As we seek to understand our child, there are some things that can get in the way of that. And two of the primary things that get in the way of us really understanding our child are our assumptions and our expectations. When we stop and think about where our assumptions in life and our expectations come from, they come from our experience. I'm going to challenge you that your assumptions about your child, your expectations for what your child is capable of, is probably not as accurate as you think. Let me explain that. Take for instance, how different would you say your experience growing up being a child and being parented is from that of the experience of your child? Now there's a broad variety of backgrounds that your children come from. So I want to talk about some of those things to understand how we're different from our children. Take for instance the prenatal environment that you developed in and that of your child. or chemicals that were put into their biological mother's body and you weren't early in life. What were the experiences of being cared for as an infant? Were you fed when you were hungry? Were you cleaned when you were dirty? Were you held and touched and talked to and your child wasn't? All of these things come together to build an experience that then determines what our expectations are for ourselves and for others and for our children. And so when we look at our children knowing that they've had such a different background from us, we have to be very careful about what we assume about what they're thinking, what they're capable of, and our expectations for what their behavior can and will be. So as we talk about expectations, I want to hear a little more from Pastor Bockham about the expectations that some of us enter into when we go to adopt or foster a child. is our expectation. Oftentimes, we have this picture in our mind. And the picture is, it's sort of a lifetime movie picture. We have this Hallmark Movie of the Week idea that we're going to adopt a child. The child is going to come from a difficult background. They've been waiting for us their whole lives. When we adopt them, they will run into our arms, and they will hug us, kiss us, and thank us. And it'll just never end, and we'll ride off into the sunset. The fact of the matter is, That's not real. Our children are sinners. We are sinners. And we're dealing with children who have tremendous problems. Chief among them is the fact that they're born in sin and shaped in anguish. And so our goal has to be a realistic goal. And it also has to be a Christ-centered and cross-centered goal. So I may never experience the kind of relationship that I imagine with a child that comes into my home through adoption. So I want to just pause there because one of the things that struck me is he says the greatest difficulty in his estimation for many parents actually begins with their own expectation. And that's maybe different than probably a lot of us thought about it or even the way a lot of us might even think about it now. How much of the difficulty actually has to do with our thinking as as parents, and he goes on to talk about the reality of sin, not just in our kids, but in us, that compounds this difficulty in the way we think. And he says our goal has to be realistic, and it also has to be a Christ-centered and a cross-centered goal. That's one of the things I really like about the emphasis of this teaching and these speakers here, because there's other important things even that have been brought up in the beginning here and there's different emphasis that you can find from psychological goals or bonding base or behavioral goals for our kids. But I think it's important to start where he says this is such an important issue that often or in many cases a great difficulty that we have to talk about is expectations. And if you have your study guide open, that's also what John Bergeron, the guy who introduced this, says, on the left-hand side there, he says, the two primary things that get in the way of understanding our children are our assumptions and our expectations. And I want to play, actually, a little bit more from John Bergeron, where he kind of expounds on this in his own... He's been doing a lot of ministry in this area, a lot of counseling for over 10 years of families, and he talks about some of the most common as something that I'm hoping for that will continue. And it's something that I'm learning more and more. It's just that we can never, ever minimize the impact that we could potentially have if God is the one fueling it. So, again, today you're in for a treat with this interview. I was able to sit down with Welcome to Think Orphan, the podcast for orphan excellence. Real talk with real people, navigating the global crisis. Something that I'm learning more and more is just that we can never, ever minimize the impact that we could potentially have if God is the one fueling it. So, again, today you're in for a treat with this interview. I was able to sit down with Jon Bergeron, at the Austin Stone Counseling Center. And John's also a speaker. He's an adopted father. He's just a man who you're going to learn a lot. And on that note, what are some of the most common issues that you are dealing with? I'm sure so many of the people out there listening have adopted or are in the process of fostering or considering it. What are the most common issues you're dealing with? And really, how are you advising and counseling people to go through those similar issues? uh... sherry i you have to answer that question uh... in two ways uh... one probably the one most people are expecting would be the kind of talk about how uh... the what kind of things that children bring into the home in terms of you know you've got aggression you've got attachment issues there's also a lot of neurological and health issues but as i was thinking about that question as you asked i thought you know I really end up working more with parents because I believe I can help a child far more by equipping and preparing their parents than really working with them maybe once a week at most. And so the things I see in families is probably two things. Number one is after the adoption, I find a lot of couples struggle with some pretty deep and painful disappointment. And that comes about because we often enter Into this this adoption world kind of the way I did with some really unrealistic expectations about what it's going to be like and what I'm going to do for this child and what you know how quickly they're going to heal and bond to me and sometimes it Often I would say we as parents we end up facing some real disappointments in that arena Reality is often a lot harsher than what we had imagined and sometimes even were prepared for So I would say that's probably one of the big issues that I work through parents with. It's just kind of grieving the loss of that dream and sometimes those unrealistic expectations so that we can step into the reality that God's called us into. Right. Which often isn't quite as glamorous and definitely not as neat and clean as we would like it. Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. Definitely. I've seen a lot of that in the work I've been doing. So, very similar answer or assessment he gave in terms of one of the most important issues where we have to start and acknowledge and talk about it. Actually, in Brian Gorgman's book, on the very first page, if you remember reading that, Dan Kruver, I don't know if you're familiar with him, but he's probably been one of the most involved Christians. He's been the founder of Together for Adoption, organizing conferences and supporting parents. Wonderful Ministry Together for Adoption is their website. Some great resources. But he talks about how common and easy it is to romanticize adoption. Brian Borgman's talked about that also. But he writes there on the first page, the post-adoption journey always involves some suffering. And then he goes on to mention often unexpected parental feelings of loneliness, resentment, anger, doubt, and regret. He says, I've talked to many couples who began their adoption journeys with great anticipation and excitement. Those are those expectations only to be met with behavioral and emotional issues that quickly move them out of your depth. And then at the very end of the introduction by Pastor Borgman, he says this, the quicker you know the truth, the quicker you can adjust your expectations. So as you're able to learn and adjust and then step into the reality, as he says, that God has for us, the sooner you can do that, the better. Let me just ask you guys, how many of you guys have read Brian's book through yet at this point? It's OK if you haven't, but I encourage you guys to read through it. For next week, I think just to give you a homework assignment, it would be good to reread chapter 5 and 6, where he talks about grace to readjust our thinking. a ministry mindset and spiritual warfare. He talks about, we'll get into that a little bit later in the course, but he writes this on page 52. We must go into adoption with this kind of ministry mentality. How do you know when you have a ministry mentality? When you're bringing to the calling no expectations and a heart full of compassion. And so he says, one of the ways we know we're thinking ministry-wise is we're not expecting things that for us, we're expecting what God has for us to do. And I want to introduce you to another ministry that's actually touched very much on the same note. How many of you guys have heard of Tapestry Ministry? It's out of Irving Bible Church. They have some very helpful resources. And so this is a good ministry for you guys, tapestryministry.org. This is their website here, and you probably can't read that, but you can see, just to give you an idea of their categories, on the right-hand side, resources for adoptees, birth mothers, for churches, for families, books, challenges, issues, discipline, getting started, motivations, expectations, race, culture, school issues. and various blogs and all kinds of topics down here, but they also talk about this. Michael Monroe and his wife Amy started this ministry out of their church to support families, and this is, they've had a lot of involvement in counseling and being involved with people, so I want to let him weigh in on this whole topic as well, taking a new look at your expectations. We often talk with parents and we find them very frustrated, sometimes even on the verge of crisis because of the challenges and behaviors they're facing with their kids. And while there are a number of principles and strategies that are highlighted in the Connected Child and that are focused on the Empowered to Connect website that can deal specifically with how to respond appropriately to those behaviors, I think it's important for parents to always keep in mind that we need to go back and look at a number of things, and one of those is our expectations. Expectations play a huge role in the adoption and foster care journey. I think oftentimes what we find is that we hear about some of the challenges and some of the behaviors and some of the issues that we're likely to face along this journey early on. We hear about them. We may even read about them. We may go to trainings and conferences and really get a lot of information. But somewhere along the way, many times, and I know this has been true for Amy and I, we filter those out. We simply make the logical decision in our own mind, that's not going to happen to me. And so we go down a series of steps where we begin to form very solid expectations about what life and what this journey is going to look like for us. based on filtered information. The reality is that when we adopt a child from a hard place, when we adopt a child who's experienced loss and trauma or abuse or neglect, which is all of our kids who come into our family through adoption and foster care, we need to have the appropriate expectations. Many of our kids don't know what it's like to be a part of a family. Many of our kids don't know what it's like to feel safe. Not to be safe, but to feel safe. Many of our kids don't know what it's like to have a voice, and to be able to use that voice, and to be able to have that voice heard and responded to in a loving and nurturing way. Many of our kids don't know what it's like to have appropriate boundaries and limits put on them in love. And yet, many of us fail to expect that our kids don't know those things, and therefore when they don't respond the way we expect them to, we're surprised. and we quickly become frustrated and we quickly become sometimes even disillusioned and disheartened in this journey. The reality is that we should expect challenges along the way. And while that won't make those challenges any easier, expecting them and then knowing that we need to be prepared for them, knowing that we need to connect with others and be supportive to respond to them is a big part of being successful along this journey. Empower2Connect.org is also a website with a lot of resources. Karen Purvis, Texas Christian University have done a lot of stuff. What Tapestry Ministry does is they partner with them and they bring a lot of some of the scriptural principles to bear. They actually have a free downloadable study guide called Created2Connect where they tie in some of those principles with things that are in God's Word and so that's another helpful resource. How many of you, I know a couple of you guys have been involved with the trust-based relational intervention, which they're also partnering with. If you're familiar with that also, my wife and I have gone to one of their training events. They actually, they have some various events and trainings in the area here. I know Jeff and Mia have also benefited from them. Anyone wanna share just a little bit, something that you found helpful through the trust-based relational intervention approach? Well, we have the video series. We haven't gone through the entire thing. You'll have to revisit that for sure. And then we're involved with a group that Jeff and Mia have been involved with in Roseville. I think for me it's removing, the biggest thing was removing the emotional piece and setting limits. So you're not giving in to your child, but you're setting boundaries, but you're doing it without the emotion. They train you on how to do it, you know, and remove that piece. I think that's the biggest challenge for me, so that's where it's been really helpful for me. Yeah. Jen? I think that was the first place that I had learned about the science behind how trauma affects our kids' brain and how devastating it is. So they do a lot of I've done a lot of research on that and how our brains function, how they develop, how our kids who have had severe trauma and neglect have parts of their brain that just aren't even developed at all. And it doesn't allow them to have eye contact, to have conversations, to respond in any kind of a normal way. So it was very, very eye-opening. On your study guide, on the right hand of that page, I think it's page 27, there's a little graphic that, as we think about some of the things that we may be expected as we love and do things for kids, this is a tree of what often, and not all of these apply to everyone, but these are often things that are what we see. What are some of the things you see on that on the tree at the top there. Lying, what are some of the others? And so that's obviously not an exhaustive list, but there's a number, those are common things. And what do you think is the point of the top of the tree and then the bottom of the tree? I'll pull this up in case you don't have the handout here. So it could be tantruming could be involved here, excessive clinginess, manipulation, power struggles, lack of affection. And then what's the point of this lower half of the visual here? I think they're trying to represent the fruit. Of those things are what you see above and the root of where those come from. the root of the issues are what these are showing. Yeah, and so we'll actually see this a little bit more next time. John Bergeron will talk more about this from a scientific and scriptural standpoint here, but I like the way he breaks it out because some people you'll read and they'll tie these specific things all as a one-to-one relationship to different things, but I think to see there's a cluster and there's a variety of roots and And spiritual is not to be ignored as well. Spiritual and even some of the backgrounds where these kids have come from, but grief, lack of learning, bad learning. Sometimes there's neurological deficits that we have to be aware of, attachment problems, trauma. And so those are some important things for us to think about as we is we realize that there's often a connection between those roots and those fruit. But it's not always clearly a one-to-one relationship. Sometimes there's a combination and constellation of different things. Can I just mention something? Yeah, absolutely. Any of our kids, those of us who have both biological and adoptive kids, they can have the fruit on the top of our bio-kid scan. And needing to be taking care of with discipline and things like that, but it's different with our adopted kids when the fruit looks like that. I mean the roots looks like this because it's not necessarily a behavioral sin issue, but it can look like that. The fruit can look like that. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah, and so that's why I like the They've got spiritual there in the center, and certainly there can be spiritual reasons, but there also can be these other reasons that are either contributing factors, or in some cases, especially with neurological deficits and lack of learning and bad learning, that it's very difficult, it's harder for them to break through some of those temptations to sin. And so we keep the spiritual in mind, but we need to recognize there's these other things going on as well. So, yeah, Steve. I'm at that same line because when you start bringing in the sin part of it, sort of sometimes the hair on the back of my neck stands up because yeah, there's that component in all of us, but then you come to the neurological stuff. And I know for myself, I feel like if I could just embrace the neurological problems, my expectations would change but because of my upbringing and how my expectations are and then the whole bringing the sin part of it my expectations are too great and it brings the stress in of how do we deal with the emotions and everything but to be able to recognize that there is an issue that goes beyond the sin or how we raise child, it would make things a lot easier because then you can take the emotion out and realize that there is something going on here. Yet at the same time, you want to teach them what they need to know just in case they come out of it and they have those tools and stuff. That's been a hard thing for... That's the balance that I feel like the questions of wondering, okay, is this particular behavior, is this just a sin? Or are we looking at some kind of fruit of, you know, do you genuinely have a medical problem? And when I say, I'm using the word medical because I'm trying to separate just the natural propensity that we have to sin as to something that's hardwired or whatever. Like, how do you draw a line or figure out what's what? That's the question that we always have and struggle with. And when we, you know, we have these behaviors that we discipline and then wonder later, you know, hope that was the right thing to do. Isn't that also, in the balance that I was thinking about, is that when scripture talks to it, it doesn't say, if you have an autistic child, if you have a whatever, something, you know, a traumatized child or adopted child, that maybe you shouldn't, you know, you have to focus this way. The balance is you focus both ways. You never, I think, you know, eliminate an opportunity to present the gospel knowing that there's maybe other things, you know, in there. Because we serve a sovereign, huge God who had, you know, died for that child, you know, died for that child. and wants to redeem him, you know, bring him back. He's born a sinner too, so, or she. So, anyway, it's a balance. That's why I loved your work. Yeah, and you know, I would guess, Steve and Nancy, you guys have had the physical disabilities and then there's the mental things that aren't as obvious. I would guess it's easier to be compassionate for the physical obvious things, but when the things aren't as obvious or you're not sure, is that true, it's harder to be compassionate. And I was just thinking about, this doesn't mention fear here. I think that'll come in later. But I remember being in an event, and there was a young girl standing up giving a speech. And it was just so obvious she was fearful, and her lip was trembling. And I think every mother in the place is just melting with emotion and compassion. Sometimes fear actually looks quite a bit different for some of these kids. And when it looks like anger and aggression, it's a lot harder to be compassionate than when you just see them before your eyes, and so that'll come in later, but I think it's just a really helpful thing to keep those things in mind. I was just thinking, we're also not supposed to provoke our children, and so I feel like it is different with some of our biological children than our adopted children because of these things. So where we're not supposed to let sin go, you can't necessarily discipline the same because it will provoke them versus bringing them to Christ. Right, so we still have to deal with sin, but I think some of the important things is there's different strategies for dealing with sin when there's some of these things going on that we'll see as we go through this course. But yeah, that's good. Let me let me introduce you to one more resource that I wanted to make sure we get to today. It's Actually, there's a let me play this this interview for you first, but her name is Sherry McMinn. This is a Interviewed the resource just came out this year. I think just in the last few weeks Kevin Swanson was interviewing her on generations and this actually just popped up on my sermon audio when I was looking at other things and She's a mom of 11 kids, 5 of those are adopted, several of those had serious reactive attachment disorder and various background trauma things and she's been for many years putting together resources on a blog and encouragement. She's actually come out with a book and she talks about this issue of expectations also. This thing just seemed to keep coming up in the resources I was in. And so she's talking about how she tries to counsel or encourage moms who are wrestling with some of those expectation things. You know, I think a lot of adoptive parents walk into adoption with a lot of expectations, and it seems to me that they go through a period of time in which they're crushed. The immediate expectations are crushed, and they don't know what to do. How do you respond to people who are dealing with broken expectations in the adoptive process? parents who are parenting traumatized children, which all children from foster care, from adoption, from orphanages are traumatized children because they've been separated from their grandparents. I think you have to realize that they have tremendous grief that they have to go through and in that process you have grief to go through and you will be angry, you'll be denial, you'll be frustrated, but then you have to move on and really see that what you are doing is being the hands of Jesus and if you can just look to the Lord for your strength and just show up every day to do your job, His mercies are tender and new every morning and you can do it. So much of this is work God is doing on us. Every parent could agree with that. as we walk through these difficulties with our children, God is working on us. Oftentimes in order that He might work on our children, but He's working on us. First and foremost, He's using our children to get through to us. Have you ever experienced that, Sherri? Definitely. You know, I'm going to be 60 years old next year. You can all help me celebrate. I'm like, seriously, Lord, I do not want to learn more patience. I already am persevering. But yet, He gently draws me, guides me, leads me, and I think that the most important thing that you can do as an adoptive parent is remember the pit of sin that the Lord pulled you out of, and He set you on high ground, and you need to help your children go through that same experience. They carry so much baggage when they come into your home, even if they're a tiny little baby. And there are some families who really haven't had a lot of problems with their adopted children. They just have typical parent raising problems. But a lot of families just have no idea what it's really going to be like. And I hope that they'll read my book to go into this eyes wide open and then feel equipped that no matter what battle is before them, they have some strategies that they can help their children cope, they can help themselves cope, and they can just keep going every day. I think more than anything, like our faith journey, that is just do it every day, follow the Lord every day, dedicate your day to Him, seek Him, follow Him, obey Him, you know, confess your sins before Him, and let Him refresh you. I think that's the same thing that is going on with adopted children as you raise them. Sherry, can you say that in your experience in adoption there were ever any moments in which you were just utterly shocked at them? You almost traumatized yourself by the adoptions where you woke up to a reality that you had never expected. Yes, I definitely did that and I think what a lot of people don't want to believe is that your precious darling little children absolutely can have the worst of behaviors. They can be fire starters. They can exhibit sexual behavior. They can lie chronically. They can be evil in their heart. They can hurt people. And it just, you just can't believe it. You think, wow, we're a Christian family. I can't believe that this is happening. And I can't tell anybody because it's so embarrassing or horrifying. But you have to be able to surround yourself with a circle of trusted people in your life. Your elders at your church, your closest family and friends. And you have to be able to draw those people into a network of support around you. Because it is horrifying sometimes what happens. And I know my biological... I'm going to skip ahead just a little bit. Yes, he's sufficient to take care of you in parenting your children. No matter how sinful and inept you may be, He is faithful and He will provide for your children who are in your household because He knows that you seek and serve Him daily. Sherry McMahon has written the book, Adoption, Encouragement, and Advice for a Hopeful Journey, a gigantic 400-page encouragement for tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of adoptive parents around the world. Friends, check it out at Generations.org. So I made copies of the introduction, the foreword, and the table of contents. I wanted to actually just pass this around. What was her name again? Sherry McMinn. M-C-M-I. I'll show you the book. But this will have the title and the website. I have a couple copies of it. If someone needs it now, I can get it to them. We'll open it up so they can see how big it is. It's a good-sized book. It's one of those books you probably don't read cover to cover. It's one of those books that maybe you... Well, she has 11 chapters to read right now. 72 chapters, yeah. I've got 11 kids. 11 kids. Seven for each kid. Yeah, seven for each kid. But one of the things that stood out to me is on the first page of your handout there, this person, he's a member level two of ACBC Association of Certified Biblical Counselors. He's a pastor. with a doctorate of ministry, but he says this, I've studied Christian psychology, counseling, and theology in college, in graduate school, and in two seminaries. I taught in a Christian school for two years. I've been a pastor and Christian counselor for over 37 years. But Sherry McMahon has taught me more about raising adopted children in this book than I learned in all those years of training. I only wish I had this book to guide me when my wife and I adopted our two boys, now ages 30 and 33. Sherry may not have a formal doctoral degree, but she has definitely earned an honorary doctorate during her years of study and hands-on training in the area of adoption. This book is jam-packed with specific practical biblical help in understanding the ministry of raising adopted children. She's researched a ton of information in the adopted field, but she's also learned much by plain old trial and error. And then he says towards the bottom there, there were times when we felt like complete failures as parents because our expectations were not met. It would have been extremely helpful to have been warned ahead of time regarding these difficulties and to have the many helpful coping mechanisms that are shared in this book. And so if any of you need help getting this book, just financially or whatever, we can help get those for you. But I gave you the table of contents. They were $20 each. And we can help with those if needed. But just looking at some of the table of contents, you'll see there's a lot of topics and things that are not given a lot of attention in other resources. And so, again, maybe not all of these chapters are what are pressing issues for you right now. But there's a lot of just practical information. I want to read what she said on expectations, just to give you a sample from that chapter. It's called High Expectations. And what she does is each chapter begins with a scripture verse. So this is Psalm 138a. The Lord will perfect that which concerns me. Your mercy, O Lord, endures forever. Do not forsake the works of your hands. Psalm 138a. She says, I am and have always been an overachieving, dominant personality with lofty goals and sky-high expectations. It is who I am, what I do, and how I roll. My husband also, she goes on about him, very similar traits. Yet my adopted children have taught me many lessons regarding expectations and perfectionism. Whether a genetic predisposition, early environment, or the shady lens of trauma, my adopted kids, and I would presume a majority of adopted children, do not possess the aforementioned personality characteristics. Now granted, they may be complete control freaks because of a background of abuse and neglect, but obeying their adoptive parents' high expectations is typically not in their vocabulary or even in their language skillset. A conundrum I think we can safely assume is that adoptive parents by their very nature must have high expectations to go on this journey, yet they must be willing to accept far less as they raise their adopted children. And she goes on to talk about, I've done this adoption thing long enough and I'm gaining a realistic view of the battle. First I see the wars with the enemy and not my child. Second, I know God is on my side, and I firmly believe that Jesus wins the overall war in the end. Third, I have finally come to the conclusion that if I can love each of my children each day, God will work out their education, their adult job, career to support themselves, their future spouse and children, and their negative behaviors. God will work it out. He is the potter. I am not. To keep things simple, my primary goals each day are food, clothing, shelter, and love. If I can achieve that, we had a good day. I long ago gave up the idealistic, sky-high goals I had early in my parenting life. Model citizens, excellent grades in school, scholarships to college, successful careers, and picture perfect. Let me just read a little more from her. These are different expectations. There's still great expectations in wanting your children to know God. She talks about that. But in looking back, what I wish I'd done differently from the beginning of our adoption journey was to love my children more, and to be okay with their lack of ability to love me back in the same way. I wish I'd focus more on capturing their hearts instead of on their less than perfect behavior and the accompanying struggles in the worldly realms of school and community. Was it worth my fighting over the stolen food they hoarded in their room, which attracted infestations of mice? Maybe. Was it worth me constantly correcting them about their messy hair and lack of personal hygiene? Was it worth me getting angry over their lying, stealing, and manipulation? Was it worth my frustration when helping them with their schoolwork because they couldn't read or sit still or pay attention? No, no, no. Each and every time I should have pointed them to Jesus Christ and His perfect will for them, not my expectations. I should have told them they were precious, trusted the Lord to change them. We do need to civilize all our children. We do need to correct and discipline them. We do need to keep them safe and teach them personal boundaries as we live together. And yes, in that sense, we should have expectations of them receiving an appropriate education, trying certain opportunities, and enjoying healthy relationships in our family and community. But most of all, we need to love them each day the way that they are. And we need to find out who they are and what they think what they can't communicate, what they need, and grow our compassion for them. She says they are worth the time, the waiting, and the trust in God. At the end of the chapter, she has kind of like a set of questions for you and your spouse to think about and talk about together. So how would you rate yourself, and I won't ask this for you guys, on a scale of 1 to 10 regarding expectations? And why do you think that is? When your spouse fails to meet your expectations, how do you respond? And then talking about together, how does this help you think about the next time? So, helpful resource again, if we can help you get those resources, please let me know. Our time's almost gone, I wanna just close with a passage of scripture. I meant to go here earlier, but Luke chapter nine, if you guys would turn there, and if I could ask someone to read, just to kind of wrap this up, Luke 9, 47 through 48. So does she go on to say what you do do if you're not going to choose those battles? Because when you have every one of those battles all day, to say, look to Jesus when there's ants in the- I mean, sorry, I'm being practical, like, that sounds beautiful, but it's not real life, right? So is that what the next chapter is? I've got a couple copies. Can you just run a free copy? I have a question. There's a lot of practical suggestions of things she's learned by trial and error. And I think that particular chapter, she's just looking back at her thinking and her heart, but not negating the discipline aspect, where there's very specific things she goes into. But yeah, any questions? My other copy's at home, so you can't ask another question. You got Luke 9, 47 to 48? Yeah. But Jesus, knowing what? in their heart, took a child and stood him by his side, and said to them, whoever receives this child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. For the one who is least among all of you, this is the one who is great." Yeah, so how does Jesus view our children based on that passage? And when we receive a child into our home in the name of Jesus, what does that passage say we're actually doing? Yeah, we're actually receiving Him. I mean, does that change a little bit of the way our thinking? This isn't just about this child. This is actually, we're doing this for and to Christ. And so that should help our vision of what we're doing. What does Luke 9.23 say, which also kind of ties in with this? Does someone have Luke 9.23? Just read it out if you have it. And he said to them all, if anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. So one of the guys I listened to together for Adoption Conference, his name was David Wooten, and he has a whole message, and I'll actually, we don't have the time to listen to it, maybe I'll send you guys a link to it. But he talks about this concept of denying ourself, how that looks in terms of our expectations. Because taking up our cross means, what does that mean to take up your cross daily? What would that mean to the first century people to take up a cross? Yeah, it means you're dying that day when you see a guy holding a cross. This isn't just bearing, carrying some suffering. This is actually dying to self, dying to our desires, dying to our dreams and expectations. And the disciples had a hard time with that, because they had other expectations of what it was going to be like following Jesus. And they were crushed when their dreams seemed to have died with Jesus and his path was a different path. I want to just play, just give you a little taste of this, and then I'll send you the whole link to it on our, maybe an email this week. But this is by David Wooten. He does a whole seminar on adjusting our expectations. I'll just play a couple minutes of this, and then we'll have to wrap up for today. As I wrestled with the board, I realized pointed out, willing to abandon my agenda. My agenda was to be an empty nester. My agenda is our family. And I thought, you know what? Our family is such a fun place. She was going to come in here and be lavished by our love. And her heart and mine would just be flooded with peace and tranquility. This is exactly what she needs. And we would just be holding hands and running through fields of poppies. And so. What I didn't realize was that, in her mind, the best way she could consider herself safe when she got afraid or when she got angry was to run. She's a runner. And after she'd been in our home for a few months, she ran away. Of course, we went into a panic. We didn't know what to do. We called the police. And so three times they used K-9 units to find her. So my expectation that we're going to be holding hands and running through fields of poppies, we were running through fields, but there were police helicopters. So it wasn't what I expected, the solution to physical peril and peace and tranquility, because all of a sudden she's in our wonderful, loving home that's filled with love and laughter. And I had to embrace the cross. I had to die to what my expectations were. And we all have expectations in the adoption process. Maybe you have an expectation on what how long it should take. And then when it takes longer than that, you get frustrated. You have no in the ark. So it may be that the expectation is that my child is going to be so grateful and thankful for this act of rescue that's happened on their behalf. Or that even the expectation that my child is going to love me. When we first adopted our daughter, attachment was very, very distant towards my wife. And it was a little closer with me, and yet I realized now that some of that was manipulation to kind of, you know, if she could show that she was tight with me and not with my wife, that would be another way to kind of push my wife away. And so we, you know, learned some of those things that were happening, some of the manipulation that was happening and that kind of stuff. One expectation is that your journey is going to be the same as other friends that you have that are adopting. And it seems like theirs went smooth, and you expect yours to go smooth. And it doesn't always go smooth. And we have to die to that expectation. It may be that the expectation that this adoptive child, once this adoptive child comes into our family, is going to pretty much fit in and be like my bio kids were. And that's an expectation that we have to die to. It may be that I have the expectation that the information that this country is going to provide for me on my child, the medical information, the social information, the background information on this child, is going to be complete and accurate. And you get to the country and you find out, ooh, there are more names than you were told. And you might blame the adoption agency, but the adoption agency may not have known either. And you may blame the orphanage, and the orphanage may not have known everything that was involved. expectation. The expectation that developmentally they're going to be at the level they should be at based on their age. You're adopting a seven-year-old but you may be adopting someone who chronologically or developmentally is at a four-year-old level or a three-year-old level. And so you're wrestling through those kind of issues when the child comes up. What I'm saying is to be a Christ follower in adoption means we deny ourself and we take up our cross and taking up our cross means we die to things including our expectations. And I had expectations that I had to die to. I just thought all this girl needs is a loving family. And then the third thing that has helped me in adjusting my expectations to reality is to follow Christ. And I think what that means is to conform our thinking and our living to the image of Christ. To love her as Christ loves. Even though it's been the hardest thing I've ever done in my Christian life, it really is, it really is, hear me, it really is the greatest, sweetest thing I've ever done in my Christian life. God has taught me so much about himself through my daughter. God has taught me so much about me and my own heart through my daughter. And God has built a family of support and network around us that been through, the difficulties we've been through with her, had knit our hearts together with some friends that we wouldn't have had otherwise. And God has been good in these hard providences. And if I could rewind and go back and shop for my empty Nescar and plan all that, where there are no kids in the house anymore, I wouldn't do that. I wouldn't do that. This has been too good. It's been hard, but it's been too good. I understand a little bit more, and you can tell by my testimony that I'm far from where I need to be, but I'm understanding a little bit more of the Father's Word and the Fatherless. There's a lot more I'd like to share there are times of. That is David Wooten. He's involved with Lifeline Children's Services. It's an adoption support ministry. So I'll send out the link to that for you guys during the week. Yeah. The Bodhi Vakam one, where he's talking with the team, what's the name of that one? Of the, um, with his kids? No, not with his kids, where he's actually like in a church, the background of the team. Yeah, that was part of the Rooted series, so both of those clips were from the Rooted series, yeah. End of video one, and then start of video two. So, uh, let me, for the sake of time, pray, and then we can... Heavenly Father, we, uh... As we think of your word, as we think of these weighty things, Lord, we thank you for your grace. We thank you for your goodness, as my brother just spoke of. And Lord, I just ask that your grace and your goodness would encourage your people. And Lord, we are on this journey. Others have gone before us that we can learn from. But Lord, we most of all need to learn from you and learn your heart. Lord, I just pray that you would help us to do that, and to humbly, continually seek your wisdom, and to guard our hearts, and to grow in grace. I just thank you for this family, this church family, and these families that you have brought here, and I just ask that you would bless us this week, and as we go now to the big family of Christ to worship, we pray you'd bless that, in Jesus' name, amen.