9 Lessons I have learned through Adoption.

Adoption Day July 22nd, 2010

Note: A few months ago I had the privilege of teaching at a Woman's Conference at Calvary Chapel Sao Vicente. CCSV is a church that is very near and dear to our hearts. Our family had a blessed time with our friends Pastor Celso and his beautiful wife Tati. One of the three messages that the Lord put on my heart to teach was "9 Lessons I have learned   through Adoption". For whatever reason the Lord put it on my heart today to post my notes from this teaching. I have already shared some of these ideas on this blog but I wanted to re post them to keep a record of what the Lord has been teaching this mom of many and I hope that He will use it to encourage someone else. With much love - Dani

Lesson 1.) We are chosen to be sons of God. 

(Rom 8:15) For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.”

 I have learned that it is very important to teach our children that adoption means acceptance and adoption means love. My oldest son Josiah has been told this so many times he started to tell people “Did you know I am the best kid in the whole world? Do you know why I am the best kid in the whole world? My parents could have picked any kid in the whole world but they chose me.” 

In fact our family has put such an emphasis on making sure that our children know that adoption is a special thing our biological son Ezekiel who is 4 years old started telling people that he was adopted. Adoption is acceptance. Adoption is love. We were chosen to be sons of God. Did you know that you are loved? Sometimes we as women just need to hear that don’t we? YOU ARE ACCEPTED! YOU ARE LOVED! YOU are loved by the God of the universe.  

Lesson 2 .) The Lord made a sacrifice to have a relationship with me. (John 3:16 )“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."  When we first got our kids it was really difficult. The kids came to us with lots of issues. It wasn’t their fault, they had come from a difficult life but never the less in the beginning it was very hard to parent them. I remember a time about a month after we got the kids, Nathan had gone back to Brazil to take care of the church and the kids and I had to stay in the U.S.A. to finalize the adoption. At the time we had 6 kids. Our oldest son Josiah was 5 years old, Hope was 4 years old, Grace, Lilly and Jer were ALL 2 years old and E.Z. was only 6 months old. Imagine 6 kids under 5 years old. Four of the kids were under 2 years old and FOUR babies were using diapers!! That is over a 1,000 diapers a month!! Imagine! I remember one day I was really sick, super sleep deprived, missing my husband and dealing with some MAJOR bad attitudes (mine was the worst I am sure). By noon, I had poop thrown at me, been bit, dealt with TONS of screaming, and to top it all off my face was dripping with spit from an angry two year old. My 5 year old had told me that he hated me and he wanted to go back to his “old mom”.  After I finally got everyone settled and down for a nap I sat on my bed and cried out to the Lord and said,

"Father, what am I doing? Are these kids ever going to realize what we are doing for them? Are they ever going to appreciate what we have given up for them? Are they ever going to love me the way that I love them?" 

As I sat on my bed listening to the unusually quiet house I heard my answer in the form of a question. The Lord said to me - 

“Do you realize what I have given up for you? Do you love ME the way that I love you?" 

Wow! It was in that moment that something in my mind clicked. Jesus ALREADY knew what I was feeling because He had ALREADY done it. He gave up being with His Father (WOW!) - so I should be able to get through being away from Nate for a time while we finalized the adoption. 

The Lord knew what it was like to have His kids spit in His face because He ALREADY did it - AND (here is the crazy part) He did it all for me and He did it for YOU.

Lesson 3.) Jesus is not ashamed to call us HIS brothers!  (Heb 2:11)“For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren” 

 Shortly after adopting our kids, I remember shopping at Walmart in our pretty conservative little town. Because I had 6 little kids we usually did our shopping in the afternoon which also happens to be when the older/ sometimes rather judgemental senior citizens of our town would also do their shopping. On this particular shopping trip I remember Josiah gleefully singing the “Thong Song” as loud as he could while I avoided eye contact from more than one horrified fellow shoppers. Poor Hope wanted to hide under the cart as all attempts to quiet Josiah's concert only encouraged him to sing louder. In the moment good girl Hope was a little ashamed for people to think Josiah was her brother but Jesus is not ashamed to call us HIS brothers. Wow!

Lesson 4.) We are considered joint heirs and brothers with Jesus.  

(Gal 4:5-6) to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!”

 July 22nd, 2010, our adoption day was one of the best days of my life. Like our wedding day or our other children's births is was a day that was much anticipated, planned for, and prayed over. Because it was such a crazy day I remember very little details of the day and the adoption ceremony itself. So while the details of the day are foggy one thing is forever etched in my mind and I will remember it for the rest of my life and that is what the judge said to us right before she pronounced the kids "Cates forever". The judge looked Nathan and I in the eye and very seriously said  “Mr. and Mrs. Cate I see that you already have three biological children and I want to make one thing very clear. These children that you are adopting today will be considered the same as your biological children. They have every right and every inheritance as if they were born to you.” We as Christians are considered joint heirs of Jesus. We are sons of God. 

Lesson 5.) When we spend time with the Lord we look more like Him.  (2Corinthians 3:18) “ But we all, with unveiled face, beholding a(2Corinthians 3:18) “ But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” One of my favorite things as an adoptive mother is watching our family grow and mold together. Everywhere we go people try to “figure us out”. Everyone wants to know how on earth two 28 year olds could have 8 kids. Sometimes we will tell people that we adopted but I always hate when people want to know WHO was adopted. My favorite response is, “I forgot”. Nate likes to say, “Hey if you can’t tell why should we?” I love that people can’t tell who is adopted and who is biological; this means that we are doing our job as adoptive parents. 

 Lately I have been seeing traits of Nathan in the kids more than ever, whether it is Josiah making a cheesy joke, Jeremiah making a funny face, or Lilly having an unnatural obsession for chocolate I am always finding myself telling the kids 

“You get that from your dad!” Every day the kids are becoming more like Nate because they are spending TIME with him, they have a relationship with him, and they are picking up on who he is as a person. I hope and pray that this is how I am with my Father Jesus Christ. I want to become more like Him as I spend time with Him just growing in our relationship and growing in His Word. I want to look like my Dad. 

Lesson 6.) The Lord sacrificed His perfect SON to have a relationship with me and imperfect sinner.  (yes, this verse again, hey it is that good!!)  (John 3:16 )“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 

 I remember when my kids first came to us Lilly was having a really hard time. Like I have already said, it was not her fault, she had been through a lot in her life and she just didn’t really like people. At the time out of all the people that she didn't like the one that she hated most (again, just in the beginning) was me. It was SO hard trying to love someone who only hated me. I remember one day she did something bad and I had to put her in a time out. When I asked her to go to the time out chair for her discipline she was so angry she put her hands on her hips and marched away. As she was walking away and glaring at me from across the room she spotted my 6 month old baby Ezekiel who was laying on the floor. Before I had time to make it across the room she got to the baby and kicked him in the face with her cowboy boots on! My heart broke! I loved the kids so much but I did not want to see my biological kids suffer because I had chosen to adopt my other 3 kids. I would do anything for any of my kids. I would lay down my life for any of my kids. The only thing that I would not be able to do would be to sacrifice the life of one of my kids for another kid. That kind of sacrifice would be an almost impossible sacrifice but if we really stop and think about it our Lord made an even greater sacrifice for us! At the time of this story my Lilly was bad but nothing compared to the sinner than I am. My baby Ezekiel was innocent but nothing compared to the innocence of the sinless Son of God Jesus Christ. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16) The Lord sacrificed His perfect Son to have a relationship with me. THIS IS LOVE!

Lesson 7.) There is no evidence of our past life. We are new creations in Him.  (2 Corinthians 5:17) “This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!”  I have been talking a lot about the horror stories of when the kids first came to us, but something very interesting is in only four and a half years of being in our family our kids are totally different people. Most people who meet our family are not even able to tell who is adopted and who are our biological children. Why? Because there is little to no evidence of the pain and the past life that my kids had. They have become new people. The old has passed away and new life has begun.   My kids have new names, new identity and a new family. This is something that the Lord desires to do in our lives as well when we accept Him as our Savior.

 Lesson 8.) The Lord has patience with me as I continue to grow in Him. 

 (Philippians 1:6)“being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ”

My kids are still not perfect (none of them are, they are sinners just like their mom ;) .) but they are continuing to grow every day. Sometimes the kids have bad days but I am trusting that the Lord will be faithful to complete the good work that He has started in their lives. When my kids have a bad day do I get mad and say “Ok, you have gone back to your old ways, no more love for you!” NO! I know that my kids are not perfect and I still love them. The Lord knows that we are not perfect and He choses to love us anyways. He will have patience and grace to forgive us when we fall and He will be faithful to continue the good work that HE has begun in our lives. 

Lesson 9.) I must choose a relationship with Him. We have sacrificed a lot for our kids and over the years we have had a lot of people say funny things like “You guys are saints!” or “What a blessing you are to those kids” but the reality is it isn’t only the kids who were blessed when we adopted them. Nathan and I are blessed every day to have every one of our kids as part of our family!o We love watching them play, we love watching them learn, and we love watching them grow. We love seeing their different personalities and we love getting to know them more everyday. There is no greater joy than having a relationship with our kids. When our kids choose to talk to us, when they choose to spend time with us and share their hearts with us everything that we have done for them is totally worth it. Our Heavenly Father is also wanting to have that same kind of relationship with us. The only thing is we need to do is accept that relationship with Him. We need to choose to walk in that relationship and to spend time growing in that relationship daily. You have the opportunity to become a daughter of the Living God. If you are have already accepted Jesus as your Savior ask yourself “Do I look like my Dad?”, are you looking more like Jesus daily? If you don’t see that you are growing in your relationship with Him now is the time to recommit yourself to Him and start the process of becoming more and more like Him.  

(Rev. 3:20)“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”

"Oh for gross!!"

  Lately I have been feeling like our family has been battling sickness and stomach bugs more than ever. At first it seemed like a mystery to me as to why we keep getting sick, because for the most part we eat really healthy-  beans and rice, lots of fruits, tons of veggies and mostly organic everything.  But yesterday as I was filling up my pot to make some homemade chicken soup I noticed a few unwanted guests in the water... worms  ugg!!

I asked Nate to climb up and take a look at our water box to see if it needed cleaning and this is 

what he found.............

 It turns out that the cap of our water box had been broken and instead of replacing it our 

landlord tried to just cover the hole with a plastic bag. The plastic bag broke leaving our water 

 completely exposed to rain, bugs, birds and anything and everything else that came along.  

 Nate spent the day cleaning out the box and we made sure that everyone took their worm pills. It was a neat opportunity to talk to the kids about sin. I told them like the 

yucky green water sin can also start off as what we think is a very tiny problem that we may not 

even see  but if we do not open our hearts and clean out the "yucky stuff"  we

can be left with a very big problem that can do a lot of damage.

It was a great lesson about how important it is to repent of our sins and ask Jesus to 

cleanse our heart of our own yucky stuff. 

 

 I love how the Lord can use even the grossest of adventures in our life as an opportunity to 

teach our kids. 

 

 That was our adventure of the day in a nutshell. I am pretty sure that we don't even have a 

chance of ever having a boring day around here!

 

Thank You Jesus for protecting us from the "yucky  green stuff" for who knows how long! 

"You get that from your Dad!"

One of my favorite things as an adoptive mother is watching our family grow and mold together. Everywhere we go people try to “figure us out”. Everyone wants to know how on earth two 25 year olds could have 7 kids. Sometimes we will tell people that we adopted but I always hate when people want to know WHO was adopted. My favorite response is, “I forgot”. Nate likes to say, “Hey if you can’t tell why should we?” I love that people can’t tell who is adopted and who is biological; this means that we are doing our job as adoptive parents.

Lately I have been seeing traits of Nathan in the kids more than ever, whether it is Josiah making a cheesy joke, Jeremiah making a funny face, or Lilly having an unnatural obsession for chocolate I am always finding myself telling the kids
“You get that from your dad!” Every day the kids are becoming more like Nate because they are spending TIME with him, they have a relationship with him, and they are picking up on who he is as a person. I hope and pray that this is how I am with my Father Jesus Christ. I want to become more like Him as I spend time with Him just growing in our relationship and growing in His Word. I want to look like my Dad.

2Cr 3:18 “ But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

My Twins. :)

Have you ever had the Lord speak to you? Remind you of things? Like maybe reminding you of things that He had promised you, and you had just forgotten about? Well I have, and I am forever amazed that the God that I serve is so BIG, yet so personal that He would even bother to speak to little old me.
A few months ago I was having a really hard day with this whole adoption process. I was just feeling like this adoption was NEVER going to be done, and my kids were never going to be “my” kids. I was asking the Lord why this was so hard. I mean, were we pushing for something that was not supposed to be?
As I was praying about all of these things on my heart I started to think about my twins. I was thinking about how I had missed so much of their little lives and wishing that I could have been there for them. Anyway, as I thought about them, I started to think about where I had been, and what I had been doing when they were different ages. As I thought about their birth, and where I was the day they were born I stopped in my tracks.
The twins were born on Feb. 4th 2008. On Feb. 4th 2008 Nate and I were at a Pastors Conference in Brazil. At this conference there was an orphanage close by. Before we even arrived at the conference I had joked to Nate saying I wanted to go to the orphanage and maybe meet our next kid. He had just laughed. Anyways, once we arrived at the conference I asked a few people about the orphanage, but they all told me that the doors were closed, and we would not be able to visit. I was a little sad, not that I had really expected to adopt a kid at that time, but I knew that this was a desire in my heart.
I decided to once again give this desire to the Lord.
In my quiet time that day I prayed,
“Lord, You know that I would LOVE to have more kids someday. You also know that Nate and I both have it on our hearts to adopt, and I believe that this desire is from You. I ask that you will bring those kids to us in Your time.”
As I prayed this prayer I felt the Lord like I have only felt a few other times in my life. He said, “Start praying, your kids are already born.” I wrote this down, and I told Nate and my friend what the Lord told me that day. I did start to pray for the kids- whoever they were. I knew that the Lord would bring them in His time, but little did I know that the VERY same day that the Lord told me this, my precious little Lilliana and Jeremiah were born!
How cool is our God?! He knew before these crazy awesome kids were even born that they were going to be a part of our family. He put it on my heart to pray for them from the very day that they were born, and then He reminded me of His faithfulness, and His perfect plan just when I need that extra encouragement! ☺ He is just too cool!!

“ Lord your greatness is just insane! I will never be able to wrap my little head around it. I am so glad that you see our lives from start to finish. Thank you for you plan for my life. Please help me to never get in the way of your plan and always be open to be used by You. I love you!”

The Joys of Motherhood! ;)

Oh man what a day! I am starting to get the feeling that life with 6 kids is going to be just full of adventures! This morning started out pretty normal. We woke up by 6a.m., got breakfast for everyone, cleaned up a little.. changed 6 poopy diapers by 7:30a.m. ..then bathed and dressed 6 little stink pots.. same old, same old. E.Z. was not feeling well and because I was planning on some of my very best, very oldest friends coming to visit I decided to lay him down for an early nap. My oldest boy Josiah (or Ben age 5) and Hope (4) were running around the house playing while I took care of the younger 4kids needs. For some reason they kept trying to go into my room . I was not sure what they were trying to get in there, but I had to redirect them multiple times. They both know that they need to stay within ear shot/ eyesight when they play.. they just were having a hard time with the whole “obedience thing” this morning. Anyway, to make a long story a little shorter, soon after Josiah came away from my room we figured out that the door was locked- and Ezekiel was asleep inside the room! After questioning the kids Josiah admitted that he was the one who locked the baby in the room. After sending him to his room (until I could talk to him more in depth about the importance of NOT messing around with locks – again!) the search for the missing key began. We spent the next two hours looking EVERYWHERE for the key. Couches were moved, all drawers were opened, and all purses were dumped out. The key was nowhere to be found. The more time passed the more stressed I got . I knew that Ezekiel was not able to get out of his crib, but because he was a little sick I was afraid that he would soon start to cry. I knew that if he was crying in there and I could not get to him I was going to lose it.
My dear old friends came in the middle of the chaos and tried to help us think of ways to get to the baby. After we had worn out all other options my mother-in-law looked up numbers for a locksmith. In sheer desperation, and as a last attempt to get out of paying a $150 locksmith fee I resorted to bribes for the kid.
“O.K. guys, if you find the key I will give you $3!!” Josiah looked up. Finally I had his attention!
“Ummm…. Do you mean the key to your room?” Josiah asked. “Yeah.” I answered. He then reached into his pocket and pulled out the key!
“Josiah, have you had this in your pocket the whole time?!” I asked in disbelief.
“Umm… do I get the $3?” Josiah asked. Ahhh!! I didn’t know what to do.. kiss him or ground him!
All ended well . The baby was fine, we had a great visit with my friends, and Josiah learned never to play with locks. I guess I should just be happy that he thought that a $3 reward was enough to come forward with the key, and he didn’t wait to give us the key until it went up to $5!
Oh the joys of motherhood! 

“ Lord thank you for my crazy kids. Help me to always have patience with them. Give me wisdom in raising them. Help me to always have joy in the midst of the chaos.”

Live, Laugh, Love. :)

I have been thinking that it might be fun to write a little bit about what life has been like being a mommy of 6 little ones under 5 years old. I think that I am going to start doing this more for myself than anything else. I think that it will be good for me to be able to look back in a few months from now and see how far the Lord has grown me up, grown my kids up, and how He has grown us as a family.
The last four months with my three new little blessings has been such an adventure. We have had so many mountain top highs, as well as valley lows. I have moments where I find myself thinking “Wow! Look at how good they are being! I have got this down, this is easy!” These moments are usually few and far between and they go as quickly as they come. Lol!
The other day we were having a particularly good afternoon. The kids and I had been playing games together and we were all just enjoying being together as a family. I decided that because everyone was in such good moods it would be a good time to put everyone in the shower (well the youngest 5 anyway). I knew that it was not going to be easy to convince my twins to get in the shower because they prefer baths, but after lots of convincing I had everyone undressed and the process of “destinking” had begun, A few minutes into the shower I realized that I had to go to the bathroom! I know that it sounds crazy, but when you have 6 kids and you spend the day literally running you can actually forget to go. Anyway, I knew that the timing was not the best, but I hey, you have to do what you have to do (and when you have to do it). ;)
So I very quickly used the restroom and in the matter of half a second all 5 of the kids were SCREAMING! The screams were not the normal screams of whining, they were screams of sheer horror. I looked up to see four of the five kids running out of the shower. Before I even had time to see what was wrong Grace (2) was hiding behind a plant, Hope (4) was hiding under a towel, Lilly (2) was hiding behind the toilet (and flushing it over and over again), E.Z. (9 months) was still in the shower but pretty freaked out that everyone was screaming, and Jeremiah (2) had opened the door and was dancing in the hallway – totally wet and butt naked! ;) Why all the screaming you might ask? The answer – A roach. Yes, that is right. One little roach has the power to strike fear, terror, and wreak havoc in the lives of my little people. I managed to get them all calmed down within a few minutes but it took all week to be able to convince them that the “bug” no longer lived in the bathroom, and that it actually was safe for them to shower there.
I have learned the importance of laughter in times like these. It would be so easy to let stressful moments get me down, but I have learned that it will never help anything to stress. So what do I do when all 6 of kids are having a break down at the same time? What do I do when my 2 year old is dancing naked in the hallway? I LAUGH! That’s right, I laugh, and I thank the Lord for blessing me with these crazy, energetic, awesome, and totally wonderful kids. 

“Thanks God for blessing me with every one of my sweet babies. Please help me to be the very best mom for them. I want to serve You as I am serving them and their needs. Help me to raise them to love you , and give me the energy and the strength to do it. Love you Lord! Amen.”