God put a desire in my heart to work in the mission field at a young age. Little did I know that He was calling me to a field right here in the United States.

I discovered I wanted to pursue the field of adoption and foster care when, in my senior year of college, God opened the door for me to intern at Adoption Connection PA. A year after graduation, I started working for the same adoption agency where I interned. As I was interning, my family started the process of becoming foster parents. God’s timing is always perfect. Watching my family go through the process of becoming a foster family while I was learning to interact with foster parents professionally gave me a unique perspective.

Within Adoption Connection PA, I have the privilege of helping find families for children who need more permanent placements. When a family first contacts our adoption and foster care agency, they are typically asked if they would come in for an orientation. This helps a family gain knowledge of the process as a whole and obtain more insight on what adoption path they may want to pursue before starting several hours of training and paperwork. I work with families who have decided to foster children and hopefully adopt them if reunification with the birth parents is impossible.

The majority of children in the foster care system today have birth parents, but the state has had to intervene and remove these children from their original homes. The primary goal always is to reunite them with their birth parents, but if that is no longer an option, the courts believe adoption is the next best course.

He chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. (Eph. 5:3-6 ESV)

When making a match in the foster-to-adopt process, there are two aspects to consider: the waiting families and the waiting children. Except in emergency placements, a waiting family must go through an interview process with the child’s team of caseworkers before being chosen as a pre-adoptive family for a waiting child. I worked with one of those waiting children whose alias (pre-adoptive children are required to have an alias) was Mariah. When I first met Mariah, she had just been removed from her previous adoptive parents and was very confused. She desperately wanted a family to love. Four months into her case, Mariah’s team had her meet with a family we thought would be a good match, but the match fell through. Over the next several months Mariah often asked if I was still looking for a family for her to belong to. It broke my heart every time.

When I was planning to attend an adoption event, I was surprised to see a familiar name—Michelle Fulk—listed on the flyer. Further, Michelle and her husband were looking for girl about Mariah’s age. I contacted their agency right way, but when I didn’t hear back I assumed the Fulks must have already been matched. Three months later, Michelle called me. I didn’t understand she was calling to have lunch, and instead asked if she was interested in Mariah. She said that wasn’t the purpose of her call, but she wanted to hear more of this little girl’s story anyway.

Five months later I was placing Mariah into the Fulks’ home. Six months after that, Mariah—who became Gabby Fulk—told the judge she found her family and wanted to be adopted. This is one of many stories I can tell showing God’s perfect timing. Working in the field of adoption and foster care has grown my faith in ways that I never would have imagined. I often tell families, before they are even chosen for a child, that no child is perfect. They come with a lot of baggage. It is not a matter of if they will get on your nerves and drive you crazy; it is a question of when.

This is the very way we appear before God. God adopted us to be a part of His family, flaws and all. He knows we will mess up. Look at how many Scripture passages are on forgiveness; God knows we will need it. Adoption is a story full of grace and love. It is a beautiful picture of what God has done for His people.

See adoption from the other side in an article by Michelle Fulk, https://rpwitness.org/articles/comments/a-purpose-to-it-all