Carrs for Orphans: Christian Alliance for Orphans

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

Christian Alliance for Orphans

I just returned from the Christian Alliance for Orphans Summit IV. It was an incredible weekend! As you may or may not know, this Alliance was formed four years ago with the leading of Shaohannah's Hope, Family Life, Focus on the Family, Bethany Christian Services, Crown Financial Ministries, Lifesong for Ophans, and many other Christian agencies. There are adoption agencies, orphan care agencies, churches, and media working together in the name of Christ to care for orphans all across the world. You can see more information about the alliance by clicking here. The summit has really grown over the past several years. Summit I had 39 people, Summit II had 90, Summit III had 250, and Summit IV had around 600!

This year the host was Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale. This is an amazing church with an amazing heart for the orphan. Several years ago the pastor read a newspaper article that was explaining how foster kids were sleeping in office buildings because there was not enough homes open to them. At the same time, a lady in his church had been trying to talk to him about the need of children in their city. He calls her the "Pint Sized Prophet." Today, about 25% of the foster kids are in Christian homes! The have started a ministry called 4 Kids. Take some time to check it out. http://www.4kidsofsfl.org/

1 comments:

Tom Vanderwell said...: Johnny,

That sounds like a great conference. I would have loved to have been able to be there.

How's life treating you?

Tom; 9:15 PM

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

In June 2005, while we were waiting to bring James home I was following another family's story on the web. They were adopting a daughter from the Jiaozuo orphanage. They carried the director out to eat and little Xiao Li went along (she was 3 at the time). They posted all of this along with a picture and stated that she was deaf. When I saw her photo (the one above with her tongue out) I immediately knew that she was my daughter.

Fast forward to Sept. of ‘05. We are in China picking up our son and met some Americans there. I mentioned Xiao Li and one of our new friends said she knew her. She also said that there was a family in America who wanted to adopt her. I just said a little prayer and asked God to make sure she got a good family. After we arrived home, we began to plan a trip for March of '06 to go back to the province to work in our son's orphanage and some other orphanages. Our friend in Henan was helping us do that. Unknown to us, she made arrangements for us to visit Xiao Li's orphanage. She also made it possible for me to meet one of Xiao Li's ayi's (via internet) who made it possible to us to spend the day with Xiao Li when we were at her orphanage.

I had been told in Feb. that her file was being sent out and that the other family no longer wanted to adopt her. So, I began to search every waiting child list I could find and e-mail every adoption program I could get a contact for. Turns out that her file was sitting on the secretary's desk that whole time. When we met the secretary in March, he told us he still had a few more questions to answer in her file. We got word in June 2006, that her file was in Beijing. But I just continued to pray that wherever it ended up, we would find her and be matched.

On June 24, we received a call from Dick and Cheryl at IAAP saying they had the file of the little girl we were looking for. Dick had saved the e-mail I sent out back in Feb. And even though we had moved and all of our information had changed, he took the time to hunt us down on the internet in order to match us.