Its a Small World After All

Sometimes, it seems the Lord just continues to bless me with one gift after another!  He bestowed on me another gift this week; but not only a gift for me but also for John.

John has been spending time hanging out with a buddy on his football team.  For the last couple of weekends John and his buddy Grant have nearly been inseperable.  John tried to explain to me, "Mom, we just seem to have a bond! We like to do all the same things!"  Things like fish and hunt and football and golf and playing war and hanging out.  Grant's a great kid, so we didn't mind, but also John had some responsabilities at home, however, Grant seemed just as content to help John do his chores, so we let him stay over the last few weekends. 

Then , finally, John got an opportunity to spend a few hours with Grant and his family, that live in the country, just outside of Searcy.  The boys had fun doing all the things they like to do. But in the course of conversation, it was discovered that Grant's Mom, who is a school teacher, used to be a teacher in the small town northwest of here that John spent his first 5 years.  John and Grant used to go to the same school!!

Now, without telling much of John's story, because that's his story to tell, not mine, I'll just say John's life was obviously horrible before he went into foster care at the age of 5.  The things he went through....it's devestating and horrible and sad. Sometimes, if I dwell on it, I get angry, because as a parent I feel like somehow I should have known and saved him.  I should have been there...but that's impossible and I have to move on.  Anyway, John's life took a drastic turn when he was 5 and he began a brand new journey, all alone and by himself. 

John has pictures of his past.  Pictures of him as a toddler and with various caretakers and biological family members.  From about age 4 to age 9 1/2 we had nothing.  Actually this is a whole lot more than a lot of foster kids have/had so we've been pretty content to have what we did. 

So, back to Grant and his Mom.  Grant's Mom went to her old yearbooks and started texting me pictures of my little boy taken when he was about 4, maybe 5 years old.  Adorable pictures.  Pictures I wish I could have combed his hair for him that day.  Pictures I would have given anything to buy a cute shirt for him for picture day.  Pictures that I wish so much I had been there to purchase and put in a little school book for him.  As a parent, it also broke my heart to look at his little eyes and try to picture some of what he went through as a child.  Lord, it just breaks your heart...for any kid to go through what foster kids go through.  You gotta know, kids don't ask to get put in foster care.  They don't ask for abuse and to be neglected. Then to get taken from the only home they have ever known-even a home that has no electricity, no running water, no bed for the kids to sleep on, parents that are too cracked out to notice.  Then like a mixture of a bad dream and a fantasy world, you get put in a warm home that has a toilet (maybe 2), plenty of food and regular bedtimes.  No yelling.  No strangers (after you get to know the family.)  Water from a tap at the sink-in the kitchen!!  I look at this little boy and then at the little man I have now.  Wow, what a blessing!  We met John when he was 9.  Got him when he was 10 and formally adopted him when he was 12.  But he was always meant to be a Philpott.  And meant to be Presley and Addy's brother.  And meant to be the son of David and Lola Philpott.  Man, we love him!  And God saw him through some hard times...2 Timothy 1:7 said, "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but the power and of love and of a sound mind."  Me and David had a little plaque in our home that reads this scripture in our house ever since we first got married.  That scripture proves that the Lord carried John through his troubled times.  Talk about footprints!  And a sound mind...John knows God had a plan too.   We have all been so blessed.  

I remember when Presley used to pray at nighttime for a "big brother."  I used to laugh to myself and think, "well how in the World does she expect that to happen?"  I guess I forgot Matthew 21:22, "And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing you will receive." I mean it makes me laugh a little.  But I should never have doubted the Lord.  Even as she prayed, he was preparing John in his other foster home(s) for our home.  He was building John Philpott.  Thank you Jesus for the perfect son!  Thank you God for sending your son....

Again, I beg y'all, please pray for a way to help foster children.  If you're able at all, please consider fostering.  Please consider older children-they need homes and help and love too.  We got a new 17 year old this week that is so good, he just needs someone.  But I think mostly about our "older child."  Our 10 year old.  In foster care, when a child's parental rights have been terminated, their chances of adoption decrease with every birthday.  Lots of people are willing to adopt a healthy baby.  Fewer people consider a baby with health problems.  Fewer yet consider black or hispanic babies.  As a child gets older, with each year, their chances of adoption get slimmer and slimmer.  In Arkansas alone there are hundreds of children, from newborns all the way to 17 years old that need permanent homes.  That want permanent homes.  That need loving, supporting homes. I have a bio child, a child adopted as a baby and a child adopted as an "older child" and I'm tryin' to tell ya, the love is the same and equall for all the kids. You CAN love them as "your own." 

Tangent: speaking of "as your own."  I HATE and I think other adoptive parents feel the same, I HATE when people say, "How many kids of your own do you have?"  I understand the innocence of the question and most people mean nothing by it.  But these kids are ALL MY OWN.  Blood, obviously, doesn't make a child yours.  Blood doesn't make you a parent.  Love makes a parent.  That is all. 

Thanks for reading...and thank you Shannon Holeyfield for an aswesome gift-my kids school pictures!! :)
Lola Philpott