A Place to Call Home

By David A. Sargent

     Nine-year-old Jordan wants to be a police officer when he grows up.
     “Why do you want to be a police officer?” asked Reporter Lacey Lett.
     “Because they’re fun and they protect people,” he said.
     But there’s something that Jordan wants even more: a family.
     Jordan has a brother, Braison.  Braison has been adopted and Jordan does not get to see him very often.  Jordan is living in a group home; he has been in the care of the Oklahoma Department of Human Services (OKDHS) for six years.
     Jordan longs for a family of his own.
     “If you could go anywhere – anywhere in the whole wide world – where would it be?” Lett asked.
     “To an adoption party for a home,” Jordan replied.
     And if he were granted three wishes?
     “To have a family, and family, family.  Those are the only wishes I have,” Jordan said.
     “The reason it’s important is because -- so I could have some people to talk to anytime I need to,” Jordan explained.  “I hope one of y’all pick me.”
     After his interview was aired on KFOR, families from several different states reached out to the news station, wanting to adopt him, according to The Daily Mail.  Lett reported that OKDHS has received thousands of online inquiries and countless phone calls to their hotline with people wanting to adopt Jordan.
     There is Good News for everyone: there IS a place that everyone can call home.  There is a Father that wants to adopt every person who will accept His invitation.  His family is the church – “a place to call home,” a people to call family.
     God wants YOU to be a part of His forever family.
     The Father paid a great price in order to adopt you.  Peter reminded some in God’s family of that great price: “For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Peter 1:18-19 NIV).
     God will save from sin, adopt into His family, and give eternal life to those who place their faith and trust in Jesus (Acts 16:30-31), turn from their sins in repentance (Acts 17:30-31), confess Jesus before men (Romans 10:9-10), and are baptized (immersed) into Christ (Acts 2:38).  Those who accept His offer receive the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38), and they are adopted (or “born again”) into the family of God.
     The Apostle Paul wrote to some who accepted God’s offer of adoption: “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.’  The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs; heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together” (Romans 8:15-17 NKJV).
     Borrowing some words from Jordan, “I hope ALL of y’all accept God’s offer!”

- David A. Sargent, minister for the Church of Christ at Creekwood in Mobile, Alabama, is also the editor of an electronic devotional entitled "Living Water." To learn more about this excellent resource contact David via their website: http://www.creekwoodcc.org

* Information gleaned from “‘I hope one of y’all pick me,’ 9-year-old boy desperately wants a place to call home” by Lacey Lett of KFOR, www.kfor.com, and “Oklahoma boy gets 5,000 adoption inquiries in 12 hours after heartbreaking interview in which he pleaded for a family” by Nick Givas, www.foxnews.com.