Adoption is a most daunting task: from paperwork to legal work, background checks to bank checks, if the selection doesn’t discourage you the inspection most certainly will.

Often times a couple’s adoption journey begins to feel much like one’s own private road to Ee-may-is. Confused and alone two people once so sure it was of the Lord now wondering if they haven’t taken the wrong path.

If that’s you today, please take heart. Just like those two wondering wanderers depicted in Luke 24: Jesus is always right there with us. And in our obedience to Him, He’s most ready, willing and able to lighten our load.

Ever the Brother He’ll slow the pace so that we might keep up: Ever the Teacher He’ll explain scripture so that we might brighten up: And ever the Comforter He’ll stay by our side so that we may lighten up.

God is the defender of the Fatherless, He is their rescuer, their sustainer, their Father. If He’s calling you to adopt, He’ll be right there with you. And if God is with you, who can be against you?

Any veteran police officer will tell you that broken glass is the last sign of a broken neighborhood – not the first. The theory goes that if the glass sits long enough for us to notice, that’s a clear sign that no one is around anymore who cares enough to clean it up.

And if no one cares about the broken glass, there’s probably no one left to care about the decaying homes, infested infrastructure, and boarded-up businesses, much less the women and children.

Yet that’s exactly what’s happening to our inner cities. Surburban sprawl combined with any number of misguided government social policies are killing our cities.

The question becomes, should we care. And the answer is yes.

Yes, because we still live in a great nation: undivided by wealth. Yes, because we supposedly won the fight against segregation.

Yes, because there are still people left in those cities. Real live people who Jesus says are our neighbors. Women who have no one to protect them. Children who have no one to feed and clothe them. Men who have no home, no dignity, no purpose. All, the least among us. All, those we are to love – as if we were doing it for Him.

Please don’t let Jesus go hungry, naked, homeless or oppressed in the city because you don’t like to drive there. Or visit there. Or go there at all – not even in your mind.

Second chances are integral to our societies and our selves. Making mistakes is how we learn, and our penal systems are predicated on a system of rehabilitative punishment.

Kids in foster care are often described as deserving a second chance; but I would argue when was their first?

Always, with one hundred percent accuracy, children are the victims of their parents or grandparents sins; maybe even further back.

Predictably, Deuteronomy 28 explains that the children of those who fail to obey God will be given to other people, or harsher still, to captivity. That was the fate of the widow’s sons in 2 Kings 4 until God filled her vessels overflowing.

Now captivity isn’t a word any of the wonderful people who comprise the Child Welfare Systems would use to describe itself: but the kids might. Shuttled from place to place, in many houses but fewer homes, and even fewer hearts, kids feel abandoned. Possessing no responsibility but serving all the punishment, there must be a better way.

The good news? Christ, as always. Strong Christians build strong marriages: which lead to strong families, not only stemming the tide of kids going in to the system, but through adoption can offer kids trying to get out – a first chance.

Every kid needs an uncle: especially kids without dads. You know what I mean an older, Godly man who loves them like a parent, but isn’t. Someone who can listen to what they don’t say; someone who can say things that they need to hear; someone who sticks with them through thick and thin – especially the thin.

Barnabas played the uncle for John Mark in the book of Acts. While originally a member of the Paul and Barnabas’ mission trips, John Mark deeply disappointed the great Apostle in Pam-fil-ee-yuh and lost his standing. Instead of abandoning John Mark, the Encourager organized his own mission trip and took the young man under his wing. Barnabas rehabilitated him so well that twenty years later when Paul so needed a friend we read that John Mark was by his side.

Uncles do their best work when times are at their worst. Keeping an ear available; a door ajar; and a relationship alive until the winds of change blow maturity in. Its tough work but kids need the help: and young boys without dads are at the most risk of losing their lives to drugs, jail or worse.

With so many temptations today pulling kids from God’s side, is God calling you to be an uncle to a John Mark today?

Friends often ask us to discern on their behalf if someone asking for financial help is a good investment or not. We’re certainly not alone; knowing if a few bucks would help or hurt someone in the grip of poverty is an age old dilemma.

Our advice is to always turn to Scripture for answers. First off, take it to God in prayer: Paul tells us to take everything to Him, of course that includes stewardship.

Second, if the Spirit is leading you to give money, do it: storing up your treasures in heaven is a good principle no matter what the circumstances. God’s ways are higher than ours, so if you’re in the Word and trying to be discerning, God will work out everything for good. He’s not looking to trick us.

Third, our God is a God of relationship. Getting to know the people asking for money is always a good idea. Start small, watch what they do with a little and it will give you a good idea how they’ll handle much.

Last but certainly not least: whatever you do, do it with great humility. Paul writes the Philippians to do nothing in vanity, but in lowliness of mind esteem another better than yourself. If we have money to give, that’s God’s blessing to us, not ours to someone else.