adopted for life: the priority of adoption for christian families & churches

Wow.  I'm only on the third chapter of this book, but my heart is gripped already.  I woke up, compelled to share this quote and to write it in my journal.

The universe was meant to be a home - where the image-bearers of God rule and serve under their Father.  It was all to be ours.  The primeval insurrection in the garden, though, turned the universe into an orphanage - the heirs were gone, done in by their appetites.  A serpent now holds the cosmos in captivity, driving along the deposed rulers as his slaves.  The whole universe is now an orphanage.

But then there's Jesus.

When we were still orphans, Christ became a substitute orphan for us.  Though he was a son, he took on the humiliation of a slave and the horror of death (Phil.2:6-8).  Jesus walked to that far country with us, even to the depths of the hog pen that we'd made our home, and hung on a tree abandoned by his Father in our place.

Only he could do this because only he, the one sinless human, didn't have the cosmic blackmail against him that the Accuser can call up for all of us.  The Lord Christ simply announces that "the ruler of this world is coming.  He has no claim on me" (john 14:30).

As both an adoptive mother and foster mom, this book brings special significance into my life.  But author Russell Moore challenges all of us who name the name of Christ when he says, "The gospel of Jesus Christ means our families and churches ought to be at the forefront of the adoption of orphans close to home and around the world."

My prayer from the start of the introduction provided by C.J. Mahaney has been this:

Lord, use  this book as a tool in the hands of believers everywhere to make a difference in the lives of orphans.  May we not first think that someone else ought to care for the fatherless, but may we consider how You might be calling us to play our part - for the sake of Your glory and Your gospel.