How Foster Care is Wrecking our Lives............. For Good

Our family has been involved in foster care on and off for about 4 years now.  We are currently caring for just our second placement.  So we are by no means seasoned veterans in this fight.  But even in the short time we have been a part of this ministry, it has completely destroyed our life as we knew it.  Our world view, our family, our marriage, our hearts; everything has changed.  And that’s a good thing.  The following are a few of the lessons we’ve learned along the way.

1)      God is God, and I am not.  When we choose to love a child that is in state custody, so much is out of our control.  Foster parents have very few rights in regards to decisions being made on behalf of the children in their care.  So unlike with our own children, there is not even the illusion of control over their lives.  But here’s why that’s not such a bad thing.  Because we as humans are incredibly selfish.  We will seek out the things that increase our own comfort.  And we see such a small part of the picture of the lives of these children.  On the contrary, God is Sovereign.  Not only does He see the big picture, but He acts and moves according to His Glory and according to His Love for us and for these kids.  I am learning to trust in His Sovereignty and so glad that He is Faithful and has never once let any of his good promises fail.

2)      God does indeed sometimes give us more than we can handle.  We have personally experienced being “in over our heads,” so we know for a fact that this trendy doctrine that God wouldn’t want us to suffer is an outright lie.  But here’s the thing, the suffering that comes our way is not meant to separate us from God, but to draw us closer to him.  When we are handed a burden that we cannot bear on our own, we must learn to depend on someone much bigger, much stronger, and much more capable than ourselves to stand up under it.  And when those hard times come, and we lean in to him, we find that He is indeed big enough, and strong enough to see us through.

3)      God is faithful, trustworthy, loving, and good.  In these past few months, we have seen God come through for us more times than we can even recount.  I have been absolutely blown away by how personally and perfectly he pursues me and loves me right when where I need Him most.  This lesson is very personal, and words fail me.  But I am simply amazed by Jesus. 

4)      The lives of my children have been deeply affected by this.  Probably our biggest concern going in to foster care was wondering how it would affect our own children.  And they have indeed been affected.  They have hurt, they have struggled, they have shed tears.  They have dealt with new levels of being angry, frustrated, jealous, annoyed, and overwhelmed.  BUT….. in all of that, they have seen their great need for Jesus.  AND, they have seen Him work on their behalf.  The times where we have been wise enough to guide them in asking God for help to love, God has come through for them every time.  HE has changed their hearts and helped them in ways only God can.  Because of this, they have developed a greater capacity to love. a greater capacity to hurt and to heal, to need help and to give it.  and this is a very good thing.   

5)      Ultimately, these kids are not ours.  As a matter of fact, our own biological children are not ours either.  As parents, and foster parents, we must come to the realization that these are God’s children first.  We are just called to be stewards of them for a short time.  For some of them, that time will be shorter than others.  But that difference between ownership and stewardship is a good thing.  Because of God’s grace, my children are able to be more than just the sum of my successes and failures, or in the case of our foster children, someone else’s decisions.  God loves them way more than we do, and because HE loves them wholly and perfectly, they get to be who HE created them to be. 

6)      Car seats are overrated.  Wait, what? Where did that come from?  Yeah, you heard me.  This is indeed a life-changing lesson.  During our time in foster care, and parenting in general, I have shuffled more car seats in and out of our vehicles than I even care to count.  Shuffled is a loose term.  I really mean wrestled with.  Every time it is a battle to get them buckled, strapped, latched, and fit into the car in just the right configuration for the mix of kids that will be getting into and out of them on that particular day.  Part of the frustration is that the maximum seating capacity of a full size Chevy suburban can be drastically reduced from 8 to 4 or 5 because of these evil contraptions.  I seriously long for the days when all of my cousins and I would pile in the back of my grandpas SUV and seatbelts were truly optional. And even before my time, babies sat in the laps of parents or older kids, and families would travel hundreds of miles down the highway at 80 miles an hour with no seatbelts or DVDs and just enjoy the open road.  But I digress.  In all seriousness though, I have learned that with all the heaviness that foster care brings, you must learn to laugh in the chaos.  You must have a sense of humor if you’re going to deal with the sadness.  And you must learn to laugh at yourself as you’re pouring sweat, wrestling with mammoth size car seats in tiny spaces. 

7)      The foster care system is indeed broken.  But there’s not going to be a perfect system to fix brokenness.  Any time you’re dealing with people, there will be imperfection, and among the broken, I am chief.  I had no idea that a full-grown adult could be so easily unraveled to their core by a 3 year old.  Foster care has exposed our family to the depths of the mess in this world.  We have experienced the consequences of sin in these children, in these families, and in our own hearts.  When put under enough stress, a person’s true self will be exposed, and in our case, it has been ugly.   But, the ugliness has caused us to better appreciate the beauty and the depth of God’s grace.  We have experienced the gospel in a deeper and more tangible way as we been a part of the mess, and as we trust in the promise of the restoration.

8)      Never say never.  I wonder sometimes if there is any other word that makes the Lord move in our lives quicker than the word, “Never.” We said we would never want to be foster parents because we didn’t know if we could handle saying goodbye.  We said we would never put foster children in daycare because we didn’t think that was good for them.  We said we would never put foster children in respite because we didn’t think it was necessary.  We said we would never disrupt a placement because of how hard it is on these kids.  WELL…… God has a way sometimes of breaking your pride.  We have now done all of these things we said we would never do.  We decided to foster children because God showed us how selfish we were not to. We put our foster daughter in daycare because it actually turned out to be what was best for her.  We have asked for respite because we found out we did indeed need a break.  And we had to disrupt a placement because we found out that there is such a thing as too much.  So, my advice would be to only say “never” if you fully intend to do just that thing. 

9)      Emotions are completely unreliable guides for life.  Foster care is such a roller coaster of emotion.  Ups and downs, twists and turns.  And in those moments, I will not be able to get my heart off the ride.  But I don’t have to act how I feel.  I can use my head to act in accordance with the truth of God’s Word regardless of what I feel.  I cannot make myself be happy about a parent’s decision or about a judge’s decision, but I can choose to trust in God’s sovereignty and rest in it.  I cannot make myself stop being annoyed with a child’s frustrating behaviors, but I can choose to be patient because God is patient with me.  I cannot manufacture affection for a child I am not yet attached to, but I can choose to love because God first loved me. 


10)   Foster care is inherently linked with hurt. and loss.  My heart might just break.  But if it has to bleed a bit for Jesus, I’m ok with that, because he first bled for me.