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This season has been one of the most challenging seasons in my entire career.  As if the financial stresses of having a new business weren't difficult enough, our current economy has quantified the pain.  I am surprised by the peace I feel in the midst of a financial storm the likes of which I have never faced.   I find great solstice in defining my identity in whose I am rather than what I do...

This past month, I have had a number of conversations about adoption.  I sat next to an old friend during a men's Bible study and he told me that he and his wife are in the midst of adopting 6 young children whose parents are unable to support them.  I also am part of a ministry at our church for our adopted people group, the Uyghurs.  As I reflected upon adoption, I realized it is a very serious consideration to adopt someone, a decision not to be taken lightly, a decision that is forever, not temporal.

I googled adoption and here are some of the definitions I found:

• To take into one's family through legal means and raise as one's own child.
• Adoption is an act by which the legal relation of parent and child is created.
• Adoption: The official transfer of all of the parental rights that a biological parent has to a child, including the responsibility for the care and supervision of the child, its nurturing and training, its physical and emotional health, and its financial support.
  

I couldn't help but reflect upon our relationship with God, adopted as His sons and daughters through Christ.  There are several Bible verses about adoption, but one of my favorites is Ephesians 1:4-6  ⁴For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love ⁵he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will- ⁶to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.

I must confess that I am very humbled to think that the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the God of all creation has adopted me as His son...that I am a co-heir with Christ...that I have a glorious inheritance awaiting me...that I have a Daddy in heaven who created the heavens!!! 

I find great peace in knowing that God is the perfect Father and that He will be true to His word to fully provide for my needs, physically, emotionally, and spiritually...for eternity!

My prayer for you this month is twofold:

If you are already the son or daughter of the King, I pray that you will sense the depth of the love that God has for you, that you will experience His peace and power in your life like never before and that you will be so filled with the Holy Spirit that His love overflows from your heart and becomes a blessing to everyone around you!

If you are not yet a son or daughter of the King, I pray that you will hear the Word, that you will believe it, and that you will be sealed by the Holy Spirit!  I pray that your eternal inheritance will begin today and that you will discover the fullness of victory that comes only through surrendering your heart to Jesus!

With His love,

Mark D. Halla

Steward