Many people are lonely and have no one. To fix this, your family can adopt—“take by choice into a relationship”—someone who otherwise has no family.10 An adoptive arrangement like this provides a listening ear and comfort to those who typically have no one to talk to or spend time with. Examples:
• Adopt a grandparent. In their book The Grandparent Factor, Phil Waldrep and Pat Springle detail the importance of a grandparent in a child’s life. Encourage your children to adopt a grandparent. This is a great family project, especially if your children don’t have living biological grandparents or if their grandparents don’t live close by. According to Waldrep, children also do well when a close, unrelated, older grandparent-type person has “adopted” them.
• Adopt a close friend. This idea isn’t restricted to an adopted grandparent. Our children have adopted a close friend of the family as their “aunt,” because her own family isn’t supportive and doesn’t spend time with her. They have also adopted as their aunt and uncle close friends of ours who live in another town and who are an extra-special addition to their lives.
• Adopt a schoolmate. Many children go home to an empty house every day after school. Make your home a safe and pleasant environment for children like these to spend their afternoons completing homework or playing with your own children.
Remember to send special-occasion cards and photos, and invite your adopted family to your children’s sporting and music events. Your family may choose to copy the adoption certificate found in the templates section for your special adoptee(s).
Up for Discussion
Who did your family choose to adopt? How did you make sure they truly felt adopted into your family? How did your family’s decision to adopt someone fill a void in their life? In your family’s life?
Such adoptions remind us of the pleasure of being adopted into God’s kingdom when we accept Christ as our Savior. Explain what adoption means to you and why it’s important.
He predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will.
—Eph. 1:5