In honor of National Adoption Month and in the hopes that others will be encouraged to consider adoption through foster care, former Home / Foster Parent Jordan Parks shares his story.
Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries in Harrisburg is one of my favorite places in the world. While my wife Amy and I were Home / Foster Parents, we loved our kids, the other Home / Foster Parents and our home. Even our son, who was six months old at the time, fell in love with his 30 or so new siblings. One year into it, we found ourselves moving back to Kansas City. As nice as it was to be close to family again, our hearts remained on that beautiful hill in central Missouri. We knew we had more love and wisdom to impart. Little did we know that just a few months later, we would see just how good God is and learn to trust in His sovereignty.
The summer of 2016 found us settled back at home. I had a new job, Amy was staying at home raising our son and we adjusted to our new routine. However, it wasn’t Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries and we were struggling with our new situation. Fortunately, through prayer and God’s grace, He revealed to us a plan that we could have never seen. A new adventure that was even more than what we could accomplish at Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries. That July, we were approached by a family member who was fostering a very young relative. It looked like her case would go to adoption. She asked if we were interested in fostering her, and possibly adopting. We answered with a resounding, “Yes!”
Several months passed and we hadn’t heard a word. The case’s team hadn’t even looked at us as a potential placement yet. Life went on. We found out that we were expecting child number two, which was enough to keep us busy. The holidays flew by and things began to be comfortable and routine. Then on a cold, dreary January day, our family member called and asked us if we could take the child for the weekend. This was it. The process had started! We had met her once and had seen a few pictures, but that Friday evening when she stepped into our home, she was real and beautiful to behold…and a little nervous. We knew that she was our future daughter! 
We had the privilege of keeping her on the weekends from that day forward. In the beginning, she was scared. At only 18 months old, she would scream and cry whenever Amy left the room. She clung closely to Amy, not ready to trust a father-figure. Yet it was such a joy to see how she interacted with our son. The two of them became glued. They looked out for each other. They loved and fought as if they were twins. She met both our parents and grandparents. We took her to church on Sundays and she seamlessly became a part of our family. With time, I even became “daddy” to her, so much so that she would barely leave me alone for five minutes. Bringing her into our home was exactly what we needed to remind us that our time at Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries as foster parents was not in vain. God had a plan. He blessed us with a new child to love and was about to give this girl a forever home.
“For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor. No good thing does He withhold to those who walk uprightly.” – Psalm 84:11
I wish I could say the rest of the process has been easy. For anyone involved with an adoption, you know it wasn’t. It took so long. There were many awkward conversations with social workers and with her biological parents. Feelings got hurt, and everyone involved cried at one point or another. I took time off work for classes and my wife filled out more paper work in one day than the Pentagon does in a year. But as of September 25th, 2018, she’s ours. We finally know the reason we left that house on The Hill in Harrisburg, Missouri. God had something better, because His plans are always better than ours. Just like Christ’s children, she is adopted, loved, and has a new home. 
“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” – Galatians 4:4-5
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