Kansas City First Church

of the Nazarene

Adoption Ministries

Our Ministry

        The goal of our ministry is to help raise awareness about the orphan crisis around the world and in the KC area, to meet the physical needs of orphans, and to challenge others to ask the Lord how they are to care

for orphans.  

How you can be involved:

• Adoption Small Group- This group meets to support one another through the process of adopting and growing and learning from one another through life's transitions. 
• Adoption Fund - This fund allows the body of Christ to come together to help those who are led to adopt bear the financial burden.  These funds are available for members of Kansas City First Church and Nazarene pastors on the KC District
  • Click here adoption funding assistance information

• Service Projects - We seek to aid and serve orphans by helping to meet some of their physical needs. 
  •    Examples:
    • Adopt a sibling group of foster children for Christmas
    • Host a drive for local foster kids
    • Collect money and items for children in an orphanage in Ukraine.  The money was used to buy bicycles, a computer for the orphanage, uniforms for the children, and it enabled the children to attend church camp
  20 Ways your Church Can Care for Orphans

Did You Know...

• 143 million orphans worldwide
• 500, 000 children in U.S. foster care
• 120, 000 children in U.S. foster care waiting to be adopted
• A child is orphaned every 18 seconds

Praying for Orphans

1. Pray that God would meet the physical, spiritual, emotional and developmental needs of each orphan.

2.Ask the Lord to break down the barriers to adoption  

       raised by governments and bureaucratic systems.

3. Ask the Lord how you are to get involved in the lives

       of orphaned children.

4. Thank God for adopting you into His family.

Ten Ways Every Christian Can Care for the Orphan

(adapted from FamilyLife’s Hope for Orphans brochure, www.HopeForOrphans.com)

1.  Plead with the Father for Them

• Pray for foster children and other orphans around the world.  Print out pictures and descriptions of specific waiting children at www.adoptuskids.org or www.rainbowkids.com. 

2.  Speak up for Them

• Become a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA volunteer).  These are people who volunteer their time to get to know a child in foster care and speak to the court on their behalf.  www.nationalcasa.org.

3.  Give Them What They Need

• Participate in a drive to collect clothes, shoes, school supplies for foster children or orphans abroad.

4.  Support Those Who Support Them

• Mow a foster parent’s yard, offer to baby sit. Or organize a few days worth of meals when a new child is placed in their home.
• Throw a shower for a family adopting an older child.  What a blessing and encouragement you’ll be!

5.  Provide Them a Safe Place

• Consider becoming a foster parent.
• Support &/or help build an orphanage.  Talk to Margie Schwarz for information about specific orphanages that need support

6. Go Visit Them

• Go on a Missions Trip ~ this summer a Work & Witness team is going to the Ukraine and will be serving orphans.  GO!

7.  Give Sacrificially to Them

• Give to the KCFC Adoption Fund and be an integral part of helping to bring a child home. 
• Donate funds so someone can go on a Work & Witness Trip who would not otherwise be able to do so. 

8.  Cheer Them On

• Over 20,000 teenagers a year “age out” of the US foster care system with no place to call home.  Call your local foster care office and let them know you have the deisre to be a support for a child who is aging out of foster care.
• Encourage and support children who are adopted.  Let them know how valued they are, by their Heavenly Father and by you.

9.  Give them a Forever Family

• Ask the Lord if adoption is right for your family.  Talk with Margie Schwarz or Arla Mitchell if you’d like prayer support and information.

10.  Join the Adoption and Orphan Ministry at KCFC. 

• God is at work and doing amazing things in this area.  Join us as we are joining Him in His work! 

Adoption Agencies

Children's Hope International: www.childrenshopeint.org

American World Adoption Agency: www.awaa.org

Other Resources

The Cry of the Orphan: www.cryoftheorphan.org

Family Life Today: www.familylifetoday.org

Shaohannah's Hope: www.shaohannahshope.org

Focus on the Family: www.focusonthefamily.org

Families Thru International Adoption: www.ftia.org

Isaiah 60:4-5a (NLT): "Look and see, for everyone is coming home!  Your sons are

coming from distant lands, your little daughters will be carried home. Your eyes will shine, your hearts will thrill with joy."

An Adoption Poem

Once there were two women

Who never knew each other.

One you do not remember.

The other you call your mother.

Two different lives

Shaped to make yours one.

One became your guiding star;

The other became your sun.

The first gave you life

And the second taught you to live in it.

The first gave you a need for love

And the second was there to give it.

One gave you a nationality;

The other gave you a name.

One gave you the seed of talent;

The other gave you aim.

One gave you emotions,

The other calmed your fears.

One saw your first sweet smile;

The other dried your tears.

One gave you up-

It was all that she could do.

The other prayed for a child

And God led her straight to you.

And now you ask me, through your tears,

The age-old question through the years;

Heredity or environment-Which are you the product of?

Neither, my darling, neither.

Just two different kinds of love.