Together For Adoption 2010 - Session Four - Robert Gelinas - A Story of Orphan Care at the Local Church

Robert is here to tell the story of the church that he leads in Denver CO and how it intersects with orphan care.

Robert tells the story of his conversion.  He had no Father as a child but when he was baptized he keyed in on the words of the baptismal rite, "In the name of the Father..."

He soon discovered James 1:27 in his bible reading a boy.  There is a kind of religion that makes God smile.

He has been married for 16 years and they had a heart to begin adopting children.  They adopted three times domestically and then decided to be done having children of their own.

Then they got an email from an agency in Ethiopia and began that process.  They were struck with the question, how do you fly halfway around the world to a country with millions of orphans and only bring home one?  They decided to adopt two.

What if the church came together on behalf of orphans?

19,000 children age out of the foster care system per year in our country.  Not sure where they are going to go or what to do.  Does the church rise up?

If he is a father to the fatherless then God has a wife.  Who is the wife of the Father?  The bride.  The church.  Who is caretake of the fatherless?  The bride of the father.

Six years ago he stood before his church and started a ministry called Project127.  They wanted to solve the foster care system in Colorado.  They sought to organize the body of Christ.  He met with the lieutenant governor in Colorado and told her that they would take care of 10% minimum in the Colorado foster care system.

What do we mean when we say "I can't afford to adopt."  What we are saying is that God is a deadbeat Dad.  We can trust that God will take care of his children.  He is a really good Daddy.

136 children has been adopted through Project127 in Colorado.  There are dozens of churches that have come together in Colorado.  They are just a few years away from eradicating the foster care system in Colorado.  When they started there were 856 kids waiting for homes.  Today they have cut that number roughly in half.  God's church has come together to do what he wants them to do.