Host Sandra Flach is a mom of 8 children, 5 through adoption—one kinship and 4 international. Her youngest 2 are teens diagnosed with a Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD). With over 30 years of parenting experience and 20 plus years as an adoptive and kinship parent, she’s made mountains of mistakes and learned loads of lessons. She understands the difficult road of parenting children with trauma histories—and she is still in the trenches! The Adoption & Foster Care Journey is a podcast to encourage, educate, and equip you to care for children in crisis through adoption, foster care, and kinship care. We aim to support adoptive and foster families by sharing encouraging real-life stories and equipping them with modern-day research and parenting techniques.
Episodes
Tuesday Sep 03, 2019
Tuesday Sep 03, 2019
When we welcome a child from a hard place into our family, he or she brings the hard place with them into our home. Often foster and adoptive parents find themselves feeling isolated, ill-equipped, and alone. We can question why God would abandon us in the middle of our obedience to His call to care for the orphan. But He has not abandoned us. He’s actually inviting us to go deeper with Him.
God Himself invites us into this suffering season to teach us how to trust Him who never fails us. Philippians 4:13 says, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me (NKJV). All things include hard things, messy things, on my face before the Lord things. As we keep our eyes on Him, the author and finisher of our faith, we experience blessings we would not have experienced apart from the suffering.
Our latest podcast guest, Susan Woodward, shares her experience from 15 years of fostering over 50 children, 3 of whom she and her husband have adopted. Susan is also one of 28 moms who have shared their blessing in the midst of chaos stories in the book Hope for the Adoption Journey by Katherine Piper. Listen to our conversation with Susan on this week’s episode of Orphans No More.
Thursday Aug 22, 2019
Thursday Aug 22, 2019
How can a church mobilize its congregation toward missions, increase its compassion quotient, and impact families in its community? What can help a church engage every member in outreach, involve families in ministry, and prevent children from entering foster care? The answer is quite simple - CarePortal.
CarePortal is an online technology platform that churches are utilizing as a ministry and discipleship tool and it’s having a huge impact nationwide and locally in the Capital Region of upstate NY. Liberty Church USA in Schenectady, NY, hit the ground running when Justice For Orphans launched CarePortal in Schenectady County in November 2018. They have been knocking it out of the park ever since. In just 8 months their congregation has served over 130 Schenectady kids by meeting needs such as providing bunk beds, strollers, and even replacement windows for local families in crisis. The impact of meeting these physical needs extends far beyond providing material goods. Liberty Church is seeing the lives of children and families transformed through relationships that were established when the church stepped into the lives of families in their community through CarePortal.
Join us as we chat with Pastor Dennis Graham-Parker of Liberty Church USA in Schenectady along with their CarePortal Point Person, Alyssa Dabravalskas. Listen in as they share about the impact CarePortal has had on their church and community on this week’s episode of our Orphans No More podcast.
Monday Aug 12, 2019
Monday Aug 12, 2019
Have you ever thought that you should be rewarded with sunshine and roses for obeying God? That everything should work out for good because you love God and followed his calling? Many adoptive and foster parents can testify that while it all worked out for good in the end, the journey to get there was more like storm clouds and thorns.
Author and adoptive mom, Katherine Piper, shares that she was blind-sided by the challenges she faced after she adopted her special needs daughter from China 5 years ago. Feeling isolated and needing to hear from other moms on the same journey, Katherine searched for a book or resource to help her find hope. When she didn’t find one, she decided to write one. The result, HOPE for the Adoption Journey, which is a compilation of 28 post-adoption stories from moms who have survived the trenches.
Monday Aug 05, 2019
Monday Aug 05, 2019
According to James 1:27, the purest way we can demonstrate our faith is by caring for the vulnerable among us. Orphans No More podcast guest, Bethany Hoyt did just that when her church wrapped around a family in crisis. In the process, their eyes were opened to one of the most vulnerable of God's creations, a tiny baby born at 21 weeks gestation. With only a 4% chance of survival baby Hailey would not have been considered a viable fetus under the Reproductive Health Act here in NY. However, she not only survived, but thrived after being adopted by Bethany and her husband, John. Today, Hailey is a vibrant 7 year old bringing joy to her family and all who know her. Listen in and hear why we must be doers of the word (James 1:22).
Monday Jul 29, 2019
Monday Jul 29, 2019
Only 2% of abortion-minded women choose adoption. That means 98% of abortion-minded women choose to abort their babies. Why don’t expectant moms, who for whatever reason are not in a position to parent, choose life for their babies and make an adoption plan?
These sobering thoughts and more are the topic of this week’s Orphans No More podcast with guest, Jessica Mullen. Jessica and her husband, Reggie, are parents of 1 biological son and 1 daughter through adoption. Jessica is actively involved on the front lines of battle as she does sidewalk ministry at abortion clinics across the country. She is also founder of Option-Adoption, a ministry on a mission to proclaim that there is another option to abortion - the option of adoption.
Monday Jul 22, 2019
Monday Jul 22, 2019
Monday Jul 15, 2019
Monday Jul 15, 2019
Kyle Johnson - Regional Manager for CarePortal in Ft. Worth, TX, joins us to share about how CarePortal is the perfect ministry and discipleship tool for the Church.
Friday Jul 05, 2019
Friday Jul 05, 2019
Friday Jun 28, 2019
Friday Jun 28, 2019
Jamie Becker - Part 1 with NJ foster & adoptive mom. Jamie shares about the adoption of her special needs daughter from China and how God used it to break her where she needed to be broken.
Saturday Jun 22, 2019
Saturday Jun 22, 2019
Susan Sharkey - Local NY foster and adoptive mom shares how God moved mountains in their family's adoption story.