The confession to which Free Will Baptists subscribe is the Faith and Practices of Free Will Baptists. The name of our treatise follows the traditional dual concern for orthodoxy (right doctrine or belief) and orthopraxy (right practice). This latter emphasis (practices) sometimes goes by the name ethics. Sometimes when we hear the word ethics, we think of the hot-button issues of our day, such as abortion, biotechnology, capital punishment, sexuality, war, and so forth. In fact, our treatise and annual resolutions have addressed some of these topics and others like them.[1]
However, ethics does not regard only controversial issues but also personal sanctification. For that reason, Carl F. H. Henry authored the superb volume entitled Christian Personal Ethics.[2] Even within our own tradition, F. Leroy Forlines penned the excellent Biblical Ethics.[3] Ethics, then, covers everything from the individual Christian life to the biggest questions of our day.
This article will consider just one area of ethics in which Free Will Baptists could and should increasingly invest: orphan care and adoption. We do (as we will see), and thank God for that! But I believe we could occupy this space yet more than we do within our denomination, especially given the intransigence of the culture of death (abortion) in our country.
A Pro-life Ethic
Christians’ commitment to an ethic of life is based, ultimately, in their allegiance to the God of life. In the beginning, God created life from the void—plant life, animal life, and human life—to flourish (Gen. 1:28), and He called it very good (Gen. 1:31). Thus an ethic of life does not refer simply to the absence of death but more specifically to the presence of human flourishing.[4] However, man, by his sin, introduced death into the created order (Gen. 3:19). But that was not God’s will from the beginning.
Even so God would redeem man from death unto life (Eph. 2:1, 5; Col. 2:12–13). And because life is more than mere existence, redemption also concerns life that is flourishing. Additionally, Jesus founded the church, which comprises the redeemed, to bear witness to the hope of this God of redemption. Consequently, the church testifies to an ethic of flourishing life, because God is a God of flourishing life.
Fundamentally, orphan care arises from this ethic of life, which is based in the doctrines of creation and redemption. Yet often when we hear the word pro-life, we think about abortion; undoubtedly, that is an important issue in itself. But a pro-life ethic is broader than that. (As an aside, we recognize that we could stem the prospect of abortion if we were prepared to open our arms and receive orphaned children into our homes.)
Theological Principles for Orphan Care
As we have seen, an important component of a pro-life ethic is the care of orphans. An orphan, meaning “bereaved,” refers to someone who is deprived of his or her parent(s). From the beginning, God’s plan included children, “Let them [men and women] multiply and bear fruit and fill the earth” (Gen. 1:28, nasb), but it did not include orphans. Instead, man introduced orphanhood by his sin. [5] What is more, orphanhood does not refer simply to a domestic reality but also to a spiritual reality. Because all men sin (2 Chron. 6:36; Rom. 5:12), all men are orphans, since sin deprives them from their Creator, their Father. Consequently, orphanhood is a fundamental human condition.
But God loved us while we were yet orphans and has offered to adopt us, in Christ by the Holy Spirit, into His family. The Scriptures testify to this rich theology of adoption, saying: “He [God] predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will” (Eph. 1:5); and “You [Christians] have receiveda spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Rom. 8:15b). Thus adoption is the divine solution to the orphanhood of man.
The biblical authors describe the gospel in many ways. These include economic analogies (redemption), familial analogies (adoption), legal analogies (justification), religious analogies (propitiation), and more. While each of these pictures testifies to different aspects of God’s saving activity, that of adoption brings to mind images of God as Father, the church as family and household, and Christians as brothers and sisters. Such imagery offers great hope and encouragement amid a discouraging world.
Just as orphanhood is a regrettable spiritual reality, it is also a regrettable domestic reality. Just as God cares for the spiritually disenfranchised, He cares also for those disenfranchised of family: “The unfortunate commits himself to You; You have been the helper of the orphan” (Ps. 10:14b); “Leave your orphans behind, I will keep them alive” (Jer. 49:11a); and “Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans . . .” (Jas. 1:27). Additionally, the practice of adoption figures into the lives of several biblical people, including Moses (Exod. 2:5–10), Esther (Esth. 2:5–7), and even Jesus (Mt. 1:18–25).[6]
Practical Considerations for Orphan Care
What do these truths mean for us as individual Christians and as Free Will Baptists?
They mean that we take orphan care seriously because we take God seriously. As we have seen, this pro-life ethic arises from the gospel itself. Yet it remains somewhat unfamiliar to many of us (perhaps because it is outside of our common experience). Nevertheless, God pursues the care of those in the throes of spiritual and familial destitution. Consequently, so should we.
Even so, some challenges may arise. For example, those who consider the possibility of adoption sometimes express concern that they might not love an adopted child as much as they would love a biological child. Undoubtedly, some will show an ungodly favoritism, but even that is not limited to adopted children (e.g., Isaac’s favoring Esau and Rebekah’s favoring Jacob). In addition, it is not the Christian way. God’s family comprises of both Hebrews and Gentiles, and He does not love the latter any less than He loves the former.
Instead, God has grafted Gentiles into His family, giving them the same inheritance as Hebrews (Rom. 11:17–24; Gal. 3:26–4:7; Eph. 1:11, 14). All Christians are Abraham’s children by faith in the promises of God (Rom. 4:16; Gal. 3:7). As a result, as we think about our ethic, the Spirit of Christ must animate how we think of adoption, as well as orphan care more generally, rather than the spirit of this present evil age (Gal. 1:4). By so doing we can demonstrate a pro-life ethic.
Undoubtedly many other challenges arise—some personal, some logistical, some financial, etc. While space does not permit exploring all of those here, many helpful resources exist that answer them. For example, one that I have read and appreciate is Russell Moore’s Adopted for Life.[7] In addition, many good organizations exist, such as Show Hope, which exists to “care for orphans by engaging the Church and reducing barriers to adoption.”[8] This organization was founded by Mary Beth and Steven Curtis Chapman and is based in Franklin, Tennessee.
Free Will Baptist ministries that give attention to the pro-life ethic of orphan care include: Free Will Baptist Family Ministries, with facilities in Tennessee, Virginia, and Arkansas, which works not simply with orphans but also with “pregnant teens and young women, infants, toddlers, adolescents, teens, senior citizens and families”; the Alabama Free Will Baptist Children’s Home, whose mission is to “provide a loving, Christian home to children who are hurting or struggling with life’s challenges or troubled domestic situations”; and Harvest Child Care Ministries in Virginia, which provides “abused, neglected, abandoned, or troubled children with a healthy home environment, caring parents, and a wholesome family life.”[9]
I am grateful for the work that Free Will Baptists are doing in orphan care. However, I believe that we can do more in this field. Orphan care may occur in all kinds of ways, including prayer, volunteering, financial support of individuals and organizations, spiritual witness, fostering, adoption, and more. I believe that God would call some to volunteer somewhere; that He would call others to support financially an organization or family that is engaged in this work; that He would call still others even to adopt or foster themselves (obviously, such decisions are big ones).
Certainly these paths are not limited to the infertile. After all, the Scriptures offer this ethic to the whole church, and I can think of numerous families that have gone down these roads, even after bearing biological children. But something that every Christian can do is to pray for people whom God has called to walk these paths and, certainly, to pray for the orphaned, that they would know the love of Christ.
My Adoption Story
Some may not realize this, but I am the beneficiary of this pro-life ethic. Although my biological mother raised me, my biological father did not; in fact, I have never met the man. Instead, the person whom I affectionately referred to as “Daddy” for much of my life was my adopted father. Thus my last name Bracey is my adopted name. In life and in death, he treated me as much of his own as he did my two sisters (his biological daughters). He may not have realized it, but my father exemplified for me this rich, pro-life ethic throughout his life, and my life is a testament to the power of this ethic. Indeed, it is a beautiful picture of the gospel, and I commend it to the consideration of all who, through grace, are called “sons and daughters” of God their Father (2 Cor. 6:18).
[1]See the following to review some of these materials: “Minutes of the National Association (1935–present), Free Will Baptist History; http://fwbhistory.com/?page_id=180; accessed March 22, 2020; Internet; and A Treatise of the Practices of the National Association of Free Will Baptists (Nashville, TN: Executive Office of the National Association of Free Will Baptists, 2013).
[2]See Carl F. H. Henry, Christian Personal Ethics (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1957).
[3]See Leroy Forlines, Biblical Ethics: Ethics for Happier Living (Nashville: Randall House, 1974).
[4]We should distinguish a theology of human flourishing strongly from the faulty theology of the notion of “your best life now.”
[5]I mean for this sentence to refer particularly to Adamic or racial sin, not necessarily to personal sin.
[6]Concerning the adoption of Jesus, I do not mean to suggest necessarily that Joseph legally adopted Jesus. Maybe he did; maybe he did not. That question is speculative. But good evidence exists in the Gospels to suggest that Joseph practically adopted Him for all intents and purposes and that the broader family and society accepted it as such. Still, that is not to suggest that some did not mount criticisms against His family pedigree (Jn. 8:41).
[7]See Russell Moore, Adopted for Life: The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families and Churches, updated and expanded(Wheaton: Crossway, 2015). Others that I can commend include: Rosaria Champagne Butterfield, “The Home Front: Marriage, Ministry, and Adoption,” in The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor’s Journey into Christian Faith, expanded (Pittsburgh, PA: Crown and Covenant, 2014); and David Platt, “The Lonely in Families: The Gospel and Orphans and Widows,” in Counter Culture: Following Christ in an Anti-Christian Age, revised and expanded (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale, 2017).
[8]See Show Hope, https://showhope.org/our-work/.
[9]See Free Will Baptist Family Ministries, https://www.fwbfm.com/; Alabama Free Will Baptist Children’s Home, https://fwbhome.org/; and Harvest Child Care Ministries, https://www.harvestccm.org/.
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