"Bella"

By now many of you who read this blog have heard of the movie "Bella." In fact, it's quite possible one or both of you have seen it (a little Friday afternoon humor for you). (The picture above is me trying to make "Bella" star Eduardo Verastegui look more handsome by not shaving before meeting him at this year's "Movieguide Awards" in February. As you can tell, it was a hopeless cause and for Eduardo a traumatic experience, one from which I hope and pray he will someday recover.)

If you haven't seen "Bella" yet, please do. If you're like most audience members who have seen it, you will not only love it, but you will feel very blessed by its message of hope and redemption. If you're like me, you might want to pack some tissues, or be prepared to borrow your neighbor's sleeve once the floodgates open.

I don't want to ruin the movie for you if you haven't seen it, so I won't go into too much detail. As a screenwriter, I can appreciate "Bella" on a certain level. In my opinion, it is independent filmmaking at its best. It is a real story about real people that we can all care about. There are no effects, no elaborate stunts, no shootouts, no gratuitous violence or sex. It is what I believe a movie should be...a well-told story about people and situations that I can relate to. The dialogue is not stilted or forced and clever to the point of being obnoxious; rather, it rings true to the characters and their lives and the moments in which they find themselves. Not once did I find myself cringing at a line of dialogue aimed at showing off the writer's skills and incredible intellect. Every line flowed and made sense in furthering the storyline. In a well-written drama, great writing doesn't force itself upon you...it very subtly makes its way into your heart and head in such a way that you remember the story and characters first and foremost. That's what the writing in "Bella" did for me, and that's why the script succeeded for me. That's my opinion from a writer's perspective.

As an adoptive dad and as one who is deeply involved in orphans ministry (and adoption, in particular), I can also appreciate "Bella" on a whole other level. Indeed, where "Bella" succeeds most for me is in its simple, yet powerful portrayal of the beauty of the miracle that is adoption. It's been a long time since I've seen a movie that has such a strong pro-adoption message. In fact, I don't know if I've ever seen another movie that does such justice to adoption as "Bella" does.

I first saw the movie in May at an orphans ministry summit conference in Colorado Springs. I was moved by it at that time, but I was surrounded by 350 or so people who were also deeply committed to adoption and related orphans ministries, so it was very easy to love the movie in that setting. Then, two weeks ago, on its opening weekend, I took my wife and two sons to see it. As I watched the story unfold, and as I felt my own tears trickling down my cheek, and I heard my wife's gentle sobs next to me, I knew that it was indeed a powerful movie, regardless of the setting. But would it translate to my kids? My 12 year old, who loves "Spongebob" and "Mr. Bean" said it was one of his favorite movies ever. My 11 year old loved it, too. We will soon take our 15 year old, Ashley to see it, too. I know her well enough to know that she will love it as well.

Please...if you have time this weekend, check it out and let me know what you think of it. If you've already seen it, tell me know what you think, too. And please...don't forget to tell your friends. We need more movies like "Bella" and our wallets will determine whether or not we get them. If we don't support the good that comes out of Hollywood, then we have little right to complain about the bad!

An unexpected gift...and reminder...

Each year, our church participates in Operation Christmas Child, which is organized and sponsored by Samaritan's Purse. For those who are not familiar with this ministry, it is a program through which people can fill shoe boxes with gifts, that are then sent to underprivileged children around the world for Christmas. Ministry partners follow up with the children and share the Gospel with them. It is a wonderful program. My dad has volunteered for the last couple of years at the Samaritan's Purse distribution center in Charlotte, North Carolina, helping ready the boxes for shipment overseas. He pays his own way and stays several days, working long hours, to help in this amazing ministry. He plans on doing it again this year.

We usually fill one box for each of our children (the kids help pay for the gifts with their own money). It's a great way for us to share God's love and our blessings with children whose lives are marked by poverty, and very often, despair. As we now have five children, I took five boxes after our church service yesterday.

As I approached her after getting the boxes, our 7 year old foster daughter, "A," saw the boxes and asked about them. I explained to her what they were about and she balked at first when she realized that filling one would mean that she would have to part with some of her own money (she is a real tightwad!). I reminded her of how blessed we are and how we believe it would be a good thing to share some of our blessings with children who don't have as much as we do. She began to see the reason for and the worth of doing such a thing. Perhaps she was reminded of her time in a Cambodian orphanage two years ago, just before she came to the States and entered foster care...who knows?

Then, as she took a closer look at the boxes tucked under my arm, she said, "I got one of those when I was in Cambodia." My mouth dropped open. I asked her if the box she had received looked like the ones I held. She said it did. I asked her if she liked it when she got it. She said she did. I asked her what was in her box. She remembers a white teddy bear and she remembers some combs.

In spite of our previous involvement with Operation Christmas Child, and my dad's sacrificial involvement the last two years, the whole thing became intensely personal for us yesterday. We saw the fruit of such a ministry firsthand. This was not a child in a foreign land that we will never meet. This was our own daughter who had benefited from this ministry. It hit home that all those nameless children on the videos and in the photos that we see are not just anonymous kids living in faraway lands. They are peoples' sons and daughters. Moreover, these are children that God loves immeasurably and wants to bless through His people.

Please, if your church participates in Operation Christmas Child, do your part. Use the opportunity to encourage your children to give sacrificially to others. Encourage your friends to do the same. If your church does not participate, but perhaps collects gifts for another worthy ministry, jump in and take part. If your church is not giving gifts away this Christmas, please find a local ministry or foster agency, and lead a toy and gift drive yourself. There are 143 million orphans in the world today, and countless other children living in poverty. This Christmas, let's touch as many of these precious young lives as we can with the love of God.

Why am I here?

Good question. I'm here because I see a great deal of apathy and ignorance in the church today when it comes to issues of orphan care and awareness. As a foster/adoptive dad and elder in a wonderful church (Grace Brethren Church in Long Beach, California), I believe I have to take this stuff seriously. As such, I've spent a lot of time over the past few years wrestling with questions about our roles as Christians in the lives of today's orphans.

Backing up a little...okay, a lot...my wife and I talked about adopting before we were even married. Though we are medically able to have biological children, we decided at some point that we would build our family solely through adoption, and specifically adoption through the foster care system. Our sons, Anthony and Chris, entered our lives in July 2000 at the ages of 4 and 5, and our lives have never been the same. Our eldest, Ashley, was just shy of 13 when she moved into our home in January 2005. Our soon-to-be adopted 7 year-old, came to us kicking and screaming at age 6 in August 2006 (until she is adopted, her name will be withheld for legal reasons). Finally (for now), our youngest, Hallie, was 4 days old when we picked her up from the hospital in September 2006.

We are truly blessed by each of our five children, and we don't dare say that we are finished adopting. We gave God a good laugh by saying that before (after our first two), and the next thing you know, we're driving a minivan and dropping 300 bucks a pop on groceries at Sam's Club.

Back to why I am here. Our seven plus years in the foster system have coincided with a time of incredible spiritual growth for us, due in large part to the teaching of our senior pastor, Lou Huesmann, who has spent the last few years unpacking and explaining the Bible in a faithful, straightforward, simple, yet profound way that makes so much sense, and yet is so foreign to what you would hear in most churches in America today. Every week, it seems, another light bulb goes off in my mind as God's amazing plan to restore His beloved creation becomes more evident, and my small role in His plan becomes more apparent and focused.

The more I learn about the foster care system, the more I realize that there are serious problems with its basic design and implementation. The more I learn about God's plan to restore His creation, the more I realize that He has not abandoned the foster care system, broken as it is, or the children who are a part of it (broken as they are). The more I speak to fellow Christians about adoption, foster care, and orphan ministry, the more I realize that the church of Jesus Christ today is woefully lacking in the area of orphan care and awareness. Finally, the more I learn about all three of these areas (orphans, the kingdom, and the church), the more I realize that God has a calling on my life to help the church make sense of their convergence.

So...having said that, I want to join the many voices that are already out there trying to awaken the church to the needs of the 500,000 orphans living in foster care, as well as the 143 million other orphans living throughout the world today. Further, I want to show the church a glimpse of God's heart for these children, and His expectations of us as we relate to them, who are clearly among the least of these in our generation, and in turn, to help the church catch a vision for what it means to practice what God Himself has defined as "pure and faultless" religion.

That's what God has laid on my heart, and that's why I'm here.