Fourteen From Him

Sanford Family 2006

The Lord was pleased to give us 14 children. The irony is my husband only wanted 2 children when we were married. And it would have stuck if the Lord had not given us two sons first. Therefore my husband modified his decision to 3 children because I wanted a daughter!

Since 3 was to be the sum and total of our progeny and not wanting to 'risk' a third boy, we sought to adopt that little girl. Nervously, I called the first agency but had to leave a message. With the second agency, a kind lady answered. After briefly sharing my story of having two sons and wanting a daughter she told me in no uncertain terms, "You have two healthy young boys, all you can hope to adopt is a black child, older child, special needs child, or a sibling group. The wait for a healthy white baby girl would be years."

I was totally frightened out of my wits by this news of the only adoptable children!! We are southerners, dark skinned people did not live with whites, I did not want to change our birth order, how could I ever help a special needs child, and a sibling group meant way to many children! So we took a leap of faith for another birth-child and in August of 1990 the Lord gave us a beautiful red-headed baby girl. Eight weeks later my tubes were tied. Oh, but God was moving!

September of the next year, Melinda and I had dropped off Joshua and Garrison for their first day of preschool. On our way home, we stopped by the mailbox to get the mail. It was the normal stuff of mail including the monthly magazine published by our electric company. On the cover of this issue was a mom with her two children sitting in a swing on their front porch reading a book. The bold letters printed across their legs stated 'Home Schooling' page 12.

We had already heard of home schooling. Our neighbors across the street had four children, two of which were school age, and they were home all day! I had watched her for three years and thought she was crazy. Why would she not want to enjoy time to herself and self-pursuits with her children safely tucked away in public school? And anyway she just seemed weird.

So there I am in my quiet little living room, my heart torn because I had just left my two very precious boys at a place of 'higher learning'. Joshua, as a social 4 year old, was all for it but Garrison, a shy 2 1/2 year old, was clingy. I had to make him stay. It is what you are supposed to do, right? I hated it but I wanted to be a good mom and prepare my boys for school. Obviously I could not prepare them. My college degree was not in teaching. Oh, but God was moving!

After reading the magazine article, I was intrigued. My husband was guarded but fine with me finding out more. So I gather the children up the next day and we went to the library to find some books about this allusive subject. The three-foot self which held all the home school books was empty except for two. I took them home after requesting from the library several of the other books to be held for me once they were returned. These books changed our life. I was convicted of huge sins and saw God for the first time  from, what we would call today, a 'Christian worldview'. We had never been taught that God wants all of us and every day, not just our Sunday. And that the Bible is not hard to understand but is the guidebook for all of life. Oh, the grief, oh, the joy, but God was moving!

We pulled our boys out of preschool after only two days. Then I introduced myself to my neighbor. She became my friend and mentor. Beth McDowell is the wife of Stephen McDowell who is a historian, author, and world conference speaker. He is co-laborer with Paul Jehle, John Eidsmoe, Gary Demar, David Barton, and William Potter as well as others. We did not understand any of this at the time. All we knew was they were our kind neighbors who counseled us, and our children were friends.

This was also when God moved in our hearts to understand that children are a blessing and the fruit of the womb is his reward. We wanted more blessing and reward, so we sought to undo what we had done years before. The doctor was firm and specific, he could untie my tubes. However there would be a 50/50 chance of each pregnancy being a tubal due to scar tissue and my life would always be in danger. For my husband the decision was easy, no surgery. He wanted his wife. For me the news was more devastating, I wanted more children. Oh, but God was moving!

And so were we. In 1997, State Farm moved my husband from Virginia to the corporate office in Bloomington, IL. We settled into a newly built home and new community. We found a evangelical church were folks actually brought their Bibles and opened them! The desire for more children was my constant prayer since 1991 and in 1998 it became a burning fire in my heart. One day in the spring of that year, I opened the local paper to find a full page ad for some 2,000 children in the Illinois foster care system who were available for adoption. Up to this point we had only considered international adoptions which cost loads of money we did not have. The Lord used our 'poverty' to turn our hearts closer to home to find our children.

To make an already long story short, we pursued a DCFS adoption. On September 30, 1999 the Lord was pleased to give us a baby girl of black and white race. On October 20, 1999 the Lord gave us a sibling group of three girls changing our birth-order. In November of 2003 God took us international for an adoption. We traveled to Russia to bring home a sibling group of four, two of which were special needs children. And lastly in May of 2005 we brought home another sibling group of three with very dark skin from the Philippines. (Both international adoptions were completely financed by the Lord through family and friends meeting a matching grant through Lifesong for Orphans and adoption grants with State Farm.)

So what was spoken by the lady from the adoption agency back in the spring of 1989 was actually a prophecy, 'all you can hope to adopt is a black child, older child, special needs child, or a sibling group', for by this God moved to fulfill our hope and joy of more children.

Fourteen from Him: seven boys and seven girls. Our blessing and reward.