In fact, the stress was apart of our adoption story up to the VERY end.

Due to a large “Apostles Conference” that was taking place next door to the Court House, we were hard pressed to find a parking spot.  It took us about 25 minutes to find a spot and we literally run three blocks to the Court House to make our 10 AM appointment.  And as we ran, we were witnessed to like two or three times by “apostles.”

So, yesterday I was converted about two or three times and I got to adopt my son!  Awesome day.

We were allowed to invite our families to the court room.  They sat in the back while Nicki and I were each separately called to take the stand.

We placed our left hand on the Bible and raised our right, solemnly swearing to tell the truth.  The judge asked both Nicki and I, “Will you care for Jeremiah as your own?”  Yes.  We had said “yes” in our hearts since the day we found out about him.

Fifteen minutes later it was over.

Jeremiah is our son.

We’ve been waiting for him for years.

The wait is over.

We took some pictures at the courthouse with our family.  We took some pictures at a park on the way home.  We had the fams over again for dinner and we took some more pictures.  We celebrated the goodness.  We celebrated the sacrifice of a young girl, whose gift continues to give us joy.  We celebrated the life that will now be lived in our family.

As many of you know, my wife and I are in the process of adopting our three and one half month old Jeremiah.  We were there on the day of his birth and have been with him ever since.

We have an open adoption with Jeremiah’s birth mom and we love her immensely.

The process of adoption is incredibly beautiful, but it isn’t cheap.  My sister Leah organized a fundraiser for us through “Both Hands”.  Both Hands’ purpose is to help people raise funds for orphans (adoptive children) while serving widows through home improvement projects.

A couple weeks ago, a team of our family and friends tackled a number of projects at Jane Rudewick’s home.  My amazing friend, Andrew Hostetler, put countless hours into capturing the day on video and editing it down to an inspiring five minutes.

So, here’s a full 10 hours of pure goodness concentrated down into five minutes of unadulterated smile inspiring footage:

It’s beautiful in so many ways.  For one, it starts with adoption.  Two, it highlights the goodness of palliative care.  And three, it underscores the life in death.

Death is one of the very few places in the life of an industrialized nation where we slow down and take time for one another.  There’s so few times that we allow for family.  So few times that we allow for community.

And then death.

Death.

Death for life.

I have a favor to ask you.

Even if you don’t know us personally, please advocate for both the adoption community and our personal adoption journey by sharing this video through facebook, twitter or your own website!

Adoption is such a beautiful experience and we’d love for you to be apart of the adoption community and of our own personal adoption experience by sharing this video with your family and friends.

Thank you!

If you’re interested in offsetting our $21,000 adoption expense, here’s a farther description of the fundraiser we’ll be doing through The Both Hands Project.

Caleb and Nicole Wilde have answered God’s call and stepped out in faith to adopt an infant boy from the US. The Wilde Family and a team of volunteers will be working on a widow’s home to help raise funds to cover the high cost of adopting their sweet boy. The Wildes were able to be at the hospital when their precious son, Jeremiah Michael, was born on March 16, 2012.

Jane is a kind and hardworking woman. Since the loss of her husband 14 months ago, it has become more difficult for her to keep up with the necessary improvements to her home. Jane said, “I am now on my own. My two sons live out of state so I rely on extended family and friends, who are busy with their own lives, to help out with the projects around my house that Rudy has planned to do after he retired.”

Each volunteer is raising sponsorship for their day of work. Since most of the supplies for the repairs on Jane’s home are being donated, 100% of the money raised will help cover the high cost of adopting this precious boy, Jeremiah, into his forever family – the Wilde Family. So on June 9, the Wildes and a team of volunteers are going to serve Jane by completing improvement and repair projects at her home.

If you are interested in helping us out financially in the adoption of Jeremiah, here’s the link to the organization that’s handling our fundraiser and finances.  The link also provides a secure way to donate.

Nicki gave Jeremiah to my grandfather and I gave my cell phone camera to Nicki so that she could capture four generations of Wildes.

As you know, our business is a family business that’s spanned six generations.  Jeremiah — if he chooses — would become the seventh generation.

My grandfather is speaking some words to Jeremiah.  Let’s imagine that those words are intended to manipulate Jeremiah at a young age to become a funeral director.  What could he possibly be saying?

Here’s a couple of my attempts:

“If you become a funeral director, I’ll buy you a diamond studded pacifier.”

“The morgue is beckoning.  Answer the call.”

“You like the Mercedes I drive?  I’ll see if they can’t make one for an infant.”

“I’ll buy you all the toys you want, if you’ll scribble on this contract that obligates you to fulfill your generational duty.”

“Dead people are much less scary than your father.”

“There’s nothing like hide-and-go seek in a casket room.”

“Your last name is synonymous with ‘funeral director.  You have no choice.’”

“I will buy you a breast that produces ice cream.”

Your turn … CAPTION THIS.

Before you look at the photos, afford me the leisure of promoting Andrew’s talents.  Andrew has an inordinate amount of creativity and grace; the combination of which suits him perfectly as a photographer.  I attached Andrew’s business card at the bottom.  Click on it to enlarge it.

If you live in the Lancaster and Chester County area and are looking for an affordable and professional photographer, please contact him. Here’s the link to his website, Route Ten Images.

WHICH PHOTO IS YOUR FAVORITE?

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

****

Nearly two weekends ago we reveled in the uncomfortable in breaking narrative of the Kingdom of God.

And as the narrative unfolded, we played the part of Jesus.

We are used to playing the part of Jesus.  After all, we’re Christians.  We’re a “little Christ”, “followers of Jesus” who are supposed to think, feel and do like Jesus in this world.

I work at a funeral home where I regularly minister – what I hope – is the compassion, grace and perspective of Jesus.

Both my wife and I work and volunteer at a parachurch ministry for at-risk and vulnerable youth, being Jesus to youth who have little to no family.

And this past weekend we were the adoptive couple to a healthy newborn baby boy.

But, we didn’t play the part of Jesus that you might have assume we played.

You – and I – would assume that we would have played the part of the redemptive Jesus. The Jesus who swooped down in the life of this little boy and rescued him from a potential life of difficulty.  His biological father out of the picture.  His biological mother fighting to provide for herself.

And we – the 30 something, financially stable, mature Christian couple – swooped down to take him into our Christian family.  We were the redemptive Jesus here. Right?

Wrong.

Nicki and I were the poor and broken Jesus.  The Jesus in the jail.  We were the homeless Jesus.  The whore Jesus.  The Jesus on the street corner begging for money.

We were the least of these.

In this situation, we weren’t the Jesus who gave all, we were the Jesus who received all.  We were the ones who couldn’t provide for ourselves.  We were the ones who needed the redemptive Jesus to come in and make us whole.  We were the couple who couldn’t conceive.

We were the ones who needed to be lifted out of our misery by someone else’s act of unselfishness.

And by one act of unselfishness, we were redeemed this last week.  We were lifted up.  We were made whole by a young woman who made the utterly unselfish choice to give us her baby.

“For I was broken and infertile and you gave me your son.  Whatever you did for one of the least of these, you did it me.”

It’s not very often that we really get to act like Jesus.  But last week, we were able to be Jesus – not in our giving – but in our receiving.

Today – with the incredibly low infant mortality rate that science and medicine have provided us — we simply don’t have such a problem.

Except, for those of us who adopt, there is a great risk that we could lose our child in the first couple months of our child’s life.  And we could be tempted to distance ourselves from the child we’ve fought so hard to bring into our home.  We could be tempted to hold back our love so as to protect ourselves from the possibility that he or she could be given back to the birth father or birth mother.

Over the next nine months, Nicki and I will love, care for and attach ourselves to a child that wouldn’t legally be ours.  Although it’s unlikely that we will lose Jeremiah, it’s possible.  Not probable, but possible.

In our specific situation, the birth father isn’t a part of the picture, but he does seem willing to fight the birth mother’s decision.  And although the birthmother is honestly our hero, the birthfather could take away this little gift.  If the birth father decides that he wants Jeremiah, if he hires a lawyer, and if he is deemed competent, Jeremiah is his to parent.

Part of me wants to see the birth father as MY enemy.  An enemy of my dreams, of my hopes for a family, and enemy of Jeremiah.  But then I realize that he’s unintentionally gifted me this little guy that’s tucked into my chest even as I write.  No, I want God to bless the birth dad.  And I pray for him.  I pray for him because I can’t help but love the birth dad.  I pray for him, asking God to love on him something awesome.

If he doesn’t sign off his rights, according to the laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, they will terminate in roughly five months.  After those five months, Jeremiah will legally be in the custody of our adoption agency for four months.  And after those four months are over, we meet with a judge and Jeremiah legally becomes our son.

Its nine months of emotional labor, with these first four to five months being extra taxing on Nicki and I.

We’re jumping all in, though.  We’re NOT going to be the parents of the Iron Age and attempt to distance ourselves so as to avoid being hurt by loss.  We’re going to love as much as we can, the best we can, with as much of ourselves as we can give.  We are going to love Jeremiah Michael Wilde (that is his legal name … a gracious gesture given to us by the birth mother when she filled out the birth certificate). And if we lose Jeremiah, we might have intense pain, but we’ll have no regret.

In the meantime, we’ll love and live and … we’ll fundraise (more on that later).

We SO don’t want to lose him. It’s amazing how much your heart can love in just one week.  So, please pray for us.  Pray that we’d be “all in” and love without worry.  Pray for the birthfather.  Pray that God would bless him.  And pray that we’d be blessed to have the privilege to legally adopt Jeremiah.

And if you’re not the praying type, send us your love and hope.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

I coyly responded, “For what?”

But I knew what my wife meant.  Today was our birth mother’s due date and yesterday we had received news from our adoption agency that the birth mother was three centimeters dilated.

It was time.

“Her water broke.  She’s five centimeters.  She’s at the hospital.”

At the time of the call, the cemetery was only a couple minutes away from the hospital.  But pulling up to the hospital in a hearse isn’t very fashionable, so I drove a half hour back to the funeral home, picked up my wife, we packed our bags and drove through the tourist ridden Amish country to the hospital in Lancaster County.

We arrived and were ushered into the delivery room where a group of strangers awaited to accept us into their family by giving us one of their own.  Hugs.  Kisses.  Tears.  Tears.

This isn’t how it is supposed to be.  We should be able to have our own children.  But we can’t.  The birthmother was ready to give us what we couldn’t have and she couldn’t support.  And yet, what awaits inside of her womb will forever unite our mutual brokenness in redemption.

She’s six centimeters.

It’s four p.m. and we’re all hungry.  So I grab the birthmother’s boyfriend and we speed off to McDonalds in search of a double cheeseburger, a Shamrock shake, a number one value meal and one or two other sundry health items.

By the time we get back, we learn that it’s time.  It’s REALLY time.  The nurses usher us out of the delivery room and into a private waiting room, where we’re told to make ourselves comfortable for an hour or two.  We sit down and I crack open my carton of nuggets.  It’s been a while since I’ve had McDonalds.  And I can’t help but be a snooty white person and mentally hate what I’m eating while my taste buds delight in the ecstasy of fries, coke and something that resembles chicken.

While I’m inwardly ranting about McDonalds, the door to our private room opens and the doctor pops in, telling Nicki and I that “She’s ready to see you.”

“What?” we ask, begging for more context.

“He’s here.  He’s healthy.  She wants you to meet him.”  My French fries filled mouth drops open.  What we had expected to take an hour or two took 15 minutes.  I nervously looked at my wife, we held hands and walked down the hall, opened the door and saw our son for the first time.  Wide-eyed.  Not a cry.  Not a noise.  Just looking at his new world.  This was the moment we had imagined for seven plus years.  The moment we couldn’t create ourselves.  The moment that was given to us by a young girl whose broken unselfishness made us into parents.

Introducing Jeremiah Michael Wilde, a child born of sorrow, redeemed by the everlasting goodness of God.

*****

In a later post (probably sometime this week), I’ll explain all the ins and outs of the adoption process, but until then please extend your warm welcome through congratulations and prayers for our son Jeremiah : )

We're jumping "all in"

From my wife, Nicki:

12 days to Parenthood!!!!

Yes, can you believe it? We got the call from our agency a few weeks ago that a birth mother has chosen US to adopt the child in her womb. After 7 years of infertility and only a few short months as a approved prospective adoptive couple, we are now on the fast track to bringing home a baby.

After we found out that we had been matched (being “matched” in the adoption world is equivalent to being “engaged” in the world of marriage), we waited about two weeks to tell our friends and family.  Honestly, we were too shocked and floored to actually believe that an expecting mother would choose us so soon.  So, we had to meet her to believe that she ACTUALLY wanted us, and that she was ACTUALLY serious about this whole thing.

We met her, fell in love with her and a couple days later we gathered Nicki’s family and my family together to let them know that we had been matched.  We got them all together by deceiving them into thinking that we were getting together to explain how our adoption fundraiser is going to work (our adoption will cost somewhere between 20K to 30K).

Nicki (my wife) then gave them gifts that progressively revealed some info about their soon-to-be newest family member.

This is what ensued (there’s two camera angles, each lasting about 3 minutes a piece.  The second camera angle is better than the first, so if you want to fast forward to the better camera angle, go to about the 4:06 mark):

So, we’re tentatively excited.

Even though we’re “matched” (or engaged), we’re still not “married”.  There’s a number of hurdles that stand in front of us and any of those hurdles could be devastating.  As much as we want to remain unattached — knowing any of those hurdles could put an end to our hopes — we believe that the best route is to jump all in (something I’ll write about at a later date).

Please join with us in prayer as we continue to ask God to move in this situation!  Thank you!