Today’s Ministry Monday features His Heart For Orphans Adoption Ministry at Healing Place Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. In this post, you’ll find key information about the ministry and an interview with founder, Aimeé Poché.
Mission: “Embracing orphans around the world with His hands, His words, His love, His heart.”
Description: “His Heart for Orphans” Adoption Ministry connects families to adoption resources, supports couples who want to adopt or are going through the domestic or international adoption process, and teaches the biblical perspective on adoption.
Resources: Adoption Workshops, Adoption Support Group, and eNewsletters. Provides financial grants to qualified couples to help with the costs of adoption.
Fun Facts: We have recently added a Scrapbook Corner to give couples who have adopted ideas about documenting their adoption journey in a life book. We also help other churches start their own orphan/adoption ministries.
“His Heart for Orphans” Adoption Ministry does not operate as an adoption agency.
Laura Christianson: What inspired you and your husband Tommy to start an adoption ministry in your church?
Aimeé Poché: Four years into our marriage, Tommy and I found out that we had both wanted to adopt when we were younger. So adoption had been on our hearts, individually, for a very long time. However, when we got married we never mentioned adoption until we experienced five years of infertility.
After stopping fertility treatments and trusting God to multiply our family, we adopted our first son about a year later—with no adoption support. We adopted our first daughter two months after that, again, with no adoption support. During that time, we really needed and wanted to be around and talk to couples who had adopted. We had so many questions and concerns.
One Sunday after church Tommy and I and our two children were walking down our church hall along with one of our pastors. He nonchalantly looked at us and said, “Y’all should start an orphan adoption ministry.” Period. Nothing else came out of his mouth.
My heart started beating faster and my mind started thinking in a hundred different directions. I researched orphan adoption ministries in churches on the internet and I could not find one! I could not believe it.
However, I did come across Shaohannah's Hope and contacted Scott Hasenbalg. I poured my heart out to Scott and told him my desire to start an orphan adoption ministry. He immediately gave me Paul Pennington’s number (director of FamilyLife’s Hope for Orphans) and told me to call him. Paul was excited because God had laid on their heart to start equipping local churches to start orphan adoption ministries.
Paul suggested we attend the next If You Were Mine adoption seminar because they were going to have a breakout session about starting an orphan adoption ministry at your church. In November, 2003, Tommy and I went and absorbed everything Paul and the others told us to do. After the conference, Tommy and I made a portfolio about starting an orphan adoption ministry, set up a meeting with our pastors, and were immediately embraced and supported by our church.
LC: What have you learned during your four years of adoption ministry?
AP: Not everybody is going to want to adopt. This was a shock to me in the beginning. I assumed that after I poured my heart out to our church that they would be overjoyed, excited, and come running to us to find out how to adopt immediately. Wrong!
We found out that people were just not informed about adoption, nor were they aware of the great need for adoption. Many, many people believe adoption is way too expensive.
LC: What advice would you give to someone considering starting an adoption ministry?
AP: Try not to get disappointed or discouraged when the whole church does not share your enthusiasm about adoption or come running forward to adopt. This is not a ministry that will bring in bunches of people, and that should not be the focus.
Not everybody needs to adopt. Adoption is a calling, not a command. I find this way of thinking releases people to fully pray and ask God if He is calling them to adopt.
LC: What should the focus of an adoption ministry be, in your opinion?
AP: Our ministry’s focus is on getting children out of orphanages and into loving Christian homes so they can have a family to call their own, a hope and a future.
We first focused on adoption awareness, getting the word “adoption” in front of our church family, being available to couples who are thinking about adoption, supporting couples who are going through the adoption process or who have adopted. Through perseverance and prayer, we have seen couples adopt that probably would not have adopted without having the support and information this ministry has provided for them.
LC: Other than attending FamilyLife’s If You Were Mine adoption seminar, did you and Tommy have any special training for staring an adoption ministry?
AP: You do not have to be a pastor or member of a church staff to start an orphan adoption ministry. Tommy and I are just plain old “pew people.” God laid a desire on our heart and we accepted the call.
I get many e-mails from people who have a desire to start an orphan adoption ministry but tell me they do not have a degree or that they are just a “stay-at-home mom.”
I tell them: You do not need a degree to start this kind of ministry. What you do need is a willing heart and the courage to do it! God loves doing extraordinary things through ordinary people!
For more information about His Heart for Orphans, contact Tommy and/or Aimeé Poché at ephesians1five@cox.net. www.healingplacechurch.org, Keyword: adoption
Check out the new "His Heart for Orphans" blog: www.HisHeartForOrphans.blogspot.com.
This article is permanently archived in The Adoption Support Center at www.laurachristianson.com.
Tell us about your adoption ministry! E-mail details to Laura Christianson.
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