Joyfully Embracing God’s Children (Part 2 of 2)

Your marriage can be healed. A Hope Restored Marriage Intensive from Focus on the Family can transform you and your spouse's relationship in just a few days. We'll go to this thing, but this is it. If this doesn't work, we're done. What we have now, it's way more than we ever had before and that I ever even dreamed of in the marriage. Discover more at HopeRestored.com. That's HopeRestored.com Instantly God did something in my heart when I read those words babies with Down syndrome. And it was instantaneous and I was not excited about this. I wasn't like, yes Lord, let's step towards this. It was like no no no no no. And like Josh and I lag behind and he's like, what's going on? I tell him and I'm waiting for him to say, oh no that's not what we're going to do. And he goes, yeah, I think we should pray about that. That's Heather Avis remembering a significant turning point in her marriage and family. And you'll hear more from her and her husband Josh today on Focus on the Family with Jim Dele. Thanks for joining us. I'm John Polly. You know, last time we featured a great conversation that we recorded a few years ago with this remarkable couple. Heather and Josh described their torturous years of infertility, wondering where God was and why he wasn't answering their prayers for a baby. Then the Lord revealed a different path for their family, the path of foster care and adoption. Heather and Josh were willing to embrace that and now they have three children. They've adopted two of them with Down syndrome. And you know, John, some of my heroes are parents who are raising children with special needs, especially when you are opting in to take care of those kids. That can be a challenging job and my heart goes out to you if that's your story. Here at Focus on the Family, we want to encourage you anyway we can. One great resource we have is our special needs parenting audio collection. This collection features some of our best programs and stories from parents just like you. Over five hours of inspiring content. And I know you'll find it helpful. Best of all, it's completely free. Contact us if you'd like to learn more. Yeah, you can sign up for that collection. The link is in the show notes. We also want you to know about the book that Heather Avis has written capturing their remarkable story. It's the lucky few finding God's best in the most unlikely places. Check that out on the website as well. And now here's part two of our conversation with Josh and Heather Avis on today's episode of Focus on the Family with Jim Davis. Heather and Josh, welcome back to Focus. Thank you. It was so wonderful last time. You spoke so boldly, so transparently. And I'm sure I know listeners connected with where you were at, what you have walked through, how God has sustained you. And again, John, if people miss that, I would get that through a download or just call us, we'll get you to CD whatever we can do. But it was really inspiring. And that's a big word to use. I want to continue on. We dropped off last time where you had been working with an agency, you had just taken the trip to Romania, a missions trip. The agency had texted you or emailed you saying we have two kids, but they both have Down syndrome. It's hard to place Down syndrome children. But right at that moment, you kind of thought, okay, maybe. I do want to say it's almost angelic. Most people would say, I can't carry that burden. That's too much for me. The Lord will know, I've got so much that's going on. How did you process that? How did you say, I could do this? You've only been married four years. You're young and you're mid-twenties. This is going to be a load. This isn't just normal parenting. Definitely. God had kept nudging us along the way. We had a week left in Europe that Josh and I just did together and went to Greece. And we spent that entire week. The majority of our conversations were around this idea of adopting a child with Down syndrome. And Josh would make lists, pros and cons lists. I'm not that organized in the way that I think. But Josh is. And he would do lists. I got pros and cons. And what it really came down to is as people who love Jesus and who desire to have a heart that beats like his, not one of the items on the con list was a good enough item to say no to being parents to a child to need parents. That at the end of the day there was a baby who needed a mom and a dad. We were a mom and a dad. That was it. And that's enough. And that's enough. And I think that's a huge piece of adoption. Is that the end of the day there's a child who needs a family. You can be a family. And that can be enough. We moved forward in that way. And even after saying, OK, yes, I'll learn more. We got home from Europe, call the social worker. It's a very long story. But we even in that moving forward, it was like, OK, it was a roller coaster. We're so excited. We got this. And then an hour later, no, no, no, no, no, we cannot do this. What would so like for our life? This is terrifying. This is overwhelming. We're not equipped. And then the next day, OK, we can do it. We can do it. So it wasn't just a seamless. And I appreciate that. So that vacillation to come from both of you, or was it one of you predominantly that you were retreating after going forward? Or was it a shared kind of thing where, depending upon the day, Josh, you were saying, honey, come on, really? And then the next day, it was you. I mean, that's completely natural. I understand this. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it was definitely a process for sure. It was up and down. I think it was a lot of hard conversations where I would pull her up, or she would pull me up, or you would try to convince the other, or, and even hard conversations with family, to be honest, and hard conversations with our support around us saying, are you sure about this? And so, hey, family members saying, hey, don't do this. I think they're just protective of us. Right. No one ever flat out said don't do this. Yeah. But it was a lot of like, oh. OK, tell us more. Why are you doing this? I have always been. I could cheerleader for the underdog since I was really little. Like, since my parents can recall, and since I can recall, I've had this heart that breaks for the broken hearted. And so, my mom, I think, was worried that I was trying to rescue. That I was trying to do this big, noble thing, and rescue this poor, poor child, and that my intentions maybe weren't going to be healthy in the long run for me. And I'm her daughter. So, she's looking to me as her daughter. What is this going to mean for your life? And so, I did have a conversation with my mom, where I decided to say, hey, mom, you have to trust me to be, who God's made me to be, and what he's calling us to in this. I need you to just trust right now. Did the question, did you appreciate the question for solidifying the decision you already had in your heart? Was there any appreciation for your mom's forcefulness with that? Oh, absolutely. I could see myself as a dad of a now 17 year old, in a few years. He might make that decision. I might ask that question. In part, just to make sure that my adult son or daughter really has counted the cost. Right. And so, and I think that's also why we went to our parents and went to our people who we could love and trust, because we needed that support. Yeah, that support. And the different perspective, we needed people to be pushing back, because it was a big decision for us. And I was 27 years old, you know, and it was a big decision, because we also at any given time could have said no firmly and officially, and then probably within a few weeks been receiving a phone call for this healthy infant, we've been waiting for. Yeah, sure. Let me just, the thought came to me. Do you think either of your parents, did they think what are we being pulled into here, when we have to babysit and caretake? Was there any of that consideration that you're aware of? I mean, I thought of that. I thought of that. Yeah, but that would be a normal grandparent in question here. Yeah, I think there is a lot of people's first reaction is what does this mean long term? Like this, what are you going to do with this child when you're gone? Who's taking care of this child as an adult? And things are very different now in the Down syndrome world. That narrative is really changing significantly. That's a whole topic, but definitely, I think all of everyone in our family was like, okay, this has huge implications on the entire family because it does, you know? And even my Evan Older sister who had two kids at the time, and thinking of my future daughter's cousins, and that there's no burden or pressure on anybody, but if the day comes that no one can care for our daughter and she does need extra care, is it my nephew and niece? You know, like that everyone here is affected. And before that child enters our lives, a child with Down syndrome, I think that it is this idea of this is a lot, this is heavy, this is too much. And then Inter said child, and everyone's tune changes almost instantly to like, oh no, I get her, I get her, I get her. Like this battle over that. I have a smile on my face because I know the kids are with the grandparents right now. Yeah, that's proof in the pudding, right? You know, some people Heather and Josh may not even understand the diagnosis of Down syndrome. They hear it, and we've heard it in the news lately. There's some things that have happened in other countries. What are the obstacles? What are the hurdles? What is a Down syndrome child display? Yeah, so Down syndrome is just the 21st chromosome. They have three 21st chromosomes. So everyone with Down syndrome has one extra chromosome. Right. So to call it Tristomy 21, so that's the scientific description, medical, I don't know. And the thing that with Down syndrome is there are some similar characteristics. So often it's like there's physical, so like an almond shaped eye, usually a little bit smaller in stature, flat face, like a flatter nose. Lone muscle tone. Low tone is very common. And some kind of an intellectual disability. And then there can be heart defects. I think it's about 60% of kids are Down syndrome born with a heart defect. And hearing problems, vision problems, higher likelihood for leukemia, higher likelihood for Alzheimer's. So those are all characteristics that are terrifying, right, on paper. I think that we forget as people that when you're giving birth to a child who has no special needs, that a lot of those are the same risks as they get older. If you're going to look at all these possibilities for this child who's totally healthy at birth, they could also have any one of these things. Not just the same for Down syndrome. Now let's move through that story a little more because you didn't stop there. This is number one. What happened? What's it like bringing Mason home? Night one, week one, month one, year one. Right. We took back a tiny bit that when we first, so we say yes, we want to move forward with possibly adopting a child with Down syndrome and then the social worker says, oh, okay, well, one of those babies was placed and the other one is so, we just found out all these medical needs were not looking at placing her. And we recognized later that they thought she wasn't going to live. They had just... So they were protecting their adoption. She was an option. They had just discovered this lung condition called pulmonary hypertension and that her heart defect was more severe than they had recognized. And at six weeks old, which is when we had found out about her, she was going to go in for a heart surgery, not open heart, but like a very serious heart surgery to help prolong her life. And that's where we had called instead we're interested. And they're saying, oh my gosh, we don't know that she's going to live through the surgery. But they're not telling us that. So we hang up the phone and go, oh my gosh, what if we don't get a kid with Down syndrome? And we recognize that God had done a complete shift in our hearts in that regard. And then we went along our lives. And a month later they call and say, hey, that little girl we told you about went through a surgery. We have a better grasp on her health. Are you still interested? We said yes. And we go in, learn more about her. And all of a sudden Down syndrome is a back burner issue because she's on medications. She's on oxygen 24-7. Her lung condition is so severe that they don't know how long she's going to live. And we're just like, aw, what are you doing? Lord, it was very frustrating. It became a baby with, with is very medically fragile. Right. Right. Yeah. And so now we're not just saying yes to Down syndrome. We're saying yes to, we don't know. But you're pressing ahead. Right. Some of us are shaking our heads. Oh, I know. No, we were shaking our heads and still moving from head to head. We're shaking your head and pressing ahead. We didn't want to say yes, but we knew No wasn't the answer. So we kept taking steps forward. That's what that looked like for us in that moment. And I think when I talk to a lot of people who say, like, how do you move forward in things or so scary and things are so challenging? And for us it was one foot in front of the other. Literally, like, I'm going to lift up my foot. I'm going to put it down. I have no idea what my second step is. And I don't have to know that. I just have to know that. You know, I want to just bring in some of the statistics because it's so important. 70% of babies that are in utero that are diagnosed with Down syndrome are aborted. Yeah. I mean, 70%. I know there's been, as I mentioned before, a lot in the news about Iceland and other countries now that almost a hundred percent are aborted. This kind of turns that all on its head because some of the most powerful comments that I heard is that why are we discriminating against children just to have some different physical attributes? And they are impaired in different ways. But they're still human beings made in the image of God that need protection. As parents who have adopted Down syndrome children, what does that make you feel like when they are talking about eradicating Down syndrome by aborting everyone who's diagnosed with it? Yeah, it makes me feel at first that it's like, wait, what? Yeah. That doesn't make any sense. Like, why would you do that? Because they're the best. And then it's infuriating and then it's a little bit terrifying. It's disgusting. For humanity as a whole. Like that as humans were okay or were wanting to live in a world where everyone is perfect with air quotes or doesn't have different abilities. And then you can go more concentrated as the church and say, okay, if people with different abilities are being formed in their mother's womb, created in the image of God as they are. So then if they are image barriers of God, we're missing out on a huge piece of God if we're not willing to do life intimately with them or let them live it all. Amen. And Heather and Josh, the statement here, this is not a political state. Right. This is the condition of humanity. Yeah. This is something that is in us. Right. We want another. Right. Do we do that by simply killing them? Yeah. I mean, it seems, and you've got to be somewhat intimidating to that community who wants to eradicate down syndrome. I mean, for you to say, no, we will love these children. We will take these children in. God has given me a purpose in doing this. They must go, what? Right. It's got to be an anathema to them. And I think that the majority of people who are in the world in which they're choosing to eradicate down syndrome are people who are not doing life with down syndrome. I don't know this for a fact, but I could just, I want to say with a lot of confidence that chances are these people do not have a love and with down syndrome. And the decision is being made purely out of fear and ignorance. And so it's not even a pro choice pro life issue with this, what's happening with the down syndrome world and community. It's an idea of our people with down syndrome human. Are they worthy of life? Are they worthy of acceptance? And in the church again, are they image bears of God? Do they have giftings and talents like the rest of us? Can we see God in them? The answer is yes to all those questions. So people are deciding to terminate a pregnancy based on fear and ignorance. So they're giving birth to that. So every time a child with the down syndrome is terminated, we're just giving birth to more fear and more ignorance. And then living in that. Heather, I've got to ask you because I know every mom is heart is out there saying, where is Macy at today? What's happened? Is she doing well? Right? Okay, so answer that question. Yeah, I know I will answer that. And I'll go back just a little bit because you had said first days at home, first weeks at home, what's it like? And so we say yes to this child, it's terrifying. We bring her home auction and all. And there's a baby in my arms. I'm a mom and it's the most incredible life giving experience of my life. And so there we are, parents, it's all we know. We don't need to front. The next day are very first days, parents. We go and meet with her surgeon to schedule open heart surgery. So hello, welcome to parenthood. And then a month later, she has open heart surgery. It goes great. Two years later, she's miraculously cured from this lung condition and off-oxid and in all medications. And so we are now front row seat to miracles. Seeing God's goodness, like this gift to get to experience that in and see God in that way. And so we just held this child like, oh my gosh, this is the best. Yes, we've ever said we've never we never would have known God so fully had we not taken this big risk. And today she's nine. Currently she has a cold, so that's a bummer. But she's doing great. She's amazing. And she's thriving. Yeah, health wise, we see cardiology and pulmonaryology every two years. We go in there like she's great. Get out of here. That's what you want to hear. Yeah, no other health issues. Josh, you were feeling this emotion, man. Your eyes are all water. The story still gets me choked up. Yeah, it's, I mean, we, you just see we serve such a good God and he loves us so much. And so we got a front row seat to see this miracle baby. And you know, we just celebrated her ninth birthday. And I remember when we talked to her cardiologist early on. And he said this lung thing is really scary. We can do the heart surgery. But you know, we can't guarantee that she'll live past eight. Because of the lung issue. Yes. Wow. And so nine, nine was a big one for us. So you just celebrated nine years old. And that is good. Miracles continue to happen. Yeah. And those miracles, meaning you didn't stop there. No. You ended up continuing to adopt. You adopted two more children and described those two kiddos. Oh gosh. So we went into our next adoption just a lot. Why is there, I think, in having seen God so clearly and fully. Your heart first started and a lot more humbled. Yeah. And so we went into our second adoption. God will take any child in the world. Who do you want for us? And we end up with a little girl. Isn't that quite angelic? I love you're honest. You have some boundaries. You're making me feel like a little bit more. I mean, we were close fists on the first one. Like we wanted, we had the list. We had that. This one we walked in and said, God, our hands are open. So, but we do. Your hands are of my arms. We're like, it's out of the world. So. Yeah. So it was fitting. You were enjoying this mommy thing. Oh, it's the best. It was so good. I mean, it's so hard, right? All the mom is all the parents out there now. It is no joke, parenthood. It's so hard. That is so true. So we end up with this little girl who has no health issues. She's got some family, birth family history that's pretty heavy and serious that we had to talk about just very briefly because we knew we'd say yes. This is truly, yeah. This is truly, yeah. I love it. We knew birth mother was Guatemalan and birth fathers I known. She came when it's six months old. And we've done DNA tests and things. She's a half African American, half Guatemalan. And she is just a spitfire. She's a world changer, but she's sick. So that's really hard. And you know, in the book, you touched on this and I'm glad we have a couple of minutes here to dig into this because you said she was, she's your strong will child. Those of us were strong, low kids. We're all laughing going, yeah, I got one of those. But you said something in there that at first I was struggling with and that was her attitude and her behavior. You came to the conclusion that I have a role in this, the way I'm parenting her may not be helping her. I kind of had a little conviction about that. So why did you look to yourself as the problem, not truly the strong will child? Because we really get on those kids in a bad way. You know, it's not me, it's because of you. But maybe you can teach us how to look at it differently. Sure. But ultimately, I'm the adult and she is a tiny child. And so that's not fair, right? It's not fair to say, hey, three year old mature. And that right, act like an adult, shape up. And she was so different than Mason, so people who have multiple kids. And I thought him a really good parent and then entered truly. I'm like, I have no idea what I'm doing. So she was like a refiner's fire for me. What did that look like on a day to day basis? It was really hard. It still is. Six years old in Mason's 9. And day to day, it is just like a lot of grace. There's a lot of apologizing from me to her. I apologize often, sometimes daily, for my reaction to her. It's what we're trying to figure out still and then and it's still. And I think probably forever is God's made her to be a certain way. And maybe that rubs me the wrong way. And I don't want to squelch that. Because I need control over these spaces, but she's not going to let me have that control. That's not bad. She's not a bad kid. She's not outside of God's will. She's on this path she's supposed to be on, but it's hard for me because I'm not her. And we're very different or very similar. But she's arguing a lot with you. I'm guessing. Yeah, she's pushing boundaries. Truly is, where is the line? And then she's going to put her toe over it and she's going to look at you and go, now what? And I think that's pretty difficult. And I think that's pretty difficult. She's family. And we always say the characteristics that truly has right now that are difficult are going to serve her so well as an adult. So how do we hold those, help her manage those and not squelch them? Yeah, I tell you, parents with a strong little child, I think we repeat that our pillow talk at night is, I know it's hard right now, but I think it will really serve him well. Yeah, man, Jean and I have had that chat. Yeah. And we're running out of time, but describe just quickly your third child also Down Syndrome. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Again, we wanted to be parents again and this time round, again, we had our hands open. We did it. We weren't looking to adopt a kid with special needs and sure enough, he aligned things and we met a birth mother who was pregnant with a little boy who had Down Syndrome and we brought him home the day after he was born. And August Riker is, I would describe him as, he's a bear of joy. He really is. He's three years old, three and a half. I love the name August Riker. Yeah. Sounds like a character and an adult. We have a beautiful relationship with birth mom and he just fit right in. Okay, this is the big push now. We're down to the last minute. Your convincing me, you're saying things that I'm warming up to, what should I do next? What's that saying? Okay. Yeah. Maybe I should look into adoption. Maybe I should foster adopt. Maybe I should ask for a special needs child. Maybe Down Syndrome, maybe something else. Push me over the line. Yeah. I think you've got to take that one big step. I think you have to really abandon all those fears or say, great, I'm terrified this is going to overwhelm me. Okay. I'm still going to take that step. It really is a step. It's not some giant leap of faith. I'm going to move forward towards this, recognize that this is God's calling on us if we love Him and we want to know Him more. Yeah. Can I end with this one? I keep saying that, don't I John? We're in the program several times. It's this battle that we have, especially in Western culture, where we have leisure and comfort as our main goal. It's really... That's not what God called us to. It's not. And how do we shake the shackles of that desire to have an easy life, a comfortable life? Now I'm starting to really put a knife into people's sides and say, Lord, I know you're not calling me to that. That is a big step. That's not a little step. No, you're right. I think that as in the West, we are pursuing this idea of like ease and comfort. How do we have this easy, comfortable life? And recognizing that the things that are the most worthy in life are not going to be easy period. And where God resides, where his heart beats the loudest, is not in those easy, comfortable places. So if you want to hear God's heartbeat more fully, understand him more fully, and sit in the worth and value of life and humanity, then you have to be willing to step into those heart places. You can have easy. That's fine. But you're missing out on the heartbeat of God if you do that. I just... That sounds so much like what the Lord would say to all of us. Heather Avis, author of the book, The Lucky Few, and Josh, her wonderful husband, man. You guys, you are rocking it. Oh, thanks. And it's awesome to see. Thanks for being a great witness. Yeah, thanks. Well, I hope this couple's wonderful story has encouraged you today. That's been our goal, and that you'll prayerfully consider what role you might play in helping children who are in foster care. There are many ways to get involved, simply offering to help a foster or adoptive family in your neighborhood. Prayer at your church, I think that's the easiest way, is a great place to start. And if you'll check out our Weight No More program in the US or Waiting To Belong in Canada, you'll find all the information that you need to engage. Of course, we'd also recommend you get a copy of Heather's book, Send a Gift of Any Amount to Focus on the Family, and we'll send it right out to you as our way of saying thank you for being a part of the ministry. And one of those financial partners who contributed, wrote us and said this, I was a woman named Dolores, she said, when I hear all that you stand for, it draws me to the cross and makes me want to help however I can. What you focus on the family do for children who don't have a home touches my heart. That's exactly why we produce programs like this one. And then puts a smile on everybody's face. And why we need your help getting the word out about providing good and godly homes for children in foster care. Join Dolores in helping us any way you can with a one time gift or monthly pledge, anything you can do will make a difference. And let me say thank you in advance for your generosity. Yeah, we welcome your support when you call 800, the letter A in the word family. 800-232-6459. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. We're going to be doing this for you. Live your truth. A lot of people say that, don't they? But truth isn't something we decide. God has decided it for us. And it's our job as believers to share his truth with a world in need. I'll encourage you to do that through my podcast, Refocus with Jim Daily. I visit with fascinating guests about important topics like gender confusion, cancel culture, and more, while helping you share God's love with others. Listen at Refocus with JimDaily.com.