The Youth Rally – An Epic Adoption Story,

I was a new dad, a young youth director in a mid-sized United Methodist church, and I had just gotten a new job at Lexmark to help supplement our income, and to put to work my MS in Chemistry.

Duffy Robbins was the speaker at a denominational youth even in Frankfort, and other than enjoying him I can’t remember what he had to say. Sorry Duffy.

What I do remember is walking past a table with a bunch of kids pictures on it. One of the first ministries I implemented as a youth director was sponsoring a kid through World Vision as a Youth Group. The youth would send her letters. We’d take up offerings to help cover the monthly support. I’d post her report card on the bulletin board. She eventually married at the tender age of 14 and she was from Africa.

This ministry was another child sponsorship organization called Compassion. I remember just thumbing through the packets, and eventually it hit me to see if by chance there might be a child with the same birthday as Shelbi Lynn. I felt like I was supposed to do this, but this time it was for us as a family. I made a deal with God that if there was a packet of a child with the same birthday as Shelbi, then I’d do it.

Now as the weekend went along I passed the table several times. I never found a packet with Shelbi’s birthday. On the last day the person at the booth finally asked me if I was looking for something in particular. I explained the desire for the birthday match and that there weren’t any on the table thinking she would just sigh and say, “Sorry, we can’t help you.”

Instead she pulled out a box full of other kids.

In about two minutes, there she was, Dennis (pronounced Daneese) Rafael Campos from Peru. A beautiful child, with a beautiful family, who needed Jesus, and a sponsor and I had made a deal with the LORD…

Go here for Chapter 2 “Compassion”