New Insights into Old Words, Stanza 2

Just more than two years ago, I wrote a column for our local paper about words we don’t hear so often anymore.  I talked about words like “icebox,” “mimeograph,” “Kodachrome,” “transistor,” “curlers,” “HiFi,” “oleo,” “phonograph,” and “floppy drive.”  In an effort to avoid dating myself too precisely, I’ll tell you I’ve never used the term “icebox,” but “floppy drive” is one I’ve seen both come and go.  

In that column, I focused, especially, on the word, “redeem.”  The context was the adoption of our first grandchild, Oliver Dean.  Given the circumstances surrounding his birth, the opportunity to be welcomed into a loving and supportive adoptive family was nothing less than total redemption.  Without it, his very survival could well have been at risk. Today, Oliver is a beautiful, healthy, loving, bright, energetic (I am a proud grandparent, after all) almost-three-year-old.  And in a very exciting development, he is also a big brother! 

Coehn James arrived in early December.  Like his big brother before him, he, too, is adopted.  In fact, the end of July marks the finalization of the adoption process.  At first, I wondered whether or not the idea of redemption fit his situation, too.  The circumstances of Coehn’s birth were quite different from his brother’s.  Unlike Oliver’s situation (in which DHS was involved), Coehn’s birth mother and her family made the decision to hand him into the loving embrace of a caring adoptive family (though not without a few tears, I'm sure).  However, given the legal (if not ethical) options available to Coehn's birth mother, I came to realize the term "redeemed" fit his situation just as well as it did his brother's.

Another word describes Coehn’s situation for me, too, though.  That word is “bequeath.”  Typically heard mostly in a legal context (think wills and estates), it literally means “to pass on or leave to someone else.”   When Coehn's birth mother made the difficult and selfless decision to give him up for adoption, she bequeathed to him opportunities he would not have known otherwise.  When I consider Coehn’s God-given potential and the possibilities now open to him, I begin to understand the magnitude of the gift his birth mother bequeathed to him when she made that difficult decision.   

As it was for Oliver, my prayer for Coehn is that he will come to understand how God has moved to redeem him through adoption and the vast array of blessing and opportunity that has been bequeathed to him in that process.  Too, I pray both Oliver and Coehn will come to understand that God’s redemption for them is far bigger than just physical adoption and will come to know God’s spiritual redemption, as well.  

We look forward to what is ahead. For the moment, though, we simply celebrate the redemption that has brought Coehn James into our lives and all that has been bequeathed to each of us through that very precious gift. 

To God be the glory!

#adoption  #grandchildren  #redemption  #bequeath  #redeem  #birthmom