Foster Care Is Inherently Temporary
It is not good for a child to be without a home. When a child enters the foster system, they enter into a state of flux filled with court hearings, supervised parental visits, social workers, group homes, and new people to live with.
Fostering is always temporary. The primary goal is permanence. The first strategy is to reunify a child with their parents, or with extended family if the parents are not an option. If that is not possible then other forms of permanency are needed, such as adoption.
Because fostering is temporary, there are no promises. Nothing is sure. Court dates can always be moved, decisions appealed, and other untimely events happen. Foster care is not convenient. Foster care doesn’t care about your needs or plans. Foster care is definitely not “new family member tryouts.” Foster care is taxing, strenuous, and gut-wrenching. You may not be able to adopt. You may risk heartache after you open your heart and arms to a child in need, just to have them leave, because foster care is temporary. But it is also worth it.
“For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”
-2 Corinthians 4:17-18 ESV
Everyone should count the cost before making disciples through fostering (Luke 14:28). It may hurt, but is that hurt worth being able to care for a child for however long they are providentially placed in your home? Does the emotional toll outweigh the opportunity to care for “the least of these” (Matt 25:40)?
Foster care is temporary … but the love you pour into a child, that is permanent.
Is fostering for you? Please join us at an information meeting to learn about next steps.
Is fostering not for you but you still want to help? Please consider volunteering or making a donation of any amount to serve foster families.
Here are three main ways you can help:
Become a 1HOPE Defender
Defenders answer a call from the Lord to serve children in foster care through prayer and recurring monthly donations. For $30 a month or more, you can be a 1HOPE Defender and help provide cranial forming helmets, braces and orthodontia, additional therapy, diapers, and medical expenses.
Volunteer
Not everyone is called to foster, but everyone can help. We have an amazing team of volunteers who help foster families and children through:
Prayer
Tutoring
Notes of encouragement to families
Meal ministry and Door Dash gift cards for when life makes it especially tough
Certified babysitting
Transportation
Diaper delivery
Open your home
We need safe and loving homes in which to place children in the foster system. We need families to get licensed so they can be the light of Christ to children in need. Interested in learning more? Start here.