Some of you may have heard of the music artist, Mark Shultz. Those of you that have heard of him may not know that he is an adoptee.

He sang at a Christian benefit for adoption and a lady stopped to talk to him and was telling him how special adoption was and how special the birth moms are. She asked him if he had ever met his birth mom and he said no. She inquired why he had not and Mark’s reply was, “Well, I figured she gave me away and we wouldn’t have much to say”. She shared with him that his birth mom was very special and that she had three options she could have chosen from when she was pregnant with him. The first option was that she could of decided to have had an abortion and then he would not be here today. The second option was that she could have said, “You know, I can’t give this baby a great life and I can’t provide for him, but he is mine and I am going to keep him.” But she chose the most unselfish option and carried him for nine months through the pain and struggles of pregnancy. Then she held him and looked him in his eyes knowing that she couldn’t give him the best life so she loved him so much that she handed him to a family that would love and care for him and give him the best life she couldn’t. This lady’s words struck Mark hard. He decided that he was going to write a letter to his birth mom through song.

The link to listen to a 4-minute interview with Mark and video hi-lights is at http://blog.worship.com/worship/2006/09/in_recent_month.html.

As the sibling to an adopted sister, I never really thought about the birth mother very much. My parents and I think that Gracie’s birth mom loved her because she wrapped Gracie in a coat to keep her warm, gave her a bottle so she could be fed, put her in a cardboard box to protect her from the hard pavement, and put her outside the gates of the orphanage where she knew that her little girl would be found. After seeing these clips, it gives me a better appreciation of the birth mother because of the pain they have to suffer to give their child away and the love they have to give there little one a better life.