Podcast: Christian Adoption and Fostering with Josh MacDonald

This article is part of the Affinity Talks Gospel Podcast series.

In this episode of the Affinity Talks Gospel Podcast, hosts Graham Nicholls and Lizzie Harewood sit down with Josh MacDonald, Chief Executive of Cornerstone, the UK’s only evangelical Christian fostering and adoption service.

They explore the current landscape of Christian fostering and adoption in the UK, highlighting the alarming rise in children in care – now over 100,000 – and the urgent need for compassionate, faith-driven foster carers and adopters. Josh shares his personal journey to faith, his professional background in children’s services, and the mission of Cornerstone to place children in loving Christian homes. The discussion explores the challenges of the adoption process, the societal factors driving the UK adoption crisis, and the biblical call for Christians to care for the fatherless.

With a focus on recent trends, such as the rise in unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors and the decline in adoptions, this episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in fostering, adoption, or supporting vulnerable children. It is also a challenge for the UK church to embrace a fostering and adoption church culture, inspired by stories like that of a young woman who found Jesus through her adoptive family’s love.

Discover how Cornerstone is making a difference and how Christians can get involved in this vital ministry by visiting their website: www.cornerstoneuk.org.

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Topics addressed in this Podcast:

• The UK Adoption and Fostering Landscape
  Josh discusses the current state of child care in the UK, noting over 100,000 children are currently in care, a significant rise since 1994, with two-thirds in foster placements due to abuse or neglect. He highlights trends like the increase in unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors and a decline in adoptions (from 5,000 in 2014/15 to 1,910 in 2023/24).
• Cornerstone’s Mission as a Christian Agency
  Josh explains Cornerstone UK’s role as the UK’s only evangelical Christian fostering and adoption service, recruiting exclusively Christian carers to place children in loving homes. He outlines its history, regional focus, and aspirations to expand, including registration in Scotland.
• The Biblical Call to Care for the Fatherless
  The episode emphasises the scriptural mandate for Christians to foster and adopt, citing verses like Psalm 68:5 and James 1:27. Josh frames this as obedience to God’s heart for the fatherless, urging all Christians to engage directly or support others.
• Challenges and Motivations in Fostering/Adoption
  Josh addresses the rigorous adoption process, which is far more scrutinised than biological parenting, and discusses motivations ranging from compassion to personal desires for family. He also highlights Cornerstone’s role in supporting Christians navigating secular agencies.
• Encouraging Church Involvement
  Josh challenges churches to preach about fostering and adoption, create supportive cultures, and act radically – e.g., through house-swapping to enable fostering. He calls for pastors and congregations to prioritise this ‘forgotten doctrine’.

Transcript

[AI generated]

[0:11] Hello, I’m Graham Nicholls. And I’m Lizzie Harewood, and this is the Affinity Talks Gospel Podcast. We’re here today to talk about adoption and fostering with Josh from Cornerstone. So Josh, sorry Josh, your surname suddenly escaped me, even though I know you. I’m really sorry. That’s certainly fine. We both know a lot of people. My name is Josh MacDonald. It’s spelled M-A-C with a big D if anybody cares. But if anything, just to distinguish myself from the fast food restaurant. And yes, since the start of 2023, being chief executive at Cornerstone Fostering and Adoption Service. I live in the capital of God’s Own County, up north to some, but to my Scottish compatriots, very much southern.

[0:56] And how did you become a believer? How did you become a Christian?

[1:01] I was privileged to grow up in a Christian household growing my mum and dad were kind of first generation Christians really i think they came to Christ just shortly before i came along.

[1:14] And very privileged to have the benefit of their kind of upbringing and yeah, just kind of really taught the ways of the Lord and in church from, yeah obviously, whenever I can remember. And for me, I suppose my journey was one of knowing it intellectually, knowing the Lord and who he was intellectually, I suppose. My mum always said to me growing up, you can’t be carried on our coattails, Josh. You’ve got to make your own decision. I’m very grateful that she did that in love. And I suppose her wrestling was 15, 16, 17 teenage years for me. I really felt God’s call on my life. I really felt him speaking to me in my heart, but I suppose wrestled with actually giving my life to him. Surrendering my life to him and giving my plans and desires to him. So yeah, I did that in my own little way, I think, before I went away to university. University was a challenging place initially, but then the Lord really had his hand on me and kind of started to grow in conjunction with other Christian friends my own age. So yeah, I went on with the Lord from that point. But yeah, praise him.

[2:15] Good. Yeah, lovely to hear. And before we get into kind of adoption in particular, what in your history in terms of working life or studying life kind of led you to have any clue or interest about adoption?

[2:32] It’s a great question and I suppose nothing in terms of working life directly. I would say that there’s a number of things indirectly. I’ve been involved in working for local authorities. I worked for a very big unitary at local authority and was working for two years with our children’s services department, so seeing, I think, a lot of the challenging circumstances that local authorities operate in, particularly

[3:00] in some underprivileged communities. And seeing a lot of poverty and a lot of challenge in that regard. I suppose on the flip side, or on another side, I also worked for a small evangelical church in a probably rural community actually, but doing a lot of youth work with a lot of harder-to-reach – as they would be termed back then – young people and again seeing that. And that’s where my wife and I probably first got involved in supporting children – kind of the edge of care really and getting involved in their lives again under the auspices of the church. And then it was kind of quite a lot of years later on that we kind of got involved in our own way. But yeah those two experiences probably had a big impact but nothing really before that to be honest. Josh, I would say that quite a lot of your your past life – I say your past life your life leading up to this point has equipped you – working with children and young people, working with children services, so it seems like a quite a link really. Tell us about Cornerstone, then. What is Cornerstone? Cornerstone is the country’s only

[4:11] evangelical Christian fostering and adoption service which is an amazing thing to say. No matter how many times I say it! And Cornerstone has been in existence since the very late 90s and we have consistently worked with Christian foster carers and adopters to obviously match them with referrals, children from local authorities. We are predominantly based in the northeast of England and also Yorkshire, Midlands and the Humber, but with bold aspirations to do a little bit more in coming years, at not least do something in Scotland where we’ve just been registered as a fostering service then?

[4:55] And to understand your definitions, what does a Christian adoption agency mean? And by the way, it’s also frightening that you’re the only one, not just a wonderful thing. It is a wonderful thing. It’s also a bit scary, really. But what do you mean by Christian? What I mean by Christian is we recruit exclusively Christian foster carers. We’re currently registered as a post-adoption support service because many of those foster carers over the history of Cornerstone have gone on to adopt the children that they were caring for in foster placements. We are hoping to register as an adoption agency in our own right in England and Wales with ofsted in the coming months but we’re not quite there yet. But yeah, Christian, we recruit exclusively Christian carers and adopters. How do you go about recruiting those foster care is?

[5:51] By any means possible, I suppose, is the straight answer to that question. I suppose we have a variety of means at our disposal, but we are very small, so our ability to reach is limited. We do all of the traditional means, which you would expect, word of mouth, church visits, websites, social media. We attend a number of events throughout the year, and most notably probably things like the Keswick Convention which we’ve done the last couple of years. And just try and make connections wherever we can – obviously partnering with such as yourselves and other organisations in a similar space up and down the country and we try and get a reach out. We’ve done stuff on radio. We’ve done stuff through a number of different media channels, but ultimately because of our size, the job of recruiting carers – the job of getting our name out there is difficult, if I’m honest. But yeah, they’re probably the ways I would mention.

[6:48] And what is the adoption landscape like in this country? I don’t know if you can scale in terms of numbers or just kind of anecdotally, or are there a lot of people who want to adopt and are there a lot of children to adopt?

[7:04] Okay, I’ll switch that round. I’ll talk about the need first, then I’ll maybe talk about the response, just because that’s the way it works in my head, forgive me. There’s about 100,000 children in care in the United Kingdom right now. Right, so 100,000 in the UK right now. Of those, 83,000 ish are in England, so England is obviously the biggest contributor amongst the four constituent nations of the United Kingdom. That number’s risen every year since 2008.

[7:35] And if I told you that 30 years ago, so in 1994, there were 47,590 children in care in England, that in a sense, I think tells its own story. So there’s about 83,000 per day. Back to 30 years ago, there were 47,590. So I suppose somebody wants to ask me, okay, what does that mean like proportionally in terms of the number of children in the country? I think it actually boils down, I think to 0.7%. There’s big variations regionally in terms of where you are. Obviously as you’d expect, if you live in Stoke, it’s 1.91% of all children are in care. If you live in Richmond, it’s 0.25%. So there’s obviously a big difference as you’d expect. What’s interesting locally and recently is the increase in the number of unaccompanied asylum seekers, so children that I’ve come across that foster carers are supporting.

[8:36] But yeah, in terms of the need, they’re the headline numbers. I mean, I can drill down. The only other thing I would probably mention, at least at first glance, in terms of need, is that the number of children that we are adopting as a country has gone down. There was a recent peak of over 5,000 adoptions in one year in 2014/15. In the last year, so the figures that I’m reporting to you are as at March 24, so the year 23/24, there were only 1,910 adoptions, which is an incredibly small number if you think about that across the entirety of England. So that gives a sense of need. As I said, I can drill down further, but I won’t do that at least at this point. I suppose to answer the second part of your question or what was actually the first part of your question, but I flipped it around the numbers coming forward, the foster carer population is very interesting.

[9:33] We’re actually recruiting slightly more foster carers as a country than we used to, but the overall foster carer population isn’t increasing to the extent that we need it to increase in light of the level of need. And one of the reasons for that is there are a lot of older carers who are retiring and are not necessarily being replaced by the same level of incoming carers. And in terms of adopters, I think there’s probably – because of those numbers that I mentioned earlier – in one sense there’s more of a population of adopters or prospective adopters, less than foster care. So, Josh, I’ve got a couple of questions there. I think my first question is:

[10:20] the number of um kids that are in care obviously seems to have risen exponentially and we can talk in a minute about the reasons why. But where are these children that are in care? Are they all placed with foster care? Yeah, great question. Do we have any other form of care? Two-thirds of children in care will be cared for in private foster placements. So two-thirds are in foster care as we would understand it in private households. And what’s the number of those placements? Actually it is slightly down. And one of the reasons for that is because more and more children are being placed

[11:07] in those foster care arrangements, but they’re being placed with family members or friends of the family or connected carers, as we would talk about them.

[11:16] And that’s a national trend because there is an overwhelming statistical base for trying to keep children connected with birth family, particularly birth parents, as furthering their later life outcomes. So that’s been a big thing. There’s other drivers as well, which we won’t go into now, but I think that’s a big driver and only 10 of those children in foster care at the moment in care at the moment are placed in children’s homes and that’s obviously been a big move in the last few decades – away from children’s homes and into private foster care

[11:50] placements. So does that answer – is that what you were driving at? Yeah, that’s what I was wondering. Just because I’d heard anecdotally – people who live nearby me, one of my neighbours, and they’ve gone through that route whereby a family member has, for whatever reason, been unable to have their child remain with them at home. And they seem to have gone down the kind of the family route first and saw the care of family who are able to, yeah, as you say, keep them with close familial ties. But they would still be considered to be in care, yeah, as opposed to… I suppose, yes, yeah they would. And my second question is, why are we seeing such a rise in the numbers of kids in care? Is it criteria? Is it –because as far as I’m aware, children – the number of children – that are being born is going down, but yet the number of children that are going into care seems to be going up. What on earth is going on?

[13:00] Well, as a complex question, well, well, in one sense, specifically industry, if I try and keep it there first, two thirds of all the children coming through into care are there as a result of abuse or neglect. So that’s important to recognise because it isn’t that we’ve suddenly got. So I talked just briefly just in response to Graham’s question. We have had an influx in unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors. So that is part of actually the numbers.

[13:33] But two-thirds are abuse and neglect related. So it’s not some other systemic issue or categorisation issue or we’ve had a world war or a local war or something that has taken a number of fathers.

[13:47] Do you know what I mean? There’s no kind of climactic issue like that. What we’re seeing is an increase in fatherlessness generally because of family breakdown generally. Which is obviously a symptom of deeper root causes which we obviously could talk about and would most likely be on the same page about. But yes that’s, you know, that’s ultimately where it’s coming from. It’s the increased breakdown of society which manifests obviously in the family unit. And obviously poverty and a number of other economic factors are part of that connected with an increased amount of substance use and abuse. Probably really a superficial judgment but I imagine that, I don’t know, 50 years ago most adoptions were either because the parents weren’t alive or because it was a single parent who was being asked perhaps to not keep the child or something like that and I’m sure there was abuse going on and so forth but probably that wasn’t such a significant driver. I don’t know whether… I mean it’s a bit unreasonable to ask if you know that kind of historical sweep but

[15:03] I wonder sadly whether the amount of abuse has gone up or perhaps it’s just better reporting I don’t know.

[15:10] It’s really interesting, isn’t it? I suppose I’d say a couple of things to that, Graham. One is – so if you go, so you’ve probably read Goodnight, Mr. Tom or a book like that, which has a kind of a classic kind of case of an adoption, if you like, that was the result of either poverty or loss of family or, yeah, something more straightforward than that. And that obviously has happened in previous eras. Yes, there’s less of that in one sense, I would say, at this point in time. So I think that is fair to say. I suppose the other thing is that we’ve had a big move away from institutional settings.

[15:55] And what we’ve obviously gone through as a nation is a number of scandals, really, whether that be in religious institutions, whether that be in state institutions, or otherwise, where there has been a lot of abuse, sometimes on an almost industrial scale. But it’s been connected with or into the state and so that’s in a sense been hidden because you’re looking at large numbers in one place and at one time rather than individual cases coming through into individual foster placements. I suppose the only other thing I would say to that is that historically we – there was probably more of a culture of not only relinquishment on the part of mothers who were often pressured into giving children up into adoption or into foster care. But also the climate around which we did that was far more hidden. I think you just sort of talked about this, where we weren’t talking about birth family contact. You know, I’ve had, I remember a lady come up to me in my church and telling me her story of how she’d given up one of her children and she used to pass her child in the pram of another woman, you know, on the street in the town where she lived. And yet, you know, it wasn’t talked about. Obviously, not only a changing industrial landscape, but also social media and the internet has all blown that all wide open. And I think that is a fact of the kind of things you’re saying. But I would come back to, amongst all of that, the

[17:23] problem that we’re facing as society at the moment as a nation that’s turned its back on God, ultimately that breakdown will manifest itself in the care system. So that leads us into my next question, if that’s all right, Graham.

[17:36] Why do we need a Christian adoption or fostering agency? Why can’t Christians just get stuck into any old adoption agency and go through that route? Christians can, is my straight answer to that question.

[17:50] Christians absolutely can. My wife and I did exactly that five, six years ago something like that so absolutely it can be done. It is being done up and down the country. And as the Chief Executive of a Christian fostering.

[18:06] Adoption service I’d be the first person to encourage

[18:08] people just get cracked on with whatever whichever agency I have. As far as I’m concerned, get in the game, get excited and get participating in this glorious adventure. So that’s the first thing I would say. The second thing is, with every passing day, I think Cornerstone becomes more important in my mind and I think in what’s going on in our country.And there’s two reasons for that: firstly it is a glorious thing as Christians involved in this to be able to support other Christians who are doing it. And so to have – if you’re a Christian getting involved in foster care, for example, what a wonderful thing for your supervising social worker to be a Christian. What a wonderful thing for them to be able to pray with you. What a wonderful thing for your child and your situation to come up in the Cornerstone staff prayer meeting every morning and for us to be engaged in that with you in that way. That’s the first thing I would say. So it’s just, it’s just wonderful, it’s the best way to do it. Secondly, there are those for whom navigating a secular agency in their locality and in their particular scenario is very complex, very challenging, very difficult thing and we exist also to help Christians into foster care and into adoption

[19:36] by providing them with a Christian agency that understands them, that gets them, and that can help them walk through that process. Sure.

[19:46] My experience with people who have adopted, and by the way, you just gave you, you just gave another reason why you’re suitable, suited for the job, um, uh, to do with your own personal experience. But my experience has been of both foster carers and the doctors in our locality who are believers is that it’s a very, very, very challenging process. It’s not even twice as hard as becoming a parent, it’s like 50 times as hard as becoming a parent in terms of any scrutiny that’s on you. I’m not even sure 50 is enough of a number. When you know when I became a parent, you know, my only qualification was was to

[20:34] provide the biological sort of process. Nobody asked me whether I was a suitable person, did they? No one, no one in the local authority, nobody anywhere said, ‘Oh, I wonder if Graham’s suitable to be a parent? You know, what do you think about this? What do you think about this? What do you think about this? Is it a safe environment? What about his wife, Caroline? Is she safe? You know, has, has she been vetted?’ Nobody asked that the baby turned up and and we registered its name. No one asked then, ‘Are you a safe place?’ Now there are safeguards that that are have been in place for the lifetime of my children and, you know, people making sure that they were safe. But yeah, I mean does that seem disproportionate to you sometimes? If you say, no that’s the end, yeah!

[21:26] I have at all times two hats on in a conversation like this. Because I have the privilege of running the staff team at an agency that obviously has to quite rightly submit to national regulation, legislation, and scrutiny with regards to how we go about our business and how our carers and our adopters go about their business.

[21:50] And it’s absolutely good and right that we do that absolutely. There is an absolute necessity in this country. Right now and every other month, there is another story about how we have failed children in our country because we didn’t step in, we didn’t see that situation, we didn’t properly examine or investigate a particular set of circumstances. So we have to run the rule over every prospective carer and adopter. And we have to do so with diligence, with a huge amount of energy because none of us is perfect. This is what I always say. Just because we are Christians, we don’t have the monopoly on good parenting, far from it. We need that guidance, that counsel. We need that scrutiny, that oversight. So I welcome it. I think it’s important. I think it’s important that we don’t shy away from it to a large degree. There are elements of what I would say are agency or local authority or state overreach, which I think is both unnecessary, unhelpful, and in some instances has been proved to be illegal. And I think we just have to acknowledge that and just be honest and open about that. But at the same time, as Christians who are doing this job, we have to

[23:08] remember that we are not on the same page at the same time in so many ways as those who do not know the Lord and are perhaps looking at this from a different standpoint. And we have to absolutely comply with national legislation and understand the context in which we are working, but at the

[23:39] having confidence and trust in our God, who we believe can give us the love, the energy, the care, the compassion to do what needs to be done to safeguard, support, and cause the children in our care to flourish. So yeah, it’s very difficult. The process is very onerous, Graham, having been through it a couple of times, with no denying it. I just think we have to be careful not to resent it for resenting its sake, but at the same time be quite resilient in the midst of it. And there are opportunities also to stay – our distinctive as part of the process, but yes I mean we could go more into where we’re going in relation to the authorities and to where we’re at as Christians because I think it does have a very important intersection with the world of fostering and adoption.

[24:27] So why should Christians consider fostering and have done something of this ilk, have either fostered or then gone on to adopt? And it feels like me, they’re probably overrepresented in the world of fosterers, fosterers, is that a word? And adopters.

[24:49] Why should we consider this? Can I just for clarity did you say just so I understand Christians are overrepresented in the carer community and adopter community or underrepresented? I well, just maybe it’s just the circles – I obviously, you know, associate with a lot of Christians and I probably know more Christians who would adopt or foster than those outside but… I could be wrong and that could just in my own kind of experience swaying that judgment. Okay, fascinating, yeah it’s really helpful, thank you to clarifying that. I mean, firstly, I would just say on that I think that Christians are radically and tragically underrepresented in the national scene when it comes to foster carers and adopters i think that’s.

[25:46] At the same time, local authorities and the wider state mechanisms understand that the church historically has played a huge part, in tending to the needs of the fatherless and of children who need a loving, safe family home. So if those two things aren’t at odds, I think it’s worth pointing those two things out. I think the reason that I say or make the first comment, Lizzie, because I’m not sure that as Christians we have settled in our minds. The question you just asked me, why should we – what is our role – where are we supposed to be? And I’m not entirely sure all of the reasons for that. I can guess at some.

[26:41] But Cornerstone exists to place children from local authorities into Christian homes. That’s what we exist to do. And I think the reason for that is amongst many other things, this is the mainline front and centre heart of God. If you think about scriptures like Psalm 68:5, a father to the fatherless and a defender of widows is God in his holy dwelling place. It’s who he is. Anywhere you see God at work, anywhere you see the Holy Spirit spilled out and in operation, we will see Christians stepping forward to foster and adopt. And if you think about, to give a New Testament, James 1:27 – religion that is pure and undefiled is this to help orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unspotted from the world. We’re being compelled to every book almost of the Bible to get involved in fathering the fatherless. And I always say to people.

[27:43] Every single one of us needs to be involved, either doing it directly or enabling, encouraging and equipping someone else into it because scripture doesn’t give us an out. And I always say in terms of why should Christians do that and why must Christians do this?

[27:58] It’s the heart of God. Every single one of us is adopted if we’re a Christian. And so if we are not, we understand that as a spiritual process, but it is also at the same time, a very physical, practical and tangible process.

[28:11] If we’re not out there doing it, we’re misunderstanding in a sense our own adoption because the Lord compels us to go out and and in a sense show and demonstrate his heart for us with our hands and our hearts out there. I think in one sense it’s a simple case of obedience, Lizzie, God calls us to do it, okay, we need to do it and I know there’s there’s all these bigger things we need to unpack but sometimes I think I and maybe others complicate it and it’s just quite refreshing sometimes think of it in terms of obedience. I think the only maybe two other things I’ll say one is compassion there is something about you know I had a referral come across my desk last week, Lizzie, of a teenage girl who was placed into foster care with her sister both of them had obviously gone through

[29:00] significant trauma and abuse. Her sister committed suicide in that placement in the bedroom that they shared and the local authority came to us seeking a place for that younger teenage sister and they couldn’t find anywhere and sometimes I work in this, Lizzie, sometimes you just still have to stop. My social workers sometimes will talk to me about this stopping and I’ll have 10 minutes and they’ll be like, wow, and sometimes there’s no logical reason that I can say I’ll talk to you about in a podcast – it’s sometimes just this immediate and passion that can tell you to run in, you know, and I think that’s worth talking about. It’s

[29:42] just such a joyous thing as well to be involved in. I think if you’re not involved in it you’re missing out and there’s many other things I could say but I won’t go on. Yeah, no, it’s brilliant, I wonder about the motivation I totally agree with you about adoption being biblical. It’s fundamental to our identity as Christians that we’ve been adopted into God’s family and also that general principle of care in a Christian community for those who are fatherless and widows and so on. So I totally agree with that.

[30:13] I’m not sure, I mean, I didn’t adopt, so I can’t attribute motives to others. I’m not sure about the motivation for people going forward for adoption. Maybe it should be more compassion, care and thinking this is a God thing to do.

[30:30] Maybe in practice, it’s a bit more, I want a family and I haven’t got a family. It’s not wrong to think that, but maybe that’s the hesitancy. I think there’s maybe a bit of that that we need to really reflect on and pray about. Maybe there’s also a bit of Christians are now afraid to go forward for adoption because they just think, oh, my face is going to be scrutinised. They’re going to think I’m a weirdo and they’re going to say no. I think that’s also playing as well.

[30:58] Do you want to speak into that rather complicated question? Yeah well I think there’s probably two factors there if I speak into the first I think there’s always going to be a mix of different factors for each of us. We’re all unique. I think it’s glorious absolutely glorious that somebody would reach the point where they – perhaps through infertility or different battles in terms of their own having children – they are a place where they want to step into adopting. As part of that, I think it’s wonderful, you know, we all take a different journey. My journey came by degrees and through various kind of twists and turns I often get pulled up by by friends who say, ‘Josh, you’re a real zealot for this sort of fostering adoption cause.’ And yet it wasn’t always the case. So I have to be careful. You know, for me, the Lord took me on a journey and it wasn’t always, you know, I didn’t come out of the womb thinking it was an amazing thing and determined to adopt from from day one. So I think, however we arrive there, I have such high regard for those that do arrive there. I think the second thing that I would say in response to your second part of your question is that’s why Cornerstone exists.

[32:12] For those that are out faced by a long, often drawn-out assessment process, I would say that’s why Cornerstone exists. We don’t shortcut the process – the process in many respects is almost exactly the same – but we are able to understand you and your concerns and you are able to be honest with us about where you are coming from and we can’t guarantee that you will be appropriate and the right people. And that’s why I always say it’s not for everyone to do directs and dependent on their life circumstances. But absolutely let’s get into the conversation. There’s nothing at all that should stop any prospective carer or adopter getting into that conversation from the outset and seeing where it goes because, yeah. I’m sorry, Lizzie, we were sort of taking turns to avoid the delay problem, so I will take turns after this but I have a little supplementary, which is, what do you think about single-parent adoptions by Christians?

[33:13] I think there’s wonderful, wonderful single adopters and wonderful, wonderful single carers that Cornerstone has helped, that Cornerstone has improved, that are well known to the Cornerstone family and that are part of the Cornerstone family. And I think it is a wonderful thing, if not a more inspirational thing, actually, when those who are single step forward into the breach and offer a child a loving home. I think it’s absolutely glorious. Thank you. And I was just going to it wasn’t really a question but more an observation that – so Graham, you touched on the idea of motivation and I think that we’re all going to have motivations no matter what choices we make in life. I mean the choice, you know, my husband and I made to become natural biological parents wasn’t necessarily always you know pure. There was a real instinct there. It was something that you know – perhaps there was a selfish element too. So I think, you know, just because it’s going outside and perhaps you know going through an agency or whatever doesn’t necessarily mean that that’s wrong. And if, say, I have on the other hand is that one of my closest friends she has three biological children and she went into this I think in only the way that a Christian could, with the real intention to

[34:40] basically do what you said, Josh, to show love and compassion to

[34:47] an orphan who she knew would probably be quite hard work, this varying and significant needs. And she said parenting him is hard but she went through it with her eyes open and she’s very thankful that she and her husband were able to give him a loving home being brought up in the knowledge of Jesus. And I just find that truly inspirational that she’s been a real challenge to me so I feel challenged that I need to think about how we can support more Christians to adopt or to foster and yeah that was just my tip answer. Yeah, if I could just come back on that just briefly and say that that is a great point and I think it connects with what Graham said about motivation. Some of the most inspirational carers and adopters that I’ve had the privilege of spending time with are those who come into the conversation broken, exhausted.

[35:49] Totally out of their depth, perhaps in a place where this hasn’t turned out the way they thought it might or gone the way they thought it might go.

[35:58] But they are steadfast in their resolve because they know that they are obeying a call from the Lord and that the results are over to him.

[36:09] But in their obedience, the Lord is glorified and that their sole intent was to glorify the name of the Lord. And their secondary intent was to bring or introduce, a child who came into their home and into their family, whether it be for a very short time or whether, through adoption, a permanent situation. They were able to introduce that child to their father in heaven and that’s what we are doing here. We are not adding quivers to – or arrows into our quiver, should I say – we are seeking to open our hands wide and to introduce children, not to us and to our protection and to our benefits but to his, the Lord’s. And yeah, just incredible stories I could tell you – so many of people who are doing just that at very substantial cost themselves. And I think they are absolutely tremendous. What would you want to say to people who might be listening – some of them are pastors, some of them might be prospective parents who are thinking about adoption, maybe quite a lot, who either have children or what kind of different messages would you think would be great to get out there to Christians?

[37:29] To pastors, I would say preach about fostering and adoption. When was the last time you heard a sermon on it? Okay, I’m a pastor and a preacher, so that’s done me in. I can’t remember. It’s the forgotten doctrine of the church. I think closely perhaps aligned to almost equal, well, I’m not going to debate the exact levels, but in terms of like pro-life and abortion matters, but maybe just pro-life at both ends of the age scale. When was the last time you heard a sermon on that? I would imagine you probably heard a sermon on pro-life issues at the older end of the age spectrum perhaps more readily than you have done the younger age. Fostering, adoption – when you think about those Scriptures that I talked about, you know, Scripture is, absolutely replete with this. You can take it all the way, you can think about Abram and Lot, you can think about Moses, you can think about Job who said in chapter 29 ‘I was a defender of the fatherless’. This is what I did in the city square or the town square or whatever he said. You think about Samuel and Eli. If you think about Esther, you know, I could go on. Forgotten doctrine. I don’t understand why it’s not preached at all. So that’s the first thing I would say to pastors.

[38:42] Second of all, to prospective carers and parents who are perhaps thinking, right, okay, yeah, this maybe one day or, yeah, I kind of know about it. And it’s kind of over here. Do you know what I mean? it’s kind of out there in the somewhere in the back. That’s where it was for me at one time and the Lord used my circumstances to bring me to a place where he was like, ‘Yes, I know you want to do it at some point but I want you to do it now. If my voice or if this podcast could be that nudge then brilliant – praise God. To those who are doing it, great, for those who are engaged in it, I suppose we’ve already said quite a bit about what we’re going into it for and what we’re looking for in the longer term. I would say – keep going.

[39:27] And may hope rise. You know that verse, Psalm – can’t remember, I want to say 49, I think, maybe – why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God. Just put your hope in him. This is a long-term game. You are doing an incredible thing in terms of caring for that child and also giving them the truth of God’s word. Be encouraged – that’s a phenomenal thing. I heard an amazing story from a lady last year. I think it was her and her husband over the course of their lives adopted I think it was seven children they went through incredibly tough times. They adopted a girl who went on to become quite notorious in the drug scene in the town next to where they lived and she died young but she wrote them a letter from a hospital bed to say that she’d never forgotten the Jesus that they introduced her to and she gave her life to Jesus before she died. I just want to you know, stories like that, be encouraged, keep going. This is difficult, but it’s worth it. Yeah, that, that’s probably the things I would say really. And I suppose the other thing to those who aren’t in the game, Graham, but for those around, you know, I think Lizzie, you touched on this.

[40:39] I want to see pastors calling prayer meetings to pray for those who are foster carers and adopters in their flock. I want to see churches working overtime to create a fostering and adoption church culture.

[40:57] I want to see those around carers and adopters in the church working overtime to understand the needs of the carers and adopters in their midst, but more than that, the children that those carers and adopters are looking after. And I’m talking things like, what does that plate of biscuits at the end of the service mean for a fostered child? What does all the hugging and the high-fiving uh mean for an adopted child? What does all the touching mean? What’s all that about the loud noises? You know, all these kinds of things, like really understanding. And this is obviously spills out beyond fostering adoption to those children who are perhaps neurodivergent or got, you know, distinct needs of whatever type of whatever background. So that’s what I would say and I said – the last thing I would say is get radical. Get radical. The numbers that we talked about at the top of this conversation demands that we get radical. And, for me, the Acts church – think about the Acts church. They were absolutely committed to teaching the Word and people’s spiritual formation and growth but at the same time the practical needs of the community around them. And how did that happen and how did that work? Anyone who had a field sold it and came and gave the proceeds and put them at the feet of the apostles. Now, I think there’s Christians with big houses and spare bedrooms, and I think there’s people with hearts and hands to foster and adopt, but don’t have the spare bedroom. For me, it just looks like house swap. I just didn’t need to get radical and get on with it.

[42:19] Hey, how’s swap coming to you? Then I think it’s a really good set of challenges. Really helpful. Where can we find out more about Cornerstone for anyone who’s listening – the website address or any social media or anything else you want to point to? Yeah thanks Graham. Cornerstoneuk.org. We are active under a trading name if you like or a brand identity in Scotland called Foundations Matter, so foundationsmatter.org if you are in Scotland.

[42:59] Yeah, social media, so look us up Facebook and on Instagram as Cornerstone Fostering. And yeah, obviously this podcast, many other things, Keswick Convention – if you’re around at Keswick and other events. If we can come and speak at your church – if we can support your church in becoming a supportive community to carers and adopters, we’d love to come and do that, so please get in touch. Our casual kind of email address – if you don’t want to use a contact phone on our website – is info at cornerstoneuk.org, it’s brilliant. It’s been really helpful talking to you. I hope lots of people listen to it. I’ve already got some people in mind that I’m going to send it to when we produce it. Sort of extra and above over the people that might normally listen. So it’s been really helpful.

[43:44] So thank you very much for your time. Yeah, thank you so much, Josh. Thank you for having me. I really, really appreciate the partnership with you guys and thank you for giving us an opportunity to speak. Thank you.