Brothers....
Thulani would pray urgently (when he was 4) for a brother. Then, in the wake (actually two days later) of a particularly strong time of prayer with the people of Open Hand, where I had disclosed my desire to adopt again, the local state hospital contacted me through an intricate set of relationships and circumstances, and a friend who helps with adoption.
I returned the call and was asked, “Are you the guy who writes for The Star and who often writes about his son?”
Of course I agreed that it was indeed I who wrote for The Indianapolis Star and I was then informed that a ‘male baby’ had been born a few days earlier and the mother had left the ward and abandoned the baby. I was told that if I filed the right papers at the court the baby would be mine. I was informed that I could know nothing about the baby unless I said yes and in that case I could know everything.
As you can imagine I had a deep night of the soul and felt the Lord say to me, “It is not about the baby. It is about you. There is no right or wrong answer. It is simply ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ I am with you and the baby either way. Do you want to be this baby’s dad or not?” (Even as I write these simple words to you I am all choked up).
I woke the next as his dad (internally) and put into motion the legal requirements. Court papers in hand I went alone to the hospital to meet him. I was ushered into the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and led past dozens of cribs (almost all wired to monitors of all sorts with the smallest babies I have ever seen. We (the nurse leading me) stopped at a crib with the most beautiful boy with finest and most sensitive features. The nurse asked me what his name would be and I said NATHANAEL spelling it out. I wanted an abandoned boy to have a name that meant “no guile” and in seconds she wrote the name on an index card and placed it above his crib.
At 10 days (which was two days later) I took him home. Thulani did a cart wheel when I told him (which I did not do immediately on getting the call).
There is one piece of the story I have not told you (in fact there are many). Days before the mentioned prayer meeting Thulani and I were in South Africa for a series of public seminars which grew out of my column that runs (and still runs daily) in their paper (The Mercury). One night Thulani was particularly awake after having had a long afternoon nap. As a result of this I took him down to the harbor to see the ships and the yachts. While looking at the yachts, we were approached by a street kid of about 4 years old. The child was about the same age as Thulani but much smaller in stature. This little boy worked his way into Thulani’s heart and in no time at all they were running and cavorting all over the place together as small children can do. I took pictures of the children and then, given an hour or so, we had to leave. Thulani was infuriated that this child could not just come with us and be his brother. It made no sense to him that a child who had no home and who lived on the streets could not simply come back to our house in the USA. I will say it broke my heart to leave him.
When people see those pictures EVERYONE thinks the child is Nathanael. The picture is up in our home and even Nathanael thinks it is he and Thulani in the picture. But Thulani went home that night from the Durban Yacht Basin and said, “That’s the kind of brother I want.”
