The Algea Family is Adopting!

Crissy and Roy

Signal Mountain, TN

We have BIG news and we’re excited to share it with the people who mean the most! 

When Roy and I got married, we shared our hearts desires. We both dreamt of being parents and having a home full of love and laughter. We have always wanted a big family and have struggled with infertility since the beginning. After being told that we may never have biological children, we began to explore and welcome all options with open arms and hearts. 

Many people don't know this about us... we have needed the help of fertility medicines with all 3 of our children.  Having 3 children so close together often leaves the public with questions and concerns. We get the question “Were any of them a surprise?" Regularly. We just smile at each other and said "No....not exactly!" 

On the contrary, each one was planned, prayed for, and placed so perfectly in our hearts. Each child has been celebrated with all of the Glory going to God for trusting us to be parents again.

After our third, we both knew our family wasn’t complete 

In an attempt to grow our family by one more, we discovered that my previous drug protocol was no longer working for an unknown reason. We spent excess money and time trying to get pregnant until this past October when we were overjoyed to finally get a positive pregnancy test. Unfortunately, that pregnancy resulted in a devastating miscarriage one week later. 

Through our grief, support we received from our church family, and prayer, we realized that God had another plan for us and it was part of our story all along. He revealed to us that we are being called to give another child a home full of love through adoption. 

Soon our family will be complete as we adopt a sweet baby and become a family of six.

Our hearts have the grown 10 sizes for the orphans of the world and all fears and uncertainty that we once had has totally melted away. We are excited about the possibility of parenting a child who is not of our lineage and feel that God has grown and changed our hearts for this calling!

 We have the peace and assurance that we have been praying for; one that can only He can give.

We have three beautiful, biological children, and we will no doubt make some financial sacrifices to raise one more, so then why are we adopting? We could go on forever, but we’ll just list a few points: 

1. There is a need. 

There is an immense global need to care for orphaned children. It's estimated that there are 153 million orphans worldwide. Many of these are in the United States, right in our backyard. Many mothers who are in a crisis pregnancy choose to give their unborn child LIFE simply because they have looked at pictures of potential adoptive families, like US! It gives them hope that they can bring the child into the world. Birth mothers often turn down abortion and choose to have the baby when there's the hope of a waiting family. Yes, it's only one child we could help, but what difference will this make for this ONE child? 

 

We feel specifically called toward infant, domestic adoption, so we are taking active steps to adopt a newborn within the United States. 

 

2. We are generally called to respond to the need. 

We have a calling to care for the "least of these" and an obligation to care for the orphans of the world (James 1:27). There are many ways to help the orphan, but adoption is the specific calling that has been placed in our hearts. A home is a basic human need that we can help meet and we have so much love to give. 

 
3. God has worked on our hearts over a number of years to respond to the need in a specific way. 

"The need is not the call but the occasion for the call... There are far more needs in the church than any of us has time or energy to meet, and no one is required to try to relieve them all. Nonetheless, God's call to service will be a call to meet some human need or other." -- J.I. Packer paraphrasing Oswald Chambers 

At some level, we all have a heart for children in need. We have gone on mission trips separately (before we started dating) and together (after we got married) to help serve orphans in tangible ways. Over the past few years, God has brought adoptive families into our lives in amazing ways and we have been able to truly hear their stories and fall in love with the process. 

4. God has generally provided us the ability to meet the need. 

We believe God equips us daily with grace and wisdom to be good parents. We also have a child-friendly immediate and extended family that embrace and value children. God never calls one of His children to do something without daily provision for that task and He sees it through (Phillippians 1:6). 

 

Will it be a sacrifice? Yes, definitely financially, and most likely emotionally and physically. 

 

Will it be worth it? Yes! We believe obedience to God is always worth it.  We also believe sharing our love with another baby is worth every single ounce of struggle.

5. We choose to love BIG because He first loved us. 

We love because He first loved us. (I John 4:10-11, 19) We have a heart for the orphan because God sought us out as spiritual orphans and welcomed us into his forever family. (Gal. 4:4-7) Out of gratitude for what He has done for us, and to be a tangible example of His love, we want to share His love with a child in need. 

 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

As part of our adoption process, we have started a crowdfunding campaign. It may surprise you to hear that adoption related costs can easily total up to $35,000 or more. This is why we have set this as our goal. 

We want to adopt because it is Biblical to take in a child who is outside our lineage. It is just one, big way we can live out the Great Commission in our own home and display the gospel. We all so excited to meet this baby we feel God had planned for us to parent long before the foundation of the Earth! God has placed this desire for another baby on the hearts of our 3 boys (ages 6, 4, and 3) and we all ache together for this child. We all have SO MUCH more love to give and we are excited to see what God will do. 

 

We are beyond excited and are doing everything we can to be prepared to welcome a beautiful new life into our home and our hope is that by inviting you into this process you, too, will love this child with your whole heart and invite them into our community with open arms. 

So excited to share,

Roy, Crissy, Cliff, Luke, and Leo