Kirby Williamson

My dad was adopted at birth and never had any desire to learn about his biological family. Two years ago, he took a DNA test to determine his health risks as he ages. When the results came back, they linked him to biological relatives. Through a few messages to a cousin through the DNA website, we learned that dad’s biological mother, brother, and three sisters had been looking for him for over 30 years! Within 24 hours, we started communicating with all of these “new” relatives and my family tripled in size.

The last two years have been spent catching up for lost time between my family and new aunts, uncles, cousins and grandmother. We’ve been to Florida multiple times to visit everybody, and many of the new relatives have come to see us in Texas. This whole process of learning about and getting to know my new family has felt so surreal. At times I’ve even felt “why us?” This experience has allowed me to experience and understand first-hand that God gives GOOD gifts. We did nothing to deserve or earn Him reuniting us with these people that have truly become family to us.

This has been such a sweet reminder to me of the truth of the gospel: it’s nothing we did to earn His love, it’s solely because He is gracious and merciful that He chose to die on a cross for our salvation. Before knowing anything about my dad’s biological family, I never considered what it would be like to know who they are, much less, have a relationship with them. Now that we’ve had two years to get to know them, I can’t imagine not being a part of each other’s lives. I have not only loved getting to experience this first-hand, but I've also loved seeing the ripple effect it has had on people around us.

I’ve seen a glimpse of our Father’s heart for restoration-we didn’t even realize that there was something missing until we found the other half (or two-thirds, it seems!) of our family. To see how perfectly it was brought together and how joyous it was and is, makes me SO excited for what heaven is going to be like.

Matthew 7:11 – If you then, being evil, know how to give good gift to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask Him!