Embracing Faith and Family Through Adoption w/ Spencer & Ashton Draper

Aaron Smith (00:00)
Spencer Ash and welcome to the Marriage After God podcast.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (00:02)
Yeah, thanks for having us. Thank you.

Aaron Smith (00:05)
Um, when I got your email a while ago and I always try and vet who’s, you know, there’s, get a lot of people requesting and I’m like, okay, who’s this person? I’ve never heard of you before. I started looking at your story. I started looking at your book you wrote and I just fell in love with adoption. So we’re going to talk about adoption because it’s a big part of your faith story and your journey and your marriage. Um, but first and foremost, I just would love for you to, to just share who you are, background, marriage, some of your marriage story, and, uh, just so my audience can meet you guys for the first time.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (00:36)
Yeah. So I’m Ashton and this is Spencer and we met when I was 18, maybe 17 was when we first met, but, um, we got married young. We were, I was almost 21. So I’ll just say I have 21 when we got married and you were 22. Yeah. We got married. um, Oh yeah. It was definitely something most people thought was too young.

Aaron Smith (01:01)
That’s exactly when we got married. 21 and 22. Yeah, Jennifer, my wife. Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (01:06)
especially today, but we did, and here we are. So when we’ve been married for September will be 12 years. We’ve got four kiddos, three biological kids, and then one adopted.

Aaron Smith (01:14)
That’s awesome.

Awesome. Spencer, how’d you guys meet?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (01:22)
We met through a mutual friend at a youth conference in Cedarville, Ohio. So, a no- yeah.

Aaron Smith (01:30)
Awesome. Yeah.

So my wife and I, met, not that it wasn’t a youth group, but it was kind of a youth group that turned into a church. And so we were going at the same time. had same friend groups, but we had a similar story. I was 22 and she turned 21 just before our wedding. So I was like, because her birthday is December 31st, we got married on January 6th. So she had just turned 21. was the exact same story.

So were you both raised in Christian homes or do you have, I always like to ask background questions on some of this stuff because it helps get a clear understanding of like your guys’ story and how it evolved.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (02:11)
That’s fair. I was, yeah, I was basically born into the church and raised going to church and Sunday school. They even had that at the time and Wednesday night service. Yeah. So I’ve been in the church, went to a private Christian school, uh, throughout elementary school, middle school. So yeah, I’ve been heavily involved in, um, the church scene for a while. Yeah. And I’m similar. So I grew up in the church.

Same story, we would have Wednesday night services, Friday night Bible study, Sunday school, church service. So yeah, definitely a heavy influence in our home.

Aaron Smith (02:50)
Awesome. I understand that. So from reading some of your book and Ashton, you’ve always desired, you’ve had a desire from a very young age for adoption, which is pretty much what your book is about. I know it’s a lot about your marriage and all that, but where did that start and how early were you having this vision for adoption one day?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (03:13)
Yeah, I don’t know exactly. It’s hard to pinpoint because I just feel like it’s always been there. But I do remember I was very young and a couple at our church brought home a little girl. She was not very old from Haiti. And so I just think that maybe that’s kind of where that seed was planted because it probably would have been my first exposure. It would have definitely been my first exposure to international adoption in this interracial, you know, mixing of family.

So I think that’s probably kind of where it started and then just kind of grew from there.

Aaron Smith (03:45)
So you saw it yourself, someone else was going on that journey and it kind of planted a seed in your heart early on. What about it? I don’t want say it was attractive, but drew you to it.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (03:51)
Yeah.

I don’t really know. And I think that’s the thing where it’s just like the Lord, like that’s just where the Lord has called kind of my passion. And I think, and I think I even talked about it my book a little bit. I think I had a romanticized view of what adoption really looks like, right? Like it just, it looks beautiful. Like it’s just a, it is a picture of the gospel. And so I don’t know if maybe that’s kind of what drew me in as well. But I would just say it’s just something that outside of like the Lord just putting that call in my heart, I don’t really know.

Aaron Smith (04:15)
Yes.

Yeah, I feel like ⁓ when like what you’re talking about just it being a picture of the gospel, I feel like there’s certain archetypal things in just in general that God created that when we see them take place, we may not be able to put our finger on it. But it’s like there’s something beautiful about that. Seeing a child being adopted like, wait, that child was had no family. Now it has a family and we it’s beautiful when you see, you know, reconciliation and marriage like, that’s beautiful when you see.

someone being saved, or they’re in danger and someone saves them. The hero story, we have all these ⁓ movies that highlight these beautiful things with human nature. And so I think like what you’re talking about, it’s hard to pinpoint, but there’s miraculous. There’s something just deep down beautiful about it that we see. And I think adoption is amazing. We have friends that we support. They’ve adopted seven.

children from China, all with special needs. We’ve been supporting them for years. when I see their story, like it’s not an easy story. not a, it’s been a messy story. It’s been a hard story. But when I look at that, I think, I think that’s the most beautiful, powerful thing I’ve ever seen. So when thinking about someone in ministry, I’m like, they are in one of the best ministries they saved, not just saved, but they, brought all these children in and given them a family and they’re part of their family now. And I just love that Spencer, where you

Was this something in your heart? Adoption? Like, did you see that when you were younger?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (06:03)
Not to that

same extent. ⁓ Fortunately, this was a conversation pre marriage and engagement and stuff. So I did know what I was signing up for at some point in time. ⁓ I do I do like kids. I’ve been involved in kid ministries and stuff, all grown up and in college and stuff. So I knew I liked kids. It wasn’t like a crazy ask, but ⁓

Aaron Smith (06:23)
you

Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (06:29)
Yeah, once we started having our own kids, made it even more like, it’s just a matter of when we pulled the trigger on going through with the adoption thing. yeah.

Aaron Smith (06:42)
I think

that’s wonderful that you guys talked about that pre-marriage. Was this while you were dating or were you like just before dating? ⁓

Spencer And Ashton Draper (06:47)
Yeah, it would have been, it would have been closer.

We were serious, but I don’t know if it was pre engagement or post engagement or whatever, but yeah, it was definitely pre marriage where she’s like, just so you know, this will happen.

Aaron Smith (07:03)
I love that. How’d that conversation go? You guys talking about children and what family looks like.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (07:09)
I we always knew we wanted kids. So it wasn’t, it wasn’t a hard conversation. ⁓ no matter how many we wanted, you know, not really sure. So I just think the adoptions, he was just like, okay, you know, and then we’ll cross that bridge and we get there sort of thing. And cause you know, that wasn’t the, knows how long in the future. And for me too, like I, even though it wasn’t something that like was super placed on my heart.

I too, kind of like you’re saying, I knew the archetypes of like, God loves to rescue the lost or the vulnerable and different things like that. So I’m like, this is a, it is a beautiful picture of the gospel. And yeah, to not be a part of that would be a shame. So yeah.

Aaron Smith (07:43)
Mm-hmm.

And

that’s beautiful. So Ashton, are a, I don’t know how to say it, professional sign linguist. What do you call that?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (08:05)
I

am a sign language interpreter, so yes, yes.

Aaron Smith (08:08)
Okay.

And then Spencer, what do do?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (08:13)
I’m a planer at a factory in a little town down the road. So ⁓ we manufacture brass fluid connectors.

Aaron Smith (08:24)
interesting. Okay. So let’s, I’d love to know about this journey. So you guys get married. It’s been 12 years almost now. ⁓ but in the first handful of years, you guys, did you have your, you have three, ⁓ biological children?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (08:41)
We have three biological yes.

Aaron Smith (08:43)
How is that age range and gender?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (08:46)
Yeah, so our oldest is eight and then it’s a girl and then our second is also a girl and she is seven. And then we actually went out of birth order a little bit because our adopted son is six and then our biological son is five.

Aaron Smith (09:05)
So you adopted after the second, your second child is.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (09:09)
No, we did

have all three kids before we then adopted. Yep. We started the process before I was ever pregnant with our third, though. It just took so long that he had been born and several years old before we had the adoption finalized.

Aaron Smith (09:12)
gotcha, okay.

Yeah.

Awesome. What kind of things have you learned from having your biological children? Because you had all three and then your adopted son. What have you been learning along that path of God’s ministry for you guys in your parenting and adoption?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (09:46)
That’s a really good question. No, has asked that one yet. I can go first. ⁓ Definitely. I like to try to learn. So anything that I say right now is not actually my own. It’s me stealing other people’s thoughts or whatever. So, no, like I think it’s Paul Tripp who has a book called Parenting and it just really hammers home the idea that like as much as

Aaron Smith (09:49)
Ha

Do it.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (10:14)
I the parent may get my patients frustrated by my kids or their disobedience. That is almost, if not worse, the same reflection of like, hey, I’m the kid and God’s the father and my disobedience and like, like how much patience God takes dealing with me.

It’s a good, it’s a very humbling reminder that like, shoot, like I need to treat my kids with love and patience and kindness. Even when I feel like everything about it says like you, feelings, like you just want to blow up or whatever. ⁓ so yeah, it’s a, it’s a very humbling perspective shift, that does, in my opinion, doesn’t come from anything outside of having a biblical worldview. So,

Aaron Smith (10:59)
and

Spencer And Ashton Draper (11:10)
Yeah, I think that’s very helpful in my growth as a parent is, ⁓ you know, I can still discipline and I can still set the expectation, that the kid goes against it or whatever. Like I can still discipline and love and it doesn’t have to be an angry blow up or anything like that. So, yeah, there’s a lot to unpack there, but yeah, that’s just a little snippet of what I got to share.

Aaron Smith (11:39)
Ashton,

how about you?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (11:40)
Yeah, I think as it relates to the difference between like biological and adoption, I don’t think anyone can really prepare you for that difference because it’s something that people even are like, just so you know, education classes, you learn like adoptive children may have issues with sleep. And we found that to be very true at first. And yet I still like, we look back and we’re like, man, we could have handled that better because

you naturally want to just treat them like you’re your child, right? But then you’re like, man, they’re we’re pulling them from everything that they know. And so it’s just trying to rethink, OK, where are they coming from? You know, or like, what is their what is their possible perspective? What could be causing them to feel this way about this situation? So it’s just kind of work working different angles. ⁓ But with that being said, to our adoption has

Aaron Smith (12:18)
Mm-hmm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (12:39)
been so beautifully blessed. Just having him here and integrating into our family has just been beyond what we could ever have asked for. He has done amazing.

Aaron Smith (12:52)
Did I ask your son’s name if you want to share it? You don’t have to if you don’t want to. Bismarck. So how old was Bismarck when he was adopted?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (12:54)
Yeah, yep, his name is Bismarck.

He was, well, by the time he was legally adopted, he was five. So we met him a couple of weeks before he turned five. He was in our care at the age of four.

Aaron Smith (13:11)
Okay.

Okay, so you guys were starting and then by the time he was officially adopted, was five. Yeah, and by five years old, they’ve already established almost a worldview. They have their life established. They have expectations and understandings and that’s a big deal. That transition, was it a hard transition, him coming to live with you and not being in Ghana and now being in United States? I don’t know where you guys live, but…

What do you guys love by the way? Indiana. Okay, cool. I love Indiana. ⁓ Yeah. So going Indiana is much different from Ghana. So how was that? How was that transition for Little Bismarck?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (13:44)
We’re in Indiana.

Very.

Yeah, sure. And for the most part, it’s been about as ideal of a scenario as any adopted parent. And I’m probably doing a jinx right now and I need to knock on wood or something. like, for us, the process of adoption, the process of adoption was the pain was very much the struggle. But as far as

Aaron Smith (14:12)
Yeah, until tomorrow.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (14:26)
him himself, like he was not struggling with a lot of the attachment things that you hear the horror stories about or you actually you almost expect like you go into it prepared for the eating protectiveness, different things like that. Like he meshed with our kids.

Aaron Smith (14:38)
the

Spencer And Ashton Draper (14:51)
⁓ super well. I think that that may have had a part to play was we had kids literally, ⁓ age wise all around him. our biological son being basically the same age almost as him. And so all that, yeah, really translated really well into our family and transitioning back to the States after living in Ghana for six months, ⁓ with Ashton.

Aaron Smith (15:00)
Mm-hmm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (15:21)
that still went as smooth as anyone could ask for, sleeping in his own bed from the second night on every night, like no night terrors, like I mean, I’m telling you, it’s a huge blessing.

Aaron Smith (15:35)
How much do you think that was contributed by your prayer?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (15:40)
A huge part of it. Yeah. And it helps too, that he had six months with me, more, I mean, all of us were there in Ghana, but I was there for six months and he had six months to build some of that bond before just coming to the States. Yeah. There’s an element of like, you, you wish that the, adoption was like quick and you didn’t have to live out of country for so long and you could just get them back home. But.

Aaron Smith (15:59)
Would you?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (16:09)
The ramifications of that could be a lot of the things that could cause like struggling with the attachment and all the trauma all at once and stuff. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (16:17)
Yeah. you

know, quote unquote, blessing in disguise, like being four, six months allowed him six months of transition to probably the most, the hardest part would be becoming part of your family, right? That transition of trusting you and seeing you as his ⁓ while in the comfort of his home country. So there’s some huge blessing there. I do got to ask, fears that I’ve had,

Spencer And Ashton Draper (16:23)
Yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

Aaron Smith (16:45)
⁓ You know my wife and I have discussed adoption here and there we’ve had almost opportunities in the past to do ⁓ to adopt not that we’re strongly looking to but there’s been opportunities of babies that have come up like hey there’s this mother and this situation and Didn’t happen and that’s okay, but we have six of our own ⁓ Considerations that we’ve had is is always age of the child being adopted

and how that’s going to affect the current family unit and how we are. How did you walk with your children? Because your oldest is eight. I’m sure the younger ones, probably was a little bit, you know, what’s going on, but they’re they’re learning it all as it happens. But your eight-year-old, like I have an eight-year-old and they’re fully aware. They have their, and they’re also the first born and they have this like attachment of like,

You know, they were with you first. so how did you walk with your children through this process from start to finish? Not finished yet, but start to now you have Bismarck in your home, walking them through spiritually and emotionally and mentally to prepare them for bringing in Bismarck into your home.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (18:05)
Yeah, well, I think it helps that in a sense she kind of walked through it as it came as well because she would have only been three, I think, when we started the process. So we were, she was really there for the whole thing. You know, she was older when we finally got him in our care, but I do think she was just involved in the fundraisers and you know, so was just always a conversation within the family about what was going on.

Aaron Smith (18:21)
So she’s there for the whole thing, yeah.

Okay, so you feel like they were there for the process the whole time and growing up with the process essentially, so it wasn’t that shocking of a scenario.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (18:43)
Yeah. And she’s also like,

she has like this really big heart. So I think that she really just embraced, like we took them to the orphanage with us, the older two, and they just ate that up. They just loved that. They love getting to see the babies and play with the toddlers. And so I think it just, a little bit of her heart ⁓ might even.

go in that direction in the future just because she just has such a caring, heart for others.

Aaron Smith (19:14)
Spencer, you seen a, like you’re talking about the heart of your children, have you seen a big shift in your kids and in how they view the world and people because of your guys’s journey of adoption?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (19:26)
That’s a good question. ⁓ I think that they, I like to think, I like to think that they ⁓ have better awareness of like the outcast, so to speak, of like when you’re in a, it’s easy to be in a group with all your friends and it turn into a clique of sorts or whatever, but to be on the lookout for those who maybe.

aren’t fitting into a certain group of individuals and going out your way to, to, ⁓ include them or at least engage with them at some level. know, I know our, oldest to definitely, definitely try to shoot for that. ⁓ the boys, I don’t know, they’re not there yet. They’re five and six. They’re too busy wrestling right now. They’ll get there though. Hopefully. I think to speak to that, ⁓ a little bit, my.

our seven year old just I think yesterday the day before she said mom when you helped that guy did you pull over the side of the road and so she was referring to a time when we were in Ghana there was the same guy on the street corner that we passed he didn’t have legs and we passed him every day every day and so we ended up we took the kids to the store with us we bought some some things for him and we ended up just meeting him and praying for him and giving him

some of the items that he might need. And she was referring to that moment. I think she was trying to figure out just a little bit like, what was that? Like, what was that about? And so I’ll be curious as they get older and they start to express some of these things and maybe ask more questions to see what kind of role it has played in their life.

Aaron Smith (21:12)
That’s awesome. Yeah, I would imagine it’s going to have a huge impact on their life just the way you guys have loved another child as your own and brought him in and incorporated into the home. Has there been any friction with the children with the bringing them in? like you said, they were kind of growing up in this whole thing, but…

I would imagine it’s still a huge transition. there been friction and how have you guys dealt with that?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (21:44)
Outside of like, I think your typical sibling squabbles, I wouldn’t say that there’s been any friction that’s been as a result of this that I think wouldn’t have been there with any sibling.

Aaron Smith (21:48)
Yeah.

That’s awesome. It sounds like you guys have a really good just situation. And like you said, ideal of bringing a

Spencer And Ashton Draper (22:07)
Yeah, yeah,

and maybe it’ll hit, it’s probably gonna hit later or something to make up for it, but who knows.

Aaron Smith (22:12)
Am I not? You never know. Yeah.

I think that’s amazing. so adoption took, so you said he was three. So it’s been, it took like what? Three years. How long did it from the start of your journey to getting Bismarck in your, you know, in your home?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (22:31)
So from the time that we signed with an agency to bringing him home was about five years, almost five years exactly. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (22:40)
Wow.

Why does it take so long?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (22:46)
Well, COVID was a big part of that because that stalled things. Yeah, so that was, we had signed a contract in 2019, COVID hit 2020. And so that put a pause, probably a year and a half pause just because of everybody being inside and to make kids adoptable, social workers have to be going out into the field and doing a lot of work. And that just wasn’t happening at all.

Aaron Smith (22:50)
Okay. You did this right in 2019 ish. Yeah.

Yeah. ⁓

Spencer And Ashton Draper (23:15)
So that was a huge part. But the other part is that Ghana had, they just became PEG accredited. meaning now they have all these laws to follow for the safety of families and children that they never had to follow before. So they were, we were a part of a pilot program. So we really had no idea what we were getting ourselves into when we decided that we would adopt from Ghana. And so I think that was just a lot of growing pains for the agency, for the country and the whole program.

Aaron Smith (23:46)
So, real easy and fast. I mean, so it could have taken without COVID in that year and a you know, two and a half, three years would have been probably the normal length of time.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (23:49)
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

And I think

⁓ kind of back to an earlier point you said, ⁓ we wanted to adopt a kid that was at least younger than our oldest. And so because the process drug out so long, we actually were then able to expand our age range up a couple of years, which then allowed us to get matched faster.

Aaron Smith (24:21)
interesting.

Because you had your specific age range, but then you were able to make that between these ages rather than this specific age. See, it sounds like God’s timing is better than ours, right? So time, money. So how much, if I might ask, did it end up costing? Because this is a big pinch point for people wanting to adopt.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (24:29)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Aaron Smith (24:55)
is the cost. What was the total and can you give me some of the breakdowns? The reason I’m asking is because I’m sure there’s a lot of people that desire this and it’s good to know what it could cost, what it could be and why to have that as part of the prayer process.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (25:13)
Yeah, I think before I even given a number though, like I don’t ever want it to deter someone because you hear the number and instantly I think you’d be like, we don’t have that money, but we don’t have that money and we didn’t have that money. And so I think from start to finish and this includes travel time and country, know, rent, all of that was close to probably $80,000. But there are a lot of grants.

Aaron Smith (25:25)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (25:42)
we got a lot of grants that we applied for. ⁓ So that was a huge blessing. We did two large fundraisers, like actual events, and then some smaller ones in between. so, I mean, the Lord provided every penny. I I homeschool, so I work very part-time, and ⁓ so we didn’t have the money. And so I just wanted to encourage people to, because the Lord will totally provide.

Aaron Smith (26:00)
Yeah.

Yeah, I totally agree with that. There’s been times, so my wife and I did missionary work and we had to raise quite a bit of money for that. There’s been plenty of times in my life that I don’t have what’s necessary and so I’ve got my wife and I’ve got to prayerfully seek that out and God is faithful and he is. So exactly what you’re saying is my question wasn’t to discourage anyone, it’s to give a realistic understanding, but also to

to begin that faith process of like, if that’s something we want to pursue, we’ve got to trust God in the whole process, which is exactly what God wants us to do anyway. You know, the Bible tells us that anything that’s not done in faith is sin. Like we need to be pursuing all of these things in faith in the God who knows the outcomes of these things and knows everything. So I love that. What were some of the ways that you guys fundraised? So not only grants, but you did fundraisers also, right?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (27:04)
We had a long standing one with Gobena Coffee. I don’t know if you’ve heard of Gobena, but they’re an organization that the money goes towards, so anybody can go order coffee and it goes to orphans. So they use money for orphans worldwide, but they actually have accounts that you can set up and anytime people order coffee, you get 50 % of their purchase that goes directly to your adoption account. In that one, and we love…

Aaron Smith (27:26)
that’s really cool.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (27:29)
their coffee. It’s our favorite coffee. very good. You can get like Guatemalan. You can get it from all over.

Aaron Smith (27:34)
Can I, what’s it called again? I’m gonna write it down.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (27:37)
Gobena, G-O-B-E-N-A. ⁓

Aaron Smith (27:44)
I’ll look that up. Cool.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (27:47)
So

we did that, we had that open the whole time. So every time a family needed coffee, they’d just go order the coffee and they would go to our account. We did two events. So one was like we had music, we did like a pancake breakfast, we had silent auction. Just… That fundraiser is a really cool testament to like the church in this community because like a church that we don’t go to, hosted.

Aaron Smith (28:11)
Mm-hmm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (28:15)
and a lot of people like serve the pancake breakfast and do the prep work. And it was like on a church that we have ties to, but we aren’t members of. then like people, friends and family and other people that we just know like we’re donating items towards it. So I mean, it was the adoption process leading up from a fundraiser standpoint was really encouraging from like.

Aaron Smith (28:26)
Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (28:42)
Our town has quite a few churches and a lot of them were involved in some way, or form with just being on board with helping support an adoption.

Aaron Smith (28:54)
And what’s this is always a main theme, especially for believers is coming back to fellowship and community and how the church is to operate. I love that. So ⁓ dollar amount aside, ⁓ because that’s a means to an end. It’s a tool that God gives us money. It’s a tool just like anything ⁓ that were to be stewards over. But I love that the church may not be one that you were a member of, but you are member of the

global church, the universal church, and to know that many people took part in this adoption process that you have your son because of the church, not only the church, but because of Christ’s church, that loved you and him more than their dollars, more than their items that they donated, more than their time that they donated, which is such a beautiful testimony to how the church is too upright.

is that we’re to support each other and bear the burden for each other and ⁓ strengthen that which is weak. ⁓ you know, the things that are strong need to be humbled and the things that are weak need to be raised up. And I just love the picture that the Bible gives us of how the body’s to work. And so, money, dollar amount aside, it’s just awesome that the Church participated in this process with you guys so that…

Spencer And Ashton Draper (30:14)
you

Aaron Smith (30:17)
When you look at your son, you know that he’s here because of what God had done. Not because what you did, but what he’s done. And I just love that. raising money, time, COVID, ⁓ all the quote unquote hard things. ⁓ And on top of that, it wasn’t all easy. Right? You would think that would be enough. It’s like, okay, this is a lot of stuff.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (30:41)
No.

Aaron Smith (30:46)
Tell me, ⁓ Spencer and Ashton, what else was going on in this season that just added to the level of intensity of this process?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (31:00)
Yeah, in 2020 my health started to decline and we were chasing doctor’s appointments and doing the tests and doing the things and it’s been five years and we still don’t an answer. And so my health really took a hit, but at the same time then our marriage took a hit and it was really just a surfacing problem. It was already there, but

when you put in all these external factors to add stressors onto it, it really shows you how strong or not strong your marriage was to begin with. And so our marriage was in a really bad place for a couple of years. I would say probably for a couple of years of that.

Aaron Smith (31:48)
Spencer, I just got to ask, not that it’s I’m not going to blame it you. I’m just asking you to give your perspective why. What was going on? You said that these are things that were underlying, they might have already been there. What was going on that was – what was this issue in the marriage that was going on?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (31:50)
Yeah.

You good?

Yeah, it definitely, a majority of it did, I think, tie back to the health stuff that that spiraled and we weren’t finding answers for. And kind of as time went on, the question in my mind surface, like, do we still go through with adoption? Like we’ve started the process, but we’re not, we’re not paired with anyone. Like we’re like, we, we, we still have an out.

essentially. ⁓ We have three kids and ⁓ that was definitely a tension for me was like

How do you even navigate this? Like anytime we would talk about it, Ashton’s like, no, adoption is still something I want to do, like God will provide. I’m like thinking the like, how do I take care of my family? Like we don’t even know what all is the root cause of this health stuff. And do we add another variable to the equation by continuing with adoption? So those are all the thoughts that

Satan like just keeps hammering away in the back of my mind and it’s not I wouldn’t even say that it’s a bad thing but I think he probably picked up that like ooh this is this is causing a wedge like let me keep this going so the that that was definitely some of the the thoughts and the biggest tension point ⁓ that we were wrestling with

Aaron Smith (33:45)
So the adoption, you’re kind of in the beginning stages of it. There’s lots of question marks there. ⁓ Your health, can you share what was going on health-wise? I mean, you don’t have the answers, but what’s going on?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (34:02)
Yeah, I just kind of, you know, I had some hemorrhaging after I had my, last biological child. And so we thought, you know, had had several surgeries after that. And then, you know, I had COVID as did, you know, many people, and then I had kidney stones and I had two surgeries for that. So it was like all these things that seemed very acute in nature. But then as those things resolved, like,

Aaron Smith (34:18)
Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (34:28)
I was just dealing with a lot of symptoms that like started out with a lot of nausea and I was losing a lot of weight and I was really unhealthy. I couldn’t eat. And so then I had another surgery and my symptoms kind of have morphed and changed. so it’s some days it’s dizziness. I have a lot of fatigue. I still get abdominal pain and nausea. I mean a whole, mean, I could probably list like 40, 50 symptoms that happen at any given time. And

Aaron Smith (34:56)
You’re still dealing with

this?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (34:58)
Yeah, I still still deal with this. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (35:01)
I’m going to pray for healing for you before we’re done with this conversation.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (35:04)
Yeah, I appreciate

it. And I don’t think either of us knew how to handle it. And I think we did not talk about it. Like we didn’t know how to talk about how either of us were even feeling about it. Like he was afraid to approach me about the adoption. And internally, I also knew that the adoption maybe shouldn’t happen, but I just wasn’t willing to let it go. I didn’t even, neither of us felt safe to even talk about it. And so it just drove a wedge between us.

that much further and it was just, it was just really unhealthy.

Aaron Smith (35:40)
So your health stuff that was going on, this was the stressor, main pinch point with you guys relationally?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (35:51)
Yeah, I would say so. And I mean, I think it just exposed, like she was saying, some of our communication wasn’t where it should have been. ⁓ Like, for example, like I did not feel like I could express that I was having doubts about going through with the adoption because I knew she was like still thousand percent on how I’m doing it, regardless of the appointments and surgeries and different things she’s she’s gone through. So.

I didn’t even feel like I knew how to handle that. And that’s part of just my personality and my immaturity and just things that we weren’t prepared for from a communication standpoint in our marriage.

Aaron Smith (36:37)
Was there any anger or bitterness building from what she was going through and you not, I don’t know, maybe not knowing how to help or knowing what role you play? I don’t know how to say that,

Spencer And Ashton Draper (36:50)
Yeah, no, sure. There was definitely angriness and bitterness that I felt. almost actually, it almost got to the point of apathy. And they even say that like apathy is worse than having anger because anger almost shows you still care about something, but apathy is like, you’re just along for the ride wherever that takes you. And as a leader of the family, that’s not a good position to be in.

Aaron Smith (37:06)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, you know, lot of people think hate is the opposite of love, but the opposite of love is actually apathy. You know, it’s when you don’t have any care or at all. so you were noticing that, ⁓ was, did you have to help a lot in the heavier seasons of health issues? Like take time off or like, were those kinds of the things that were adding to all of this?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (37:25)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Not as much as I felt like I should’ve. I felt like she was like, I’m gonna power ⁓ through it. Like as much as I don’t wanna get out of bed every day because of how I’m feeling, like I can’t stay in bed, I have three kids. And I didn’t know what to do with that either because I’m like, should I be signed up for?

Aaron Smith (38:01)
Mm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (38:14)
something enabled to help you out like FMLA type stuff to where I can assist if you’re having a down day. But I also yeah we just didn’t really have good communication on what that that should look like and how I can help out on the day to day. And so we just kind of kept she just kept powering through it when she probably should have had help and I kind of didn’t.

Aaron Smith (38:19)
Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (38:41)
step up and initiate in some ways that I probably should have.

Aaron Smith (38:47)
That’s awesome that you recognize these things in hindsight. Of course, it’s like how God uses our situations to mature us and grow us. ⁓ So you have, you guys are pursuing this adoption. You’ve just had your third child. Ashton, you’re starting to go through serious medical issues and no answers, which is also on its own level of like a spiritual frustration of like, there’s this thing and we don’t know what it is. We don’t know when it’s going to stop. You know, is it forever?

⁓ Adding all this weight to your marriage. want to like in the in the book you mentioned even like that you guys got to a point of considering divorce on some level ⁓ What was the trigger point for that? But then more importantly, what was the What what was the thing that God did that changed all of that? that perspective I know that the ⁓ Details haven’t necessarily

But the perspectives have and the hearts have. what got you to that point? And then what was that changing factor? What was the thing that changed?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (39:55)
I think that’s my favorite part of all of it, is what got us to the change. ⁓ Just because you can really see how God worked and how perfect his timing is. I think what got us to that point was, like we would sit down and try to have a conversation about anything, I it could be anything. And we felt completely opposite on every single thing. So we were like, okay, well I’m you back.

and you’re holding me back. We both like we should be doing these things. And this is how the enemy works. We were like, we’re like, the Lord is calling us to like pursue different things. And it’s like, no, he’s calling us to our marriage first, right? And then figuring out, but we really felt that we were like, I’m being called to do this and you’re being called to do that. So maybe we just, you know, get divorced. ⁓ But his, he took a college class. I don’t know if you read that part of the book yet, but ⁓

I don’t know how many years ago it was, he didn’t finish college. He had like one semester left. And at the time I was mad that he never finished. And then 10 years later, he has to finish in order to get this certain position he’s at at work. And because of that, he then had to take a new elective, right? One of your credits didn’t transfer. So he had to take an elective that was not there before. And it was marriage and family counseling. Is that right?

and he met his professor, is also a counselor. And we had done counseling prior, ⁓ but it was not, it just wasn’t what we needed. And that was the turning point, seeing this specific counselor.

Aaron Smith (41:21)
interesting.

So you saw this counselor and ⁓ they focused on, as you say in the book, emotions. And that was the first one. okay, you’re talking about different ones. So, okay, I’m mixing up the two. So you saw a second one and that was the turning point. ⁓ okay.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (41:47)
That was the first one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, no. We saw four. Okay, so

the first one was very like it was under the name of like Christian counseling, but it was very much like, let’s talk about how to fight fair and like just very like, I’m not gonna say bad things, right? But we needed spiritual depth. Like we really needed spiritual depth. And then we saw a couple.

within a company and they focus on emotions, how to talk through what each other is doing and how it makes us feel. I think it was an okay starting point. I think it helped us to start to talk about some things, but I still never felt the depth. Nothing, there was no, pivoting it felt like. And so then we switched counselors within the same organization and only saw him a couple of times. And similarly,

Just wasn’t, it was very, I think he was more like a psychotherapy. that right? mean, like more like psychotherapy. So you could sit and talk all day long about your life and he’ll keep you there. You will just talk about what brought you to where you are, why you are who you are. And that’s where you kind of stay. And then you talk about how that made you feel. And again, it wasn’t getting to the heart of any of it. So the fourth counselor finally was the turning point. Cause he, he really, I mean, he is just like,

Aaron Smith (42:51)
Yeah, different score pattern, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (43:15)
straight from the Bible. Yeah, he basically, he won’t, this is gonna be terrible. It sound may be terrible, but like if, if you don’t embrace a biblical worldview or like agree that like the Bible is truth and stuff, like he doesn’t even really take you on because he doesn’t have a framework within which to, to move. Like he just, he doesn’t view himself as the counselor. Like he just, I’m reframing everything else. The counselor, capital C.

Aaron Smith (43:40)
Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (43:44)
has to offer so yeah.

Aaron Smith (43:47)
Yeah,

I don’t do marriage counseling, but anytime I’ve counseled marriages, because they’re different. I’m not a counselor, but I’ve definitely been brought into marriages as I’ve needed for myself before. But I always start with, like, do you both agree that the Bible is truth? Always like, absolutely. So you agree that what it says is right? Yeah, OK. Like, cool. That’s where we’re going to start. Because if we don’t agree on that, exactly like what he said, like we’re not even going to, there’s nowhere to go.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (44:10)
Yeah.

Aaron Smith (44:16)
Because if you don’t believe this, then I’m not going to be to help you. But I do have to ask, well, first of all, it sounds like you found the right one to help you guys because he pointed you back to the word of God. What was it? If you were to sum up, I don’t know how many times you saw this person, but if you were to sum up your meetings with this gentleman and what he pointed you to, what was it that just changed the whole perspective on your marriage?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (44:16)
Right.

I feel like you’re really good at this. No, no, I see. don’t I don’t know if I can if I could pull the trigger on this one thing. No, it’s it’s. I know, right? No, it’s the engagement. And this is coming from someone who’s grown up in the church, right? Like I know the Bible and I’ve agreed with it as truth my whole life. But like.

Aaron Smith (44:55)
Just start rambling, it might come out.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (45:15)
There is something about…

putting to the test like, so you guys are gonna talk about divorce and ⁓ like that’s gonna be an okay thing. And yet you gotta walk away and call yourself like a believer. honestly, he almost puts, know that’s, yeah, that’s a very strong challenge to like, I don’t know how you, there’s a couple outs to that in scripture, but like,

Aaron Smith (45:36)
Yeah, really challenging your truth.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (45:48)
Other than that, how are you going to justify that to your kids one day? He didn’t start with that line, but some of that is like, ooh, yeah, you’re right. How do you go about pulling that off?

Aaron Smith (45:51)
Yeah.

That’s really good, just challenging your – so you claim faith in Christ. You claim to believe what his word says is true and yet you’re willing to adopt these lies. You’re like, you know, this is an option. This is a viable option. And he’s like, not if you’re a believer, it’s not. Because even though – go ahead.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (46:20)
Yeah, yeah, there were like two

examples that like I can think of specifically that I feel like when he said them I was like ⁓ like wow and one of them was like he was asking us very honestly he’s like what’s your threshold of grace like Where does forgiveness end is it like he cheats once and then you’re done forgiving she cheats ten times you’re done forgiving or maybe he doesn’t cheat but like he does something like what’s your threshold of grace and then he points back to Jesus right where he’s like

there is no threshold of grace. And that doesn’t mean abuse, right? And I understand, he’s like, I know your guys’ hearts. I don’t think either of you want to abuse the grace that you’re sharing. ⁓ And so just like that challenge of like, man, Jesus forgives every single thing. And so just challenging us to be more like him in that regard. And then as it pertains to me specifically, like he said this a couple of times, I’m a very passionate person. he’s like,

you have a passion to move to Africa for six months. You were there by yourself. You adopted a child, but where’s that passion for your marriage? He just said, he’s like, you’re willing to part the sea, but you’re not willing to just get the cup of water. And so he was just trying to get my heart to focus on, this is all part of the Bible. You pursuing adoption is great and biblical and that’s fine, but.

Aaron Smith (47:23)
No.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (47:46)
pursuing your marriage is also a part of that.

Aaron Smith (47:51)
I love that he pointed you guys back to not saying like, hey, like stop this other good thing, but make sure this first good thing is well, because like that’s, that’s what God wants this order of, you know, our focus on him, our focus on our spouse, our focus on our children. And then, you know, it’s this centrifugal, not centrifugal, it’s the concentric circles can going out. ⁓ and pointing you back to that, those truths,

Spencer And Ashton Draper (47:56)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Yeah.

Aaron Smith (48:20)
So your passion, by the way, I love the word passion so funny because it essentially means suffering. Yeah. Well, it’s the things that we love so much, we’re willing to suffer for it. Like the movie The Passion of the Christ, it was the suffering of Christ on the cross. He was willing to go to the cross for his bride. And that’s exactly how God got a hold of my heart. ⁓

Spencer And Ashton Draper (48:27)
That’s great.

you

Aaron Smith (48:46)
That same question he asked you is like, what’s your threshold of grace like? Is there anything that you’re willing to, that you think you’re righteous enough to not forgive as if we somehow are better than Jesus and Jesus forgives all. And he, you know, the Lord asked me, he’s like, you know, what has your, your wife done that, you know, is worse than you’ve done to me? And yet I’ve sent my only son, Jesus, to die for you. And it’s, it is a, it’s a game changer and thought doesn’t mean like every day I’m

constantly thinking about that I mess up as a husband and I make mistakes and I get angry and I’m short and I withhold forgiveness at times but ⁓ that is a big deal. Spencer, did you have a similar like moment of like, ⁓ like I need to forgive better. I need to have more grace and patience with Ashton.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (49:37)
⁓ yeah, I mean, definitely there’s no, there is no limit to the improvement on which I I can get better at that. Yeah, for sure. ⁓ yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don’t, I don’t think it was, I don’t have one specific like aha moment on that, but the, the methodical

Aaron Smith (49:44)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Forever going deeper.

Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (50:04)
going here and that over and over again. And I mean, Tim Keller has a really good book ⁓ that actually our counselor recommended called Forgive. And it’s very similar, like the idea that you know what, someone still pays a price. A lot of times we think of forgiveness as like forgive and forget type thing. But like, no, someone broke the lamp. If you’re going to forgive them, guess what? You still have to replace the lamp type type thinking. It’s like

Aaron Smith (50:26)
Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (50:34)
Ooh, dang. yeah, I really, when I forgive, signing up for still dealing with the aftermath of whatever the messiness was.

Aaron Smith (50:45)
Yeah. Something that’s really awesome about not just your story, but anyone who’s going through adoption. I would imagine, I know you had these moments of, should we stop this process? But I would imagine you probably both at some point came to the conclusion like, well, no, it’s not just this process that’s this child that is ours. And we are waiting in faith for that there was a belief. ⁓

Almost just like pregnancy. Like you came together, you love each other. There’s a baby that’s created, right? And then you have this 10 months of waiting while this baby’s being created. Adoption similarly, the created portion is you guys coming together and agreeing together like we want to adopt a child. And so the conception of the belief. And even though you may not know who the child is yet,

or the name of the child, just like as our baby’s growing. We don’t know this child yet. And if you are like me and my wife, sometimes not wanting to find a gender, you’re like, we don’t know at all who this is. And no, we’ve done it twice. We’ve done it twice. My wife never wants to, she always wants to know. every single time I’m like, let’s just wait. And she’s like, no, I’m not doing it.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (51:54)
You do that for all six? I was gonna say, after six, you got everything, anyways. Okay.

Aaron Smith (52:11)
but she agreed twice and so twice we were surprised, which was awesome because both times they were good surprises. I mean, they’re all good surprises, but, ⁓ yeah. So you have this process and what I was thinking in that, you know, you’re going through these hardships, you’re going through sickness and marriage struggles. And at no point did you guys think, this is going to sound weird, at no point did you think like, we should like the children are in the way of all of this.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (52:18)
Sure.

Aaron Smith (52:40)
No, they’re your children. they’re there. You have them, you birthed them, they’re yours. And similarly, this child that you haven’t yet fully adopted, that belief, that conception that you guys had together, like that doesn’t get sacrificed just because you’re in this season. Like they’re your child. You may not know them yet, you may not know their name yet. And so you guys continued on in that process despite the struggles of marriage and life and health.

And I just think that’s a really beautiful testimony to perseverance and faith and hope and the things that I think we’re called to as believers. So would you like to speak to that a little bit as we come to a close?

I said a lot, sorry. I do it sometimes.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (53:31)
I I mean, what I would say and I speak to it in my book is I don’t even think that like if we had stopped it, it would have been sin in and of itself, right? I think that, you know, we got our marriage has to be in a better place before we can bring another child into our home or, you know, whatever that looked like. But what I will say though is that like, because we persevered, we now have such a beautiful blessing out of it. And

The Lord used all of it for our better. I mean, I think we can look back on the season and just see how much we’ve grown, how much God has shown up. And then we can see Bismarck’s life is just like a true testament to like the blessing of that perseverance.

Aaron Smith (54:19)
That’s a I love it. I love the story. So for Adoption may not be everyone’s story may not be a part of everyone’s, you know Calling in this life. I think more people should for sure more believers should What would your encouragement be to those who it is their story or maybe their story in the future? What’s one bit of encouragement to? Get them praying in the right direction

Start with you Spencer. Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (54:51)
Yeah.

⁓

Hmm.

Aaron Smith (54:59)
putting you on the spot.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (54:59)
I mean, absolutely. know

there’s so many thoughts going through my mind right now. I mean, you, you already hit on it. Like God is the one going to orchestrate stuff. So be praying about it. Whether it’s the finances side of it, the timing of it, what, it is, but like the spiritual side of it, you have to be in touch.

very regularly on the topic of it. Or else you’re not going to be ready. If you’re not there spiritually, I mean, you might be able to pull the trigger on it from a physical sense and think that it’s all going to be honky-dory, but really at the end of the day, you’re going to run into some stuff, I’m sure, and not be prepared for it. yeah, the prep and prayer is the huge part I would suggest.

Aaron Smith (55:33)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (55:59)
Recommend.

Aaron Smith (56:01)
Good. Ashton.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (56:02)
The passionate part of me is just like, just do it. Like just go for it. I, yeah, just do it. It’s so worth it. And you’re right. think preparing as much as you can, but, ⁓ and there’s just so much you can’t prepare for. had never prepared for me to be in Africa for six months. Like, so even if your hearts are in the right place, I mean, that’s obviously huge, great starting point. Like it doesn’t mean you’re not going to come up against roadblocks. ⁓

Aaron Smith (56:06)
Just summer. Yeah, the process. ⁓

Yeah.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (56:32)
that the Lord is just gonna work through. And so I would just encourage anyone, I was praying about it to just reach out to agencies, just start asking questions, even if they’re not ready to like jump in and then just see, because they’re honestly, even just starting the asking questions is huge because you realize, well, I might not be a good candidate for that country or that country or that country or that country. Like we stopped, we paused when we first started because we weren’t a good candidate for any country. And so just starting the conversation, I think it’s just a really good starting point.

Aaron Smith (56:35)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

That’s great. I would add to all of that is, you know, based off what you guys were sharing is also just make sure your marriage is on point. Doesn’t need to be perfect, but like that you guys are communicating and together and in oneness and walking together and in the word of God together and prayer and just strengthening your marriage so that when that when God puts it on your heart or in the timings right or, know, whatever the circumstances that you’re ready together. So and you’re going to you’re going to go through trials.

I think your next book, well first of all your book’s called The Big Yellow House. I did want to ask why is it called The Big Yellow House?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (57:39)
Big yellow house, big yellow house, yeah.

Because when ever a would come over and visit while you’re in Ghana and then they go home or like They would leave and take one of the siblings or two of the siblings home with them and Bismarck couldn’t go and so we just Our house is big and it’s yellow our house here in the States So we’re like they’re going to big yellow house and we’re gonna go to big yellow house soon and so we just coined big yellow house and That’s where it’s stuck

Aaron Smith (58:10)
So it

was like a thing to look forward to for Bismarck. Oh, I love that. Okay. That makes sense. Okay. My last thing, I think your next book should be a practical guide to fundraising for adoption. you walked through that and I think that’d be really cool because I’m sure there’s a lot of people that are designing to adopt that are like, where do I start on raising the funds?

Spencer And Ashton Draper (58:13)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Hey, there’s a lot of, there are a lot of options.

you

better watch it. She’s gonna go, you know, I think we need to do a couple more before I can write a book like that. few more fundraisers.

Aaron Smith (58:40)
Yeah, that’s good.

That’s amazing. Well, I really appreciate you guys. Would you just share where people can find your book and again, say the title of the book again. And I just love everyone to pick up a copy of this just to hear your story and be inspired by it.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (58:55)
Yeah, so I actually have a copy here. So that way people are watching it, but it’s big yellow house. ⁓ And then I have a journal as well that goes with it. But it just basically takes questions from each chapter and goes deeper and just allows people to journal thoughts and give challenges and prayer ⁓ ideas and things like that. ⁓ So Amazon, find the book on Amazon, find the journal on Amazon. And I have like a Facebook page. I’m not the best at using it, but I do have like a…

Aaron Smith (59:04)
cool.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (59:22)
Ashlandraper Bigot has a Facebook page if anyone wants to follow.

Aaron Smith (59:26)
Awesome. I’ll make sure to put the links in the show notes. ⁓ Spencer, Ashton, thank you so much for sharing your story and your testimony. And I just love that ⁓ your family is serving God by growing. That’s big thing. know, your adoption story is amazing. So I really appreciate your time. God bless you guys.

Spencer And Ashton Draper (59:38)
Yeah, thank you.

Thank you for having us on. Yeah, thank you.