Shannon Dingle is one of the voices at the forefront of the evangelical adoption movement. An advocate for adoption, foster care, and children with special needs, Dingle and her husband Lee have six children, four of whom were adopted and five of whom have medical, physical, psychological, or neurological diagnoses. Her writing and speaking has been featured on the Today Show, NPR, and in the Journal of Discipleship and Family Ministry, and she maintains a blog called Dinglefest, where she writes about her family and ministry. This week, she answers a few of our questions about how churches can better embody Christ’s call to care for “the least of these.”

Many churches have embraced adoption and foster care, but smaller churches might be intimidated by the scale of the need and their lack of resources. What encouragement would you give leaders of such churches?

In the programmatic culture of so many churches, the idea of inclusive ministry seems scary. Many leaders are ...