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Scarlet: God's Healing Sometimes Looks Different

10/30/26

“God told me if we adopt Scarlet, He’d heal her.” — Loren, Scarlet’s dad, 2021

Five years later, God’s healing has looked different than Joan and Loren imagined, but Scarlet’s life has been full of miracles.

Joan and Loren were planning an early retirement when they met Scarlet, a little girl with special needs, at a home run by our ministry partner, Back2Back Ministries, in Mexico.

Adoption was never part of their plan. But God put Scarlet on their hearts, and they said yes, even though her future was uncertain.

Doctors didn’t expect Scarlet to live this long. Today, she’s 9 years old. She travels the world, hikes or bikes almost every day, and is adored by her family.

“One thing God has showed me is His miracles may be different than our miracles,” Joan says. “...I feel like we as humans see miracles as huge things. Like, they have to be a big thing to be a miracle, like Scarlet walking or talking... We need to see miracles in little everyday things. Like when Scarlet does something new, that’s a miracle.”

“At times I get a little discouraged,” Loren says, “but somehow God just keeps telling me that maybe it’s not the way I thought it was gonna look... I see how people interact with Scarlet and I see what an impact she has on people... It’s encouraging to see what she is able to do.”

If Scarlet could tell the world one thing about herself, Joan thinks she’d say: “I’m a miracle of God.”

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