When Jami and Clint Kaeb married, they had an idea of what they thought their family would one day look like. But God had a different picture – one that was bigger and better than they could’ve imagined. Now, 25 years and eight children later, they’ve seen God grow their family on a foundation of faith and a heart for radical generosity.
After welcoming her first two biological children, Jami never considered their family would grow in any other way. But one night, something stirred inside her as she listened to a story about adoption play from the radio in her home.
She whispered a quiet prayer: “Lord, I hope you’re not trying to tell me something.”
“When we first got married, Clint and I never considered foster care or adoption,” Jami says. “If I’m honest, I’d say our hearts toward it were pretty closed.” But over time, God would slowly place adoption on their hearts.
What began as discomfort became curiosity. Jami’s father had founded Lifesong for Orphans, a nonprofit that mobilizes Christians to care for orphans through adoption, service, giving, and more. There, the couple had been exposed to the scale of the need for adoption, both domestically and internationally. They listened, studied, asked questions, and prayed. And slowly, adoption started to feel like a calling for the Kaebs.
“God did a beautiful transformation in our hearts. Because of that, we chose to open our home, our hearts, and our family to the children he had for us.”
Growing a family
The Kaebs first adopted internationally, bringing home a son from Guatemala. After that, they stayed open to the possibility of adding more children to their family.
But as any adoptive parent knows, the road to welcoming a child into a family isn’t usually smooth. For two years, they attempted to adopt domestically, but, each time their profile was shown to a prospective mother, the answer came back, “No.”
“I didn’t understand why,” Jami says. “I didn’t understand what the Lord was doing.”
What he was doing was asking the Kaebs to trust his leading into new territory.
“God changed our hearts again. He opened our eyes to the need for children to be welcomed into a family through foster care. And now he was asking us to be a family for a child in that way.”
So, the Kaebs set to work researching the foster care system. They took classes, were quickly approved, and soon welcomed two brothers – ages three and seven months – into their home. Within months, the boys’ younger sister joined them. After about two years of fostering, the opportunity arose for the Kaebs to adopt all three siblings.
“It was the Lord’s graciousness to allow us to be a part of their lives,” Clint says.
Not long after, another door opened for to adopt a son from Uganda, who officially made them a family of nine.
“This was the plan for our family all along,” Jami says. “I’m just so grateful that God softened our hearts to say yes to it.”
The value of generosity
Opening their home changed more than just the size of their family. It grew their hearts for generosity too.
“As our family grew, we started to dream. If that business really grew, how did we want to live, and how did we want to give?” Jami said.
That dreaming led the couple to make a bold decision: They would cap their income, setting aside the remainder to give more generously to others. The Kaebs prayerfully defined what their family would need to live on and designated the rest for generosity.
“If we made above and beyond what we needed, it automatically became something we could give to someone else,” Jami says.
For the Kaebs, this was a decision made in faith.
“We both felt God’s call to steward his resources well,” Clint says. “We felt challenged that, rather than living an increasingly comfortable life, we should increase our freedom to give.”
Family vision day
But as they started living with this cap (often referred to as a financial finish line) in place, Jami wanted generosity to shift from something her children observed to something they were invited to participate in themselves.
“We were getting the blessing of giving,” she says, “and we wanted our children to experience that blessing too.”
So, they planned what they called a “family vision day.” Together, all seven children gathered around the conference table in Clint’s office with their parents. The couple walked their kids through their finances, sharing just how much money was available to give and just how important generosity was to their family.
Then, they invited the kids to take ownership in helping them discern how to steward that surplus well.
“We wanted them to know that giving is what we do as Kaebs. But more than that, we wanted them to develop their own hearts for generosity rather than just follow ours.”
Now, when it comes to giving, each child has a voice. The whole family has a chance to speak into where they believe God may be leading them to give. Sometimes they share those needs around the table, like at “family vision day,” while other times, they respond in the moment it’s presented.
“It’s given them more of a heart for missions and helped them understand that life is not all about them,” Clint says. “Plus, having the kids involved has made giving all the more fun. Their excitement for generosity is contagious.”
One year, the family attended an event where a missionary described his work flying planes into remote regions of Brazil to share the gospel. He mentioned that a single wing for one of the planes costs about $10,000. The Kaeb kids looked at each other with excitement in their eyes.
“I remember seeing the looks on their faces,” Jami says. “We asked, ‘Kids, do you want to buy the wing?’ And they were unanimous with a ‘yes.’”
This kind of responsive generosity is something NCF has helped make simpler for the Kaebs. With their family’s Giving Fund, they hope to continue to give quickly as needs arise.
“With NCF, I always have confidence that any giving is going to be done with integrity and excellence,” Jami says.
‘We’re all vessels’
Perhaps more meaningful than any single gift is what generosity has done for the children themselves. Jami says it has taken root in the way they treat one another too.
“This isn’t something we told them to do; it’s just who they’ve become,” Jami says. “It’s the product of God growing their hearts and expanding their vision of what they’re capable of through giving.”
Since then, God has continued to work in the lives of the Kaeb family in ways they didn’t expect. Just last year, 23 years after welcoming their first biological child, Jami gave birth to their eighth child, a son.
As a result of their experience as a family, Jami also launched The Forgotten Initiative to help local churches support foster care caseworkers in their communities. The organization now serves 60 communities in 25 states, where churches are coming alongside foster care agencies to better resource, serve, and support their workers. This, too, is something that NCF has helped make all the more possible.
“I’ve loved working with NCF as a nonprofit leader too,” Jami says. “They’ve enabled our generous donors to give quickly and easily, and that’s made it possible to keep doing the work we do. I have no concerns when I direct a donor to NCF, because I know they’re going to get the best service and that all kinds of charities are going to benefit as a result.”
After years of opening their home and their hands, the Kaebs have come to see all they’ve been given through a different lens.
“We’re all vessels. We’re not entitled to anything, and we don’t own anything. That’s the way I hope my kids see the world. If God chooses to give us a blessing, our first response should be to consider how to share what’s so graciously been given to us.”
