Five on Friday

Featuring Greg Bruner, director of financial aid

What is the most common question you are asked as director of financial aid?

"Where can I get more money for college, and why doesn't the government help the middle class?" Also, "I paid a company to find financial aid for me and it's the same thing your office did for me. Why is that?"

You've been married for 23 years. What's your secret to a long-lasting marriage?

Just to wake up each day and say "I'm sorry.... for just breathing, being a man, or whatever else I will do wrong today." Most men realize they married so far over their head that we want to stay in God's good grace to keep going.

Your family has recently grown. Tell us a bit about the process to adopt 11-year-old Sierra.

She has been a true God-send. After having our dossier in China for over two years, and having gone through a serious illness myself, we literally stumbled over her picture in a compilation of "special needs" children in China. She was considered "special needs" because she was eleven years old. She was getting close to the age that they are no longer eligible to be adopted. We prayed and asked God for direction, and we accepted His call to adopt her on November 26, 2008. We had no idea that was her 11th birthday!

How is everyone adjusting to the new family dynamics?

God has been so good to the Bruner's. Lily [adopted from China in 2004] just LOVES having Sierra in our home. She is practically joined at the hip. The other day, she said "Sierra, isn't it just great having a little sister?" with all of the pure truthfulness that only a 6-year-old can have. Her older brothers, Marcus and Joshua, have just enjoyed watching her adapt to America.

She's learning English very well, and one thing she would like to do for ONU folks is to write their names in Chinese for them. She loves to see the reactions when she does that.

I hear you're a force to be reckoned with on the church softball circuit. Do you have any pointers for our readers?

I have no idea who on earth would have thought that. I haven't played in years. I do, however, get to sit in the dugout with Kankakee First Church’s team, led by Matt Whitis, and keep the book.

The only thing I add is the ability to call out to the team where the batter hit the ball last time. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I have no athletic ability at all, except for the fact that Sierra said something in Chinese when she saw me for the first time that sounded like "Sumo," as in wrestling!