Family

After nearly forty-two years of marriage, two children, two wonderful spouses for our children and five phenomenal grand children, you would think there would be no new plateaus of loves or realities uncovered; but I was wrong!  Yesterday, my wife was feted in a tremendous way by a large group of her peers and leaders at a faculty and staff recognition breakfast at her school, Lake Center Christian School, from which she has now retired. 

We gathered in familial secrecy to surprise Alicia (which she does not like to be surprised) but mission was accomplished as we gathered around her at the round table for us, our family.  As we sat there watching a video made specifically for Alicia's tribute, listening to person after person offer comments of her love, her caring, her touch on their lives and the lives of countless children, I found myself becoming absorbed in an amazing way with the power of family; my family.

The day was simply beyond anything any of us could have or would have thought about for the event was well planned, sincere, low profile, loving, respectful and wonderfully stressful in all of us striving to hold back tears of joy. By the way, I did a terrible job of holding back those tears for the harder I tried to restrain, the more my whole body was pained with the effort.  But I looked around our table many times looking at my children, my son-in-love and daughter-in-love, my grandchildren and I kept having these waves of warmth wash over me at what family really means; it means life during and legacy after this life!

All afternoon after we finally returned home I was basking in how much I love my family with the many personalities, loves, ages, intricacies, hopes, drives; the threads of a woven DNA from two people that met when we were twelve years old at a pee wee football game. To see Alicia, that cheerleader, honored in such a hallowed way was such an uplifting, joyous experience for us all but I will say especially for me for as the husband, the father and the patriarch, I had never felt more special and more loved than sitting around that table watching the whole process unfold.

In the work that I now do, I see so much distress and void from dysfunctional or nonexistent families in my students and therefore I can easily take my family for granted. I do plead guilty to that and I seek God's forgiveness doing that. My family is, well, special. We are close. We are respectful. We can laugh at each other and at each other. We can cry, we can laugh, we can poke, we can be quiet and the threads of love are always evident. As we all pitch in to raise and nurture and just enjoying getting to experience our precious Hope, our grand daughter from Ethiopia, I realized all over again what a phenomenal stroke of blessing God delivered upon our family with her place now in the family.

Yesterday provided me a step ladder upon which I could lift higher than normal to view across the horizon of the reality of how much family is and means as the years flow and meander toward that time of departure from this stage of life.  My heart swelled with pride in my children and the words my son offered to the gathering about his mom.  Listening to the flow of compliments and loving testimonies about my wife from so many others lifted me higher and higher.  Yesterday was a day of renewal, the beginning of reinvention, the precipice of the next step of life; and it feels really good this beautiful Saturday morning.

My family is much larger than just who sat around that table.  My family encircles thousands of students that I have come to know so well in the good times and the not so good times.  My family is stronger as the bonds of realizing how much we need each other's special touch is needed.  My family respects each other.  Families are a future built on a past.  Families are God sanctioned, set apart, sanctified for His Glory if committed to His Word.

This morning I am still tingling in the afterglow of a wonderfully stressful day of recognition, celebration and outpouring by so many about a member of my family which means my whole family was the recipient of all the words, expressions, gifts, testimonials and, well, unbounded, undeniable love focused on a woman that deserved every increment of the outpouring. 

So to my pretty little cheerleader from Elliot Grammar School, I could not be more proud nor any happier as my wife and as my friend than I was yesterday.  As the newness of days now come and reinvention of each other gets carved into our new lives together, I look forward to each new sunrise and sunset.

I do love my family! I love my family for God resides as the centerpiece of our existence and in all we do or will do. We are blessed and we know it!