My mom and dad sold everything and moved to Panama two weeks ago. Not bad for and year olds. Free-spirited adventurers, they decided to nestle into an ex-pat community for their last whahhooo. I grew up thinking that living in Appalachia, spearing lobsters while living on a sailboat, and rehanging bikinis in your parents surfshopβall by the age of 9βwas normal.
So what if I never learned to play kickball. But in just a few days families will gather round tables and talk and share and bicker and reminiscence. My parents in Panama. Us in Utah. Because they are being embraced by an ex-pat family of friends. And we will celebrate together another year. Plus, we have family, here, too. We share no DNA. These precious saints have taken us in. Because sometimes our definition of family is too narrow. We think of family in terms of bloodline, heritage, last name.
But the New Testament reminds us the ultimate family is the family of God. Families may include biological children, foster children, adopted children, or those who are childless. Yes, you may need to read that twice.
Families are defined by those who fling open the doors of their hearts, the doors of their lives. As we approach Thanksgiving, Advent , and Christmas, my hope and prayer is that you will fling open yourself to compassion like never before. My hunch is that those are people and livesβincluding your ownβwhere God may be at work the most. Or your copies today and spread the Christmas joy. Good morning and Blessings! You took me back to when we moved to Ft Wayne with our 3 children who had never been away from family.
Basically we cried all the way there. We were used to having family all around us on holidays β we cried again. When the next Christmas came I decided we were not going to repeat the previous scenario so invited other Seminary families who were not going home to fill our home and share Christmas with us.
