Becky and I will be in Sturgis, Michigan, for Thanksgiving. Hoping to avoid some of the day-before traffic on the Turnpikes (Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, in that order), we will leave early Tuesday morning and hope to arrive late in the afternoon. Our son-in-law, Ryan, has to work on Wednesday, and Katharine, our daughter, has a bit of at-home work to do, as well. “I’m sure you won’t mind playing with the girls for a while,” Katharine wrote a couple of days ago. Her confidence is not misplaced.
Lena will be five in February and Ada was two in September. We won’t mind playing with the girls for a while. Becky will bring books to read and crafts to do. The girls will delight in what Grandma brings in her bag. I will be down on the floor, my specialty is to provide the voice for whichever stuffed animal I’m assigned in the drama that unfolds throughout the weekend. At nearly five, Lena will undoubtedly provide the story line. Two-year old Ada will not be far behind. My guess is that the story told will have something to do with baby kittens.
I love Thanksgiving. I love this best of all holidays. I love being with family.
It’s going to be a good Thanksgiving. Becky and I won’t mind playing with the girls for a while, Becky with her amazing bag full of wonderful things. Who knows, I may be the voice of Daddy Bunny as all the stuffed animals search for some lost baby kitten.
Between crafts at the kitchen table and whatever story unfolds on the living room floor, we hope to enjoy some time of good conversation with Ryan and Katharine. We have a lot to talk about.
The trip to Sturgis and the time with Ryan, Katharine, and the girls will be a nice break. The fall has been busy with Becky’s good work at HPCA and the life of LPC. It’s been a fall full of national politics and now the sorting out of what it means and portends.
We need a break.
In ways that matter, though, the trip to Sturgis may be the most important thing we do this busy fall. Hardly a break, it may be the main business of our lives. We’ve been distracted by other things.
Who knows the outcome of crafts at the kitchen table and the search for Baby Kitten on the living room floor? God has called Katharine and Ryan to be mother and father to Lena and Ada. It is a heavy responsibility and they bear it well. Really well. Day in and day out Ryan and Katharine are being used by God to shape and form two young lives. Becky and I are support players, coming when we can with a bag of projects and a voice for Daddy Bunny; coming with our love for Lena, Ada, and their parents.
God’s ways are not our ways. Sometimes they are deceptively simple and other times mysteriously deep.
In their place each is important, but I’d be willing to say that families are more important than presidents, mothers and fathers more significant than cabinet members. Being a mother or father in response to God’s call is much more difficult than issuing executive orders, and the consequences of godly parenting far outlast any presidential decree.
We won’t mind playing with the girls for a while. But I have to tell you, being the voice of Daddy Bunny all weekend long will be exhausting.
We are leaving for Sturgis, Michigan, early Tuesday morning. We’ll play with the girls and talk with their parents and do our best to be a part of the deceptively simple and mysteriously deep wonders that God works through families.
I love Thanksgiving. I love this best of all holidays. I love being with family. I give thanks to God for the family he has given us.
Now, I wonder where Baby Kitten may have gone.
See you Sunday