Earlier this Summer ‘24 our family did what has become an annual tradition and went to the beach. We ‘glamp’ as a resort that is nothing short of 5-star spectacular. It is a negotiated truce between a dad that loves to camp in the mountains and a mom who loves the beach. It is wonderful.
This year we arrived the weekend before Memorial Day and the resort was full. We went to the pool, that we love, and set up chairs for the day facing the lazy river that runs around a section. We’re people watchers and this gives us a front row view to observe.
Shortly after setting up, a large family came and set up shop for the day (then weekend) in the Reserved Cabana area. Our youngest daughter quickly found this family’s kids and befriended them for the tenure of the trip. As all great parents, and we learned grandparents do, the adults searched my wife out and introduced themselves.
The next day as this family arrived, I decided to have some fun and kid them about being the “Haves,” sitting in the cabana area with a lazy river of water separating them from the simpletons like us, positioned on the free chair side, destined to watch from a distance as the “cabanaites” relaxed in shelter, with food and drink service and even TV if they so desired. That banter moved to more serious introductions and the discovery that we were all ‘Haves,’ as the family was and is deeply rooted in their faith, had lived in Ohio and more astonishingly, were from an Appalachian area of Kentucky very close to where ‘my people’ were from. We have similar histories and have the promise of the same future. We found family.
So that week we spent a significant amount of time with the Daniel and Skagg family. This family is cousins by lineage, but brothers and sisters by time, place and salvation. As we spent time together we found that we had similar senses of humor. A love of corn hole verging on an unhealthy addiction. A deep sense of family and heritage. The joy that comes every morning as children of God. And brothers and sisters in Christ connected by eternity that only other sisters and brothers of the Father in Heaven can relate.
This weekend we have been so blessed to visit our friends in their Kentucky hometown and spend more beautiful time together. We have laughed, loved and grown closer as only those who have the promise of a future in Heaven understand. We have watched kids run, play, wrestle, swim, eat…repeat. What a beautiful time God has blessed his children with.
We are multiple families from distant upbringing, brought together through common faith and appreciation for the life that our Father offered us. Lives maximized through hard work and commitment to a life surrendered to him and loving all those around us.
Jim, Steve, Judy, Maggie, we love you and your family(ies). We marvel at a God so good, so loving, so perfectly watching over us that he gave us the gift of your friendship. We have been blessed. We have been gifted. We have new friends for life. We have brothers and sisters to sharpen us as we will sharpen you. Have the assurance of eternity in Heaven. We have as you have been blessed in ways too marvelous to understand.
Thank you for welcoming and loving our family so well. We love you.
“How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!” Psalm 133:1 NIV