Rockfest Day 13 - The Shape of Things

Life is full of extraordinary circumstances. As we move through it we encounter chance happenings and unexpected moments that forever change our lives. We try to control the outrageous unknowns we experience by choosing the people in our lives. Its one of the few things we truly have control over.

But the people we choose can be a grab-bag of sorts. Some will fit and some will not. Some will become influential and some will have no effect whatsoever, passing through our lives like mist in the wind. It is probably the people we cannot choose that matter most. It is the people that were chosen for us that have the biggest effect.  It is the people chosen for us, the ones who start early in our lives who shape us most. It is these people we call family.

There are days when family is great and there are days when family is the worst thing that has ever happened. But there is something about this hand-picked group of people that draws us in and motivates us to keep us going.

Even when they’re dysfunctional they are the best thing going. My family can be infuriating. My family can be generous. My family can be unapproving. My family can be forgiving. My family can be indifferent. My family can be deeply loving. My family has made me laugh, made me cry, made me storm out in anger, made me jump for joy.  I am who I am because of my family. I am a part of my family and they are a part of me.

I had no choice about the matter. God put me into the family He did for the reasons He did - and one day He will explain those reasons to me. And I will thank Him profoundly.

I am a firm believer that there are no coincidences in this world. God has a plan. And part of His plan for me was to put me into a family full of wonderful women. Wonderfully diverse women. I have put a picture of some of these women below (there are wonderful men in the family too – they were just too busy watching football). It is a picture taken some time ago. I know it was taken ages ago because I’m still a small girl being held in her mother’s arms.

This is some of the family who shapes my life. Four of the women are no longer here. One of them, my aunt in the white dress, died prematurely just yesterday. She was a vibrant and gregarious woman. She had a wonderful laugh. She was my mother’s older sister; they were close and got into lots of trouble together. She will be deeply missed. But she will remain on in those she touched and who love her. And that’s a wonderful thing about family – once you are part of it, you never really leave it.

I am not discounting the fact that there are people we choose who become our family too. God had a hand in selecting those people for us also. They are a vitally and richly important part of our lives.  But it is those in whose histories we share for generations that help steer the course and color the world in which we grow up and live.

One thing about family is we completely take it for granted most of the time. But when “the chips are down” its family who sustains us. Its family who shapes us with its collective wisdom. Its family who protects us with its strength in numbers. Its family who loves us with its heart so big God could not fit it into just one person.

The women in this picture are my part of my foundation and my future. They are my family and the well from which I draw strength. I don’t know why God chose me for their tribe, I’m just thankful He did.

Family. God’s extraordinary way of showing he loves you.

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