The Family

The family. We were a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together. ~Erma Bombeck

I have been MIA for a few days busy with my family. Often I feel like I need a Xanax or a gin martini when put into group settings with my extended family. (I realized this weekend it is probably more a general anxiety disorder related to ALL large social settings and my family just kicks it up a notch.) Our society places such extreme pressure on us to find deep meaning and satisfaction in our relationships with those bound by blood. I believe this sets us up for constant disappointment. At the end of the day I know for sure there is a common thread, and if I take the time and effort to follow it closely it will take me to the hearts of these people, most of whom I may never even speak to if I met them as strangers on the street.

One lesson God has been teaching me recently is to really try to meet people where THEY are. If I go into any relationship with the rules all set about who I want the other person to be or how they should look or behave I am sorely disappointed and completely frustrated. God showed me again this weekend that He can only work through me when I surrender to the truth that He is in control, and I cannot play "god" in other's lives anymore than I can in my own. This is especially hard with close family. It's another call to let go of something that was never mine in the first place and let God do His perfect work on His timetable.

Thank You for my family. Thank You for time with them and the common threads we share. Please help me to surrender my expectations and humbly seek to love as You have loved me.