God's faithfulness never ceases to amaze me. i have been separated from my siblings for awhile now. Too long. I do not function terribly well without them, partially since there are so few people that are capable of relating in the way they can, since everything i have experienced, so have they, and also because i have no friends that i have know for more than a few years at best. Part of never being able to form relationships with people until recently means you have no long term friends. This gets me down, since i am closest to my siblings and they are extremely dear to me, the most dear you can hold someone is how i hold them. I have lived my whole life until two years ago with my brother, jay, and i have seen him a handful of times in those two years for hours and a day at best. After this way too long separation that wrenches my heart, he and i are living in the same city again in a few short months.

More and more i understand why God established families, why we are created to be in and thrive in families. I do not have a family, i have the remnants of family, my siblings, but no functioning family unit. I spent thanksgiving with an incredibly loving family of ten and i got the chance to watch and participate in their family life. watching how loving their family is, how accepting they were to me, and seeing how their kids thrive and know they are loved brought me to tears several nights. It was possibly the most refreshing thing i have seen since i moved here. Then seeing how i need my siblings, how i need the relationship i have with them and how quickly i can pick it up again after not seeing my brother in years and just how close we are so quickly once again, i see the reason why God commands families to be families. Why parents are meant to love their kids, why families are supposed to continue to grow by being fathers to the fatherless. We are designed, we crave, we long to find that loving relationship. in the end, that relationship and that love is found in our heavenly father, but the family system points us directly to that is a more tangible way for us to experience that love.

family makes sense to me. It is what i crave. it is what God has given to us.