This picture was taken five years ago when we were getting ready to move to China. Grandpa Mark was deciding which books to take, and grandson Samuel Reed was hanging out with him. We were visiting them in Chicago at the time.
Fast forward five years. Samuel is now six, and his family is going to Mexico soon. Therefore they are getting rid of things for the big move. That rocking chair you see in the background is one of the things they recently sold.
Here is what Samuel's dad, Matt, wrote:
Once again we created an opportunity to productively empty our house of another posession. The glider and ottoman we bought when we were expecting Samuel a bit over six years ago had served its purposes in our home and it didn't make the short list of things to take to Mexico. So we found a buyer and on Saturday morning they came to take it off. Both Rebeca and Samuel had an emotional impact as they saw us walk it downstairs, put it on the back of the trailer of the buyers and wave it off down the street and out of sight. Rebeca was close to tears and as for Samuel, who does not know a Reed living room without it, his lower lip was quivering a bit as he indicated how sad he was to see it go away. Little by little we are getting to that point where we are positioning ourselves for a move down to Mexico and our children are definitely a part of the experience.
I realized how the decisions we are making with our lives are having a big (and will have an even bigger) impression on our kids. We took this as an opportunity to remind Samuel how everything we have has been given to us by God and that "He gives and takes a way" but we will always "bless His name." (see Job in the Old Testament).Even though we can't always exactly anticipate them, we expect situations like this will become more and more frequent. What a blessing to have real life situations through which to instruct and teach our children about the things that matter most. Please be remembering them in prayer as you think about it.
On our May Holiday from April 29 to May 3 we went on a culture trip with our Chinese teachers and other "foreigners" to a beautiful quaint town called FengHuangCheng - Phoenix City. There are over 50 minority groups in China, and in the area where we went most of the people belong to the Miao minority. As you see in the pictures, we had all sorts of experiences. This was one of the most enjoyable AND tiring trips we have been on recently, but we'd highly recommend this to anyone coming to visit China !
