Fascinating Family

Tonight I got to enjoy my aunt Norma Jean's wonderful cooking at an impromptu dinner at their house with my cousin Cindi, who is visiting from Arizona. Galen and Carol were also there, and my cousin Gwen and her husband stopped by a little later.

It's always fun being with these people, although I began to wonder a little bit if these get- togethers had turned a corner and we would always have to listen to everyone's latest colonoscopy story or other fascinating health issues. I am by far the youngest of this group, and I just don't want to hear them urgently warning me that I must have a colonoscopy now that I'm 50, just because some distant relative had polyps!

I love it when conversation turns to the past, to times before I was born or too young to remember. My dad's seven siblings all stayed in the small community of Milford where they were born - all of them but my Uncle Cloy. Tonight he talked about pastoring a mission church in Lincoln, Nebraska, where some church members became upset by the number of black people who started attending the church, not wanting their young people mixing with them in youth group.

Cloy and Norma were foster parents and took in a little baby with this dark skin color, (Tony) who they eventually adopted. In the early 1960s, they felt God calling them to leave this church and go west. They got rid of most of their possessions, and with $600 to their name, put their four children in the car pulling a small trailer and drove west. They stopped in Tucson, Arizona and looked for a house to rent. My aunt said they needed to do some laundry, and while at the laundromat, Cloy was holding Tony. Another white man with a dark skinned baby came in, and they got to talking. This man was a Presbyterian minister. He invited them to his church and they spent some time together. This man's sister-in-law and her children had recently been killed in a car accident and he was storing all their furniture, which he gave to Cloy's family. It was everything they needed for the rental home. In church, he urged his congregation to share what they had, and Cloy and Norma were amazed by all the things that were offered to them! They prayed that Cloy would find a job, and within a few days, he had three job offers!

A few months later, God led them to Santee, California, where he again brought one of his servants, a man named Tom, into their lives. He worked with Teen Challenge and sounds like a pretty radical guy for a Mennonite pastor from Nebraska to get involved with! Cloy says only once did he join Tom in a street demonstration. Nude bars were springing up in the city, and Cloy was persuaded to carry a sign that said, "Jesus Loves You." as the group walked the sidewalk outside one of these establishments. He said during one of those demonstrations, John Wayne came along. He asked what they were doing, and Tom told him if he didn't repent and give his life to Jesus, he would end up in hell someday. John Wayne told him to keep up the good work and went on inside the bar!

I never get tired of hearing the stories of God's faithfulness and how He works in people's lives. Uncle Cloy told more stories, and has many more to tell. Someone should be writing them down!