Cathy and Randy are a couple we know from church. The first time I saw a large square dining table was the first time I visited their home. That was also the first time I had felt such a warm, loving presence in anyone’s home.

Whenever I go to the Freeby’s house, a lump rises in my throat and I sometimes have to fight back tears. It’s quite surreal, actually, and very difficult to describe.

Besides in the presence of the Lord (that can happen anywhere), I have never felt such love and peace. But no wonder: Cathy and Randy are worshipers to their very core and they are loving and kind at all times. They exemplify the love of Christ on this earth.

Their three children are grown, young married couples. Until last winter when their two daughters moved back to town, Cathy and Randy visited them a few times a year in other states.

So much about this family is simply foreign to me: the kids moved away but not to “get away”; they moved back because of a strong, loving connection to one another and their parents; each family member is very much an individual AND an integral part of the whole…no outcasts, scapegoats or black sheep in the bunch. These people get together regularly…deliberately…to celebrate family.

That’s where the dining table comes in: it’s a large square…about 60″x60″; it caught my attention the day I first saw it, and its presence was beautifully obvious to me each time I visited. There was just something about it. What was it? What about this table demanded my notice?

I did finally figure it out a couple of weeks ago, when the kids and I participated in a Freeby birthday get-together: the table speaks “togetherness.” It invites celebration. It is perfectly suited for the unity their family shares.

It’s just so…Freeby!

My heart’s desire is that our when our children are adults, our family gets together deliberately — because we want to and need to, not because we have to. I’m blessed to see in the Freeby family a real-life example of what I hope for our family’s future.

© Alexa Lopez, 2008