Amazing

I must share this story of our evening and how we wound up hanging around the park this Memorial evening for 2 1/2 hours with an amazing group of people. So after I got off work, Jered and I drove over to Sar Ko Par Park b/c there was a rumor that there might be a climbing wall inside the coffee shop inside the church adjacent to the park. I wanted to run, so we drove straight from Target to the park where I changed and Jered just planned on journaling and poetry writing since it was so crazy nice outside.

So I'm on my fourth or fifth lap around the lake when I see Jered standing and talking to two people. This is not uncommon. Jered knows just about everybody in this city and wherever we go, he falls into conversation with some old friend of his. Jered motions me to stop and pull out my earbuds so he can say something. He then tells me that these people are grilling and want to feed us. I say what I usually do in such circumstances, "Sure, Dear." Then away I went.

Okay. Turns out Jered does not know these people. They simply asked him if they could use the picnic table he was sitting at because it was next to a grill and they were having a group of friends join them for dinner and they had jokingly invited us along. He'd ultimately said he'd just move to the next picnic table and he hoped they had a good dinner. I joined him there after my run and as I sat recuperating  (it was dang hot outside!), one of the gals that Jered had been talking to walked over to us and thanked him for moving. Then she said that No, Really, We were very much invited over for dinner if we wanted. It was just a group of young couples and they had plenty of food.

 Jered and I looked at each other and she shrugged and walked away and for a moment, neither of us spoke. Being randomly invited to things by complete strangers is not something unknown to us and we've been known to accept many a such invitation. Truth was, we'd had no plans this evening but to chill and relax after a long weekened and gather our strength for the chaos that was this coming week. But Free Food?? And grilled food no less. With some friendly people (friends!!!!) who happened to be our age. We would've been completely senseless not to agree (although perhaps a little awkwardly).

They were a group of young adults and they were just hanging out. The only "Group of Young Adults" who bring their picnic blankets and kids to a park are undoubtedly Christian so I asked what church they go to and they do in fact go to some church in the area (who's name I can't recall currently). We told them that we attended church as well and low and behold, we weren't strangers anymore. We were a gathering of Believers on this Monday evening breaking bread together. It was beautiful. They were all couples and every single last blessed couple (save one) was either pregnant or had a baby (read: less than a year old. . .no kidding). There were probably about six couples plus us and they were all every single last one of them our age (read: between 24-33).

It was a fabulous time and the Father provided food and fellowship and we soaked it up like the dried out flowering desert plants we are. In the midst of these hard decisions we face and the drying financial land before us, the Lord is good and He provides what we need. Even if we need to take those first awkward steps and say, "sure. We'd love to eat with you."

And all night, as more couples came, they looked at us and shook our hands and laughed with us then asked, "so are you friends with Ross & Helen?" Then the story got told of how Jered got kicked off his picnic table and the evening ended with the exchanging of numbers and emails and invites to future events. And coincidently, Jered did wind up knowing one of the guys who was there with his wife & daughter. They hadn't seen each other in twelve years and they'd played basketball together & had attended VOX. I chatted with his wife and we exchanged numbers and I told her just say, "Hello. This is Kaitlyn from The Park."

It's just Amazing. Simply amazing.