God's Formula = "x + 1"

This will be our last blog entry until we return from the Central California Coast following Austin & Meagan's wedding. Tomorrow morning we leave as a family of "x" and once again return as a Kruggel family of "x + 1", only this time not by birth or adoption, but by marriage. I believe we've now exhausted the ways to add numbers to our family surname. All of these methods are mere tangible expressions of the same manner God adds members to His family. We must be born ("You must be born again.", said Jesus in John 3:7b), we must be adopted ("He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself", said Paul in Ephesians 1:5a), and we must enter into marriage ("He who has the bride is the bridegroom," said John the Baptist in John 3:29a).

I have personally experienced all three of these physical modes of expanding a family; first born as a German, later adopted and naturalized, and now married. And it all started with the last first. "... a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh." (Genesis 2:24) And so it was with me when I first asked Victoria to be my bride while standing on that park side vista in Highland Park overlooking the Emerald City with a little diamond ring slipped over a long-stemmed red rose. And so it also was when an unassuming soul first introduced me to Jesus and He took me as His, never to leave my side or forsake His love. When I slipped that second ring over Victoria's finger several months after slipping the first on that crystal clear evening, I forever became hers. In the same way when I completely saw Jesus for who He was that very first time, He forever became mine. Birthing Austin, Annie and Barret, and adopting Poppy and Willow grew our family to what it is today, and marrying Meagan Kirkpatrick into Meagan Kruggel will grow it into what it forever shall be after May 23rd. There's now no separating any of us.

Every time a new member is added, we ask ourselves how this will impact the dynamics of our family or how our love can extend beyond the boundaries we currently know. And yet each time God has introduced another to the Kruggel name we find that we're more complete than we were before, and in similar fashion we find that our love stretches beyond our perceived capacities, much like a balloon filling with air to the point where you think it's going to pop but it just keeps accepting more. I'm beginning to believe there's no limit to man's love (or if there is it's yet to be pinnacled), just as there's no limit to God's. And yet I'd be a fool to think the two are comparable, and I'd also be a fool to think the two are separable. "We love, because He first loved us" (I John 4:19), and apart from Him the capacity to be like Him is unattainable.

God's formula for adding to His household is one by one, "x + 1". For as long as He prolongs our lives, our formula will also remain the same, believing that the limits are endless until He puts an end to our limit. So here's to Meagan Kirkpatrick, soon to be Meagan Kruggel. Welcome to our abode, and thank you for allowing us to love you as our own.

(Tom) The Kruggel Seven, + 1