Roots

The widespread arms of a stately oak offer shade to the whitewashed clapboard church where our ancestors once worshiped. Like the oak whose roots grow deep, our family roots are here, at least five generations deep.

On the first Sunday in October we gather at Mt. Enon Cemetery for Homecoming. At half past noon the dinner bell clangs,  the crowd circles, and the food is blessed. We catch up with relatives and friends over a covered dish luncheon and a glass of sweet iced tea ladled from a #2 washtub. The annual business meeting of the Association follows.

Mt. Enon Homecoming has been a tradition for as far back as I can remember.  In college, I drove 300 miles home for this event all four years. As a newlywed living in north Georgia, I came home for Mt. Enon.  One year we drove into the wee hours of the morning from North Carolina where we had attended a Saturday evening wedding. 

It's just that important to us.

For us, it is a sacred place, a place of peace, of final rest. Our mother is buried in our family plot at Mt. Enon.  Our grandparents, great aunts & uncles, cousins ... our ancestors - ones we knew and ones we never knew - are interred at Mt. Enon.  In time, we, too, will be laid to rest here.

I am grateful for my roots. Not everyone is as fortunate as we are to have deep roots, to have a place that will always be home. 

I am grateful, too, that I have roots in Him and that my roots continue to grow deeper in Him.

Let your roots grow down into Him, and let your lives be built on Him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught and you will overflow with thankfulness. Colossians 2:7

Your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong.  Ephesians 3:17b 

In a Nutshell
I am thankful for my roots. 
What special traditions does your family have?