Our sixth and seventh-born children are Daniel Wesley and Wesley Josiah. The were born in Knox County, Ohio. Daniel at home in our farm house out on Rutledge Road and Wesley on in our home on Apple Valley Drive a few miles away. Daniel and Wes spent four of the most significant years of their lives living with the family on the sixth floor of a hotel-turned-Christian-ministry. 16 stories. 450 rooms. Huge ballrooms and public areas. Downtown Flint, Michigan. I got them out of the building every time I had a chance.
In mid-April of 2005 I was invited to speak to a group of churches in southern Illinois. Dan and Wes and I went together. During the daytime we went on excursions including bike rides in a beautiful hilly park filled with banks of daffodils. It was a sunny, warm, beautiful early spring week.
Today Daniel is in the Gulf of Mexico on a company fishing trip. He is sending stunning pictures of sky and sun and water. He works all over Texas. He will marry in June. Wesley married in January. He and his wife, Dylan live in West Michigan, but only the Lord knows where life will take them. I wouldn’t be surprised to see them in Africa some day.
But back in the spring of 2005 we had a few days together in the sun. We slept in the same room. We had a few meals together and some long, quiet car rides, as when evening fell we grabbed out Bibles and met with some brothers and sisters at the church and tried to be a blessing.
Sometimes in the spring of the year I remember that trip. It was just an ordinary trip, but it’s an extraordinary memory.