A Month of Gratitude, Day 5
November 27, 2008
It seemed appropriate on Thanksgiving Day, the day we gather together and express thanks for all the blessings in our lives, that I share the next installment of my ‘Gratitude’ series. Today the thing I am most grateful for, aside from my relationship with God, is my wonderful family – Kate, Ethan, and Andrew. My family means the world to me, and they are the fifth thing I am grateful for from my time at North Point. Let me explain.
As I mentioned in passing in an earlier post, I was single when I first started attending North Point. One of the things that I loved then, and still love today, about North Point is that they care about and focus on creating environments for single adults. These environments allow single adults to grow spiritually, to connect relationally, and to serve strategically – that is the goal of singles ministry at North Point. It’s unfortunate that most churches can’t or won’t reach out to this ever-growing segment of our culture. Too often singles are ignored or made to feel like their singleness is a problem to be solved, not a season of life to be leveraged for God’s glory. It is not North Point’s express goal to get singles married…but, sometimes it happens.
I first met Kate in 1999 through my good friend Scott Tanksley. 
Over the next couple years, Kate and I saw each other from time to time at singles events, parties or at 7|22, but we were just acquaintances. In 2000 when I left to work overseas for MAF, Kate joined my support team, and we corresponded sporadically over the following year. Ironically Kate had also left Atlanta during that time and was living and working on her family’s ranch in Wyoming. Kate moved back to Atlanta in 2001 to take a position with Ron Blue & Company, just a couple months before I returned to Atlanta from my time with MAF. We reconnected at 7|22 one night and made plans to meet for dinner to catch up. Kate offered to host and told me to invite any other friends I wanted. 
Conveniently I failed to invite anyone else, so it was just Kate and I. I still count this as our first date, though she says it doesn’t count. 
We were engaged six months later and married (in Crested Butte, Colorado) four months later on August 24, 2002. Our first son, Ethan, came along just two years later, and we were blessed a second time in 2007 when our son Andrew arrived.
I am so grateful to God for my family, and I am so thankful for the way God used North Point do deliver this blessing. North Point played such an important role in bringing Kate and I together, and it has been the community that has celebrated with us and supported us as we began our family. For this, I am forever grateful.
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