Letting go

"
The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail."
Isaiah 58:11 NIV

This is the season of goodbyes as parents rush around organizing high school open houses for their soon to be graduates, their graduates anticipating with both happiness and sadness what lies ahead. It is also the season of college graduations as many watch their adult child begin to test their wings of flight and soar into the hitherto wonder of life's next chapter. 

Like a mighty crescendo, the child becomes an adult living on their own for the first time, away from the comfort of mom and dad's watchful eye, making their decisions for the first time on their own. Dad, especially, worries about those decisions their adult child makes and tries to occasionally put in his many years of wisdom into the situations without realizing that unwanted wisdom isn't well received.

Being a parent is never easy.  Choices have to be made each day of a child's life to give them increasing independence and freedom. 

When a child is born, we convince ourselves that our time with them will last forever, not realizing that each year of their life will be different in many respects. Parents who have lost a child way before their time, learn quickly the pain that is often associated with 'letting go'.\ as they struggle with the many regrets and what if's after that loss.

 We desperately try to overcompensate for the deceased child by over protecting the rest of them. In a sense, we become the helicopter parents we were hoping never to be.

While we jokingly search for that button that forever keeps them small, most see the value of letting their kids grow up. 

Families from small towns realize the importance of letting go so much sooner than in larger metropolitan areas simply because they know that if there are fewer opportunities for their child if they stayed. 

So often, it seems, we try to live our lives through our children. Like the fans in the stands, we cheer them on with every success. Taken to the extreme, we try to get our kids to be successful where we never were. We enroll them in after-school sports programs thinking if we only gave them a head start they will gain that all important sports scholarship at the college of their choice.

 We think about all of the 'what if's' when we were younger as if we can help our children avoid the same mistakes we made at their age. We want to quite literally remove the pain of growing up from their shoulders and place it on our own.

 While there is the pain in parenting, we have a mighty Savior who is has taken the pain of mankind and placed it on His shoulders.  Each time you feel sad about the prospects of missing your child, cry out to God because he will meet you where you're at.

 In Isaiah, I'm reminded of this passage, "The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail."  

You can be assured as your child's parents that our Lord loves your child as much and more than you did. He has promised that when the time comes where you must 'let go' that he will give you the strength to do so. 

That, my friends, is an awesome thought!

7 A Samaritan woman went to get some water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink of water.” 8 (His disciples had gone into the city to buy some food.)
9 The Samaritan woman asked him, “How can a Jewish man like you ask a Samaritan woman like me for a drink of water?” (Jews, of course, don’t associate with Samaritans.)
10 Jesus replied to her, “If you only knew what God’s gift is and who is asking you for a drink, you would have asked him for a drink. He would have given you living water.”



On my first full day of my 'staycation,' my wife and I did a variety of chores around our home before taking our son's labrador retriever on a lengthy walk through Bunker Hills Regional park. Once returning home we had supper before we decided to venture to the movie theater in town to watch the latest rendition of 'Beauty and the Beast.

At the theater, we picked our choice of seats, seats that recline, and went into the theater. Next to us were a mother and daughter, with the traditional but modern hijab, who were also there to enjoy this movie.

Later that evening, I was reminded of the biblical story of Jesus at the well when he had a conversation with a Samaritan woman, someone the Jewish people weren't supposed to talk to, but yet Jesus knew everything about this woman and wanted her to know that He had what she truly needed which was 'living water'. I couldn't help but see the parallel between the Samaritans of that time period and today's people of the Muslim faith. Also, I couldn't help but see the thousands of Muslim people coming to Jesus every day because of their dreams of seeing Jesus.

Perhaps, I thought, God, has sent us these people  to find the 'living water?' Perhaps, our response should not be a response to 'fear' but a response of 'love'? Instead of hating these people and building walls, we ought to give them a cup of cold water and learn to be their friend?

 Franklin Delano Roosevelt said one time, "there is nothing to fear, but fear itself". I think it is a reminder to all of us to focus on what we have in common with each other, not our differences.

I'm proud of my city of Coon Rapids, a city that has chosen to embrace diversity, not fear it. In a way, it is like the city of St. Louis Park I grew up in with its diversity of Jewish and Japanese immigrants who were prevented from settling in other suburbs because of their backgrounds. To this day, I have memories of hearing the stories of our Japanese American neighbors next door who were once forced into WWII camps despite being American citizens. I also remember the stories of Jewish Nazi concentration camp neighbors--all because my city embraced diversity.

Our God sent his son, Jesus, to die for all people of all diverse backgrounds and it is our job as believers to love them just as Jesus shared this living water with the Samaritan woman at the well.

2 Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
When you think about it, it is amazing that over 2000 years ago God came to earth in the form of a baby boy to teach us what it means to be humble and human.  

God saw up until that time men doing terrible things when given the reigns of leadership, ugly and horrible things. He watched as the slaves in Eygpt suffered under the power hunger of Pharaoh who was filled with making his figurehead bigger and greater than God himself. 

 God protected a little baby named Moses by sending him safely through the waters of the Nile only to be found by Pharoah's daughter.For it was in that time that Pharoah had become upset by the mere fact that the Israeli slaves were increasing in numbers that he passed a decree that any boys that were born to the Jewish people would have to be killed. Pharoah was upset that his kingdom would soon be overrun by the Israelites. Well, Moses grew into a man as one of Pharoah's sons that God used his prestige to eventually rescue the Jewish slaves from captivity. 

I'm reminded every day that God is the source of my life. Each Sunday I attend Church, I humble myself as I take in the worship music and the teaching from the pulpit.   God continues to be doing a mighty work in those who love Him. Every day I'm amazed at the personal testimonies that flow out of people's lives of how He changed them, how he healed them of emotional afflictions, and certainly physical ones as well. 

On countless of occasions, doctors have given their patients good news and prefaced it by saying, "I'm not sure how this happened, but it looks like the cancer is in remission."  Many fall short of calling it a miracle, but those who believe know it was.

Just as God did for the Israelite's, God desires to walk with you through whatever journey you are on.  Unlike Pharoah who thought much higher of himself than others around him, God humbled himself in the form of a baby who eventually would become the Savior of the world!  

I may not know what you're going through in life, but Jesus Christ does. Won;t you humble yourself in prayer asking Him to walk with your in this life?  As Revelations 3:20 illustrates if you open up the door to your heart Jesus will come in and help you through whatever suffering comes your way in this life. He will take all of the messiness in your life and turn it into a beautiful work of art suitable for framing in the finest gallery. 

Yes, there is beauty in humility.