Graduation

My oldest child graduates in a few weeks, and will start college in the fall. My time as his authority has been slipping away over the last year, and it will soon be gone forever. As a college student he will be increasingly faced with the temptations of the world, and at the same time have more freedom to follow those temptations.

This morning I read Psalm 106; this is a concise history of Israel. Look at the list of what the people of Israel did over the years:

They gave no thought
Did not remember
Rebelled
God saved
They forgot
Did not wait
Gave in to craving
Wasting disease
They grew envious
Earthquakes and fire
They made an idol
Forgot God
Destruction, but Moses stood in the breach
Despised
Did not believe
Grumbled
Did not obey
Promise of coming judgment
Yoked themselves to idols
Sacrificed to idols
Provoked God to anger
Plague, Phineas stood and intervened
Angered the Lord
Rebelled
Moses sinned
Did not destroy enemies
Mingled with unbelievers
Adopted their customs
Worshipped their idols
Sacrificed their sons and daughters
Defiled themselves
Prostituted themselves
God was angry and sent them into exile
They were oppressed
God delivered, many times
They were bent on rebellion
They wasted away in their sin

So often the pattern of our lives follows that of the nation of Israel. Is it any wonder that we are concerned for our children as they go out into the world on their own? We have prepared them and taught them as best we could, but now comes the test. Will they pass? Will they remember what they have been taught? Will they trust God for themselves, by themselves? Will they take my faith and make it their own?

Lord, I pray for my son. I pray that you would hold him as you have held me, that you would keep him as you have kept me. I pray that your Word and your Presence would be a living thing in his heart and his mind, and that his conscience would be sensitive to Your Spirit. I pray that you would put godly friends in his life who would encourage him in his walk with You. I pray that you would put godly teachers in his life who would consistently point him to You. I pray that success and failure alike would drive him to his knees before You. I pray that he would seek You above all else, and that You would conform him into the image of Your Son. I pray that he would always be able to see and remember and know that I love him and am proud of him, and that home is a safe place. Amen.

Rebecca A Givens, 05/2008