If you are a mom and have sent your child to school this past week, how did you react to saying goodbye? Perhaps you breathed a sigh of relief and ran straight home to have a cup of coffee in peace, or maybe you threw on your tennis gear and headed to the courts for some uninterrupted fun?
Well, if you’re like me, you came home to an oddly quiet house and ran the video of the last 5 years with your child through your mind stopping to edit the places where you might have messed up somehow. Did you play often, love enough, plant the seed of confidence, lay the proper foundation to which your child will navigate through life only to come back full circle blaming you for the times you unjustly made them eat their peas? Did you give them ENOUGH peas? When the blame game is finished you think about the huge building your child is in, alone and with no one to hug if the tears start to flow. What if she gets lost, left out, or horror of all horrors…what if she gets lice?
As the fears flooded my mind, I began to realize that they were MY fears, not my child’s. My daughter practically ran all the way to school. The excitement in her eyes and her eagerness to soak up every word the teacher had to offer told me she was ready.
While looking at the pictures I took of my daughter in her class I thought, there she is, part of me, but also an individual. This huge milestone is just one tiny step she is taking away from me and away from my protective arms. (What must moms of college kids be going through?!)
I take comfort in knowing that although I am letting go for a short while each day, God will never let my little girl go. Knowing HE has his loving arms around my greatest treasure helps me to let go and let God.
And suddenly my “oddly quiet” house is filled with His reassuring words.
“And Peter said, “See, we have left our homes and followed you.” And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life.”
Luke 18:28-30 ESV
Posted by Karen Harrison
No comments:
Post a Comment