It often feels that their walk into destiny is actually a walk away from us. A recurring thought I’ve had as we raised our sons was that they were trying to move away from us. See when they crawled, they crawled away; when they walked, they walked away; when they ran, they ran away, we taught them to ride bikes, they peddled away, they got their licenses, they drove away. Now we see them in pursuit of independence and finding their voices. The problem we are having is they are fighting to get independence from us and their voices rarely sound like us. It’s a painful job this calling to be a parent.
It’s getting more painful all the time because the world is getting scarier and increasingly unsafe. On top of that we are the generation that has over indulged and over protected our children. We have cared more about their comfort than their character development. We have done everything we could to keep them from pain – every sharp corner covered, every outlet protected, “baby on board” signs in every minivan. We haven’t wanted them to feel the pain of losing either, so now every sports participant gets a t-shirt and a trophy for just showing up. We call their bosses if they get harsh evaluations at work. I recently heard a professor interviewed and he said “parental intervention is getting out of control”. He was further quoted as saying “that for the first time in 30 years he was having to regularly defend grades to parents of undergrad and grad students a like”.
We must stop the madness of constant interference. These young people are actually God’s plan to bring in the next great harvest. The work is going to be hard, painful, lonely, humbling, and even dangerous. We can’t run behind our children any longer with pillows trying to soften the pain that God himself may be orchestrating.
Our young adults need an alternative to our interference. They need places that will offer initiation into adulthood. They need places to find their voices and independence. They need places to be exposed to real pain and have the Holy Spirit ask, “What will you do about it”? They need places with close community that will challenge the behaviors and attitudes that we have previously excused. In short, they need places to grow up and grow away from us.
The World Race is one of these places and it provides this kind of discipleship. It offers ministry in tough places internationally while bringing ministry to tough places internally.
Real discipleship should offer real ministry while providing a real invitation to real maturity.
The world needs our kids and we need to let them go!!!
