Continued from yesterday’s blog:
After our hour-and-a-half church service in our pajamas, Michael,
our 14-year-old, asked if he could talk to Lisa and I alone. In tears he began to express how hard life in Africa is. How much he misses his friends, his
grandparents, football, and just the ease of life in America.
We ministered to him,
prayed and he left. Tyler
came up to our room and asked if he could talk. Then Alexis, then Emily – we
spent the next few hours hearing, in general, the same story from each our
kids. Many tears, a lot of confession and then break through…
Lisa and I would love nothing more then to “Fix” our kids
problems. Make them comfortable, buy them what they need, move them home; our
first reaction is to jump in and make everything right for them!
But, God
didn’t ask us to “fix” everything for them and to just make them happy. He
asked us disciple them, raise them up to always depend and expect things from
Him, not us.
We told them what my dad used to teach me about God; we look
at your lives all at once. We ask God for His eyes so we can see you now, and
at age 20, 30, 40 – we ask God to show us what your marriages look like, your
children, our grandchildren, and we make our decisions from that perspective,
not today’s.
Press in; embrace what God is doing in your life. He is jealous to
be your best friend, your father, your lover – He wants your total affection
and He has given you the opportunity to find it here in Africa.
When you get this, you get everything! You will never have to come around the
mountain of making God your all again, if you will do it now!
The heaviness lifted, the confusion was gone. As we
individually prayed for each of our Children, they came alive in the fact that
they are gaining way more then Lisa and I could ever give them – they are
getting Luke 6, the Kingdom of God!
