To teenage children,
(and their parents)
God is my father. And I am yours. It is in this relationship with you that I learn more about my relationship with God than ever before. Some days, that is depressing because I know I am not as faithful as God is. Other days that is helpful because I can see from the other side of the conflict and I realize the relationship has been restored. Here is what I mean.
I feel like I have so many wonderful gifts to give you. I can see things from a different viewpoint as you do. I have the advantage of experience and age. And I see so many traps set to hurt and destroy you both now and in the future. And I know that you don’t even realize that most of them exist. Others, you don’t know how to recognize. And still others, you see but you don’t realize they are traps. I want to tell you about them. I want to warn you about the troubles that live here. I want to teach you how to recognize what is dangerous and what is helpful. I want to teach you how to navigate these and how to recover when you fall in them. This is the biggest desire I have in life, to give these gifts I have to you.
But you are so smart and your intelligence has skyrocketed over the past few years. So now you scorn my wisdom. You mock it. You fully trust in your own intellect and believe you have no need for the things that I can offer. You are currently discovering all the ways in which you are different from everybody else. So, you no longer believe me when I talk about the other ways in which you are exactly the same as everyone else. You are absolutely unique. You are a one-of-a-kind person. But you are not a different species, you’re still a person. And so I want to share with you things that are common to all people regardless of their individuality.
But you ignore what I have offer. You belittle and argue,confident that if it were true, you would see it and know it without any help from me.
I can clearly see aspects of the road that lies ahead of you. And I remain confident, just as I have always been, that you have a wonderful future ahead of you. But I also know that it is a treacherous road. And without the guidance of someone that has walked down it before, your progress will be much slower than it could be. There are many voices that will offer you guidance but mine seems to be the last one that you will ever consider accepting.
It is so disheartening at times. I have cared for you and guided you along for many years before you had a choice to except or reject my wisdom. And that has put you in a place of unlimited potential. But now you have a choice and immediately, and at every turn, you reject me. It is almost as if you are seeking to prove all of the ways that lead to disaster rather than simply walk the healthy road!
But I guess that’s the only way that you can gain enough confidence in this wisdom that you will be able to own it for yourself one day. I guess, as painful as it is for me to watch, it is necessary. Because one day you’ll be a parent. And you will have the awesome and overwhelming task of leading children with your wisdom. And if you do not test the limits you may never understand the grave danger. And then you may never truly be so emotionally invested that your heart feels as though it has been ripped out every time one of those young ones disregard the gifts you are trying to give them.
So maybe it actually is a valuable and necessary thing that you reject my gifts for a season. But don’t think that means that I will ever be comfortable experiencing that and watching you go on that path. Because I also know that many people through the ages have gotten lost going down the wrong road and never made it back to realize that potential glorious future that once laid ahead of them.
So I guess being a father means experiencing rejection and betrayal. Being a father means having to watch your children fail and sabotage themselves. But you should also know that being a father means that I will never give up speaking truth and offering these gifts of wisdom, truth, and love to you. I will never change my mind about the truth I have learned through experience simply because of your desires. The truth is eternal because it came from my father and was true for his father as well. It’s timeless.
I now know being a father redefines sacrifice. I used to think of sacrifice as something I would do to benefit someone else. I never realized that the majority of the sacrifices I make will never even be received by the people that I make them for. You see, I am sacrificing for you. I sacrifice peace, comfort, and rest. And instead I take on pain, anxiety, and suffering. I do this by continuing to love you even as I watch you harm yourself. Can there be any greater torture than watching someone you love hurt themselves repeatedly and knowing that you are powerless to stop it until they make a different choice! Yet the job of a father undoubtedly includes this aspect as well as the more celebrated parts.
In society, we often glorify roles of leadership such as fatherhood. And we neglect to remind each other that good leaders also carry the burden and pain associated with the growing pains of life. I don’t write this letter to my son because it is something he needs to understand today. I write this letter to myself so that I can see that God could say the very same things about the way I have treated him as I have written about my son. Surely God would word some things a little differently. Certainly, God would have a slightly different perspective because he is infinitely more holy than I could ever be. But if I contemplate the similarity between my relationship with my children and my relationship with my heavenly father it gives me insight. First, it reminds me of the universal condition of humanity. It reminds me that the faithfulness and hope that I am called to maintain for my kids are nothing compared to that which God exercised on my behalf. Secondly, it gives me a clear view of the end result. After a period of testing the universal laws of this world, I came to a moment of brokenness where I agreed that I was not nearly as wise as I had once believed. I relented in my pursuit to live a life governed by internal wisdom and I surrendered to the supremacy of an eternal wisdom. It was the same decision that my father had to make and his father before him. And it is the same decision that my children and grandchildren and great grandchildren will have to make for themselves.
And yes, it can be extremely scary because of the untold multitudes of people that get so lost that they never find their way back to the true wisdom and receive the gifts the great father is giving them. But the calling of a father is not to doubt or despair. My job is simply to continue offering the gifts. My responsibility is to continue to offer the gifts of wisdom, faith, and love no matter how often or how much they are rejected. It is then and only then that I can find rest and place my trust in my father to bring about the best results possible.
