25 years later: God is still faithful

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by the choice in front of you, and the choice felt like the biggest choice in your life? Have you ever said to God, “Could you just send me a bolt of lightning and let me know what you want me to do, please? Could you make it easy for me and tell me what the right answer is???” Wouldn’t it be nice if God worked that way? But one of the biggest mysteries is how God allows you free choice AND is still in control; which means He doesn’t always just tell you what to do! The truth is, He lets you choose, but He will be with you in your choice and grow you in good ways that you could never imagine. We recently went on a trip to visit colleges for my daughter, who is a senior. She has made it very clear that she wants to explore and try different things, experience a way of living different from where we live now. It’s been a hard thing to accept, but I felt the exact same way as a 17 year old. I told everyone that I wanted to go to an Ivy League school and did not want to stay in the Midwest, and my parents let me go. So now, it’s my turn to let my daughter go. Going on this trip was both good and hard for many reasons. As I sat listening to the admissions officer for the 4th college we had visited in as many days, I began to feel overwhelmed, thinking about all the information we had to organize, and how on earth was my daughter going to decide where to go? And all the forms we had to fill out, all the deadlines, all the MONEY!! When I was a prospective 17 year old going on all these tours, everything seemed exciting and the possibilities endless—-I didn’t sweat the details like I do now as a mom. My mind immediately started going to the practical. Can we afford this? How will we get her back home for holidays? How will we be able to call her with a three hour time difference? My mind was not going to the right places. Instead of thinking more about where God wants her to be, what He wants her to learn, and where she might best grow into the adult God wants her to be, I was thinking more about how WE could get her where she should be. I was forgetting that though we have choice, God’s hand in her life means she will go where she is meant to go, no matter what the price tag looked like or how far the distance. He has a perfect place for her, and that place will provide her with the experiences she needs to grow the way He wants her to WITHOUT me being there. What a hard thing for a mom to process!

How thankful I am that I know from personal experience God takes care of you through these formative college years. I was poignantly reminded of how God did this very same thing for me during the trip. My husband and I were able to take our daughter to our alma mater, a college we haven’t been back to in 25 years. It was so strange to see it, as it was both familiar (like coming home familiar) and also incredibly different than it was 25 years ago. So many new buildings, updates to old buildings, and missing buildings—- my first year dorm had been completely demolished, but my apartment that I lived in for 3 years looked like nothing had been done to it in those 25 years! I had old memories of walking down the same paths as an 18 year old super imposed on currently walking on the campus tour with my children, and it was like I was both there as a college student and as a mom of a soon-to-be college student at the same time. Our college sat on top of a pretty tall hill, and every day, I would walk down from the top to my dorm far, far below. It is an incredible view, with old gothic style dorms silhouetted by rolling hills, a sparkling lake, and the beautiful sunset. I would pause and stand at the edge before I started down, gazing out at the scenery, marveling that I was in this beautiful place. I remember feeling terrified and alone the first week, knowing only one other person amongst 16,000 other students, and suddenly realizing the enormity of being so far from home, from anything and anyone familiar.

And then I also remembered later in my college years, when it felt like home—-having lunch with people who became lifelong friends, swimming in the gorge, practicing piano for hours in the basement of the music hall, sitting in office hours with the other chemistry majors because none of us understood the lecture, singing on a stage with an acapella group, and the many Fridays I spent at our campus Intervarsity chapter. I had grown up a Christian, and considered myself a strong Christian, but I didn’t really know what that meant. In college, my faith really became MINE. I came into college not really thinking my faith needed to grow or change much, but realized quickly how naive that was. Of all the things I learned in college, the thing I did not expect, but ultimately learned was the most meaningful, was that if I put my trust in Jesus, and put Him first, everything else would follow as it should. Memories came of my spiritual growth—- how I was challenged my first year in college by an older friend engaging me in a debate about Jesus’s sacrifice and what it meant for my life; being encouraged to go on a missions trip for the first time, which led to a lifelong love for missions. I remember older Intervarsity friends mentoring me about my choices in dating, career, and friends. I remember feeling God so close by when I broke up with the boy I thought I was going to marry. I remember praying to God while I spent hours in a lab, asking him to help me get through my honors thesis. I remember singing in a room with 500 people in the audience and sharing the love of Jesus with them. I remember feeling God calling me away from my major and setting me on a career path that I would never have expected. All these things I never could have imagined when I first started, and God saw me through it all, good and bad.

And now as a mother, remembering all these things, I can be reassured that if my daughter wholeheartedly puts God first, and seeks his guidance, my daughter will be exactly where she is meant to be. He will provide the means and give us the certainty that her choice is the right one. And we pray that as she goes and continues to seek Jesus first, she will be amazed at all the experiences she will have, and all the ways she will grow and change in ways she can’t imagine. I pray that YOU too, learn all the amazing things God will do to you and for you as you seek to put Jesus first.