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There are moments in life in which God catches our attention, and gives us opportunity to reflect. One of those moments came for me during a church fellowship dinner.  I happened to look toward the kitchen and notice two of our young dads, Matthais and Justin, standing next to each other, each holding their little boys. It was a heart warming scene. As I watched though, I realized that my own 10 year old daughter was sitting on my lap, and I wondered how much longer before she would stop crawling up into my lap to sit.  It dawned on me that as Matthias and Madison, and Justin and Brooke are just embarking on the journey of parenthood, the season of little kids has closed for me and Kim. Car seats and diapers have given way to band concerts and ball practice. My how fast the past 16 years have gone since my oldest son Collin was the age of these two young gaffers. In less than three years Collin will be off to college!

What season in life and parenting are you?

Ecclesiastes 3:1 says that “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.”

With parenting, we often wish we were in a different season, mistakenly thinking that the next season will be easier while missing the special moments of joy God grants us that day. For each season of life and of parenting is a good gift from God and part of His perfect plan for our lives. Unfortunately, the busyness, demands, and frustrations of life can cause us to forget this truth.

An example of this forgetfulness came to me immediately after the fellowship dinner described above. We came home to find that some sheep had jumped the pen (the day before) and my boys had failed to notice them in the wrong pen without water when they had done chores. I was not very happy and immediately forgot the precious moment of reflection I had just an hour earlier. Later that night though, as I was praying, God convicted me and reminded me once again what is truly important.

I was reading from Ecclesiastes 2 and the phrase “vanity and a striving after wind” kept coming up. Parenting can certainly seem like a striving after the wind when after tidying the bathroom for the third time in a day the kids come in and throw their dirty clothes all over the floor. Yet, I wonder if this “vanity and striving” phrase could also be applied to some of the goals we encourage our children towards? For example, our sheep will all eventually die no matter how many ribbons they win at shows or how good the care is given them. The little league all-star championship game will eventually be forgotten, and all who hold that memory will someday pass from this earth. Is this what King Solomon meant by “vanity and a striving after wind?” In verse 16 Solomon lamented that there is “no enduring remembrance,” and the fact that all men die no matter how wise or what they have achieved.

This thought so burdened Solomon that he wrote in verse 17 that he “hated life.” And I must admit that there have been times when in the stress of work, kid’s activities, ministry obligations, and trying to fix everything that keeps breaking around me, I have found myself hating life as well.

In these times though, I am making the same mistake as Solomon- I am taking my eyes off the Lord and focusing on the stuff and problems of this world. We live in a culture that idolizes wealth, pleasure, fame, and personal autonomy; all of which are fleeting and fail to provide lasting satisfaction (this is the “vanity and a striving after wind” Solomon was taking about). As a parent we need to be careful that we are not modeling for our kids materialism. We instead need to look at the events of each day through God’s eyes and with eternity in mind.

Solomon claimed that there is no enduring remembrance, but there is someone who does remember: God! Through all the seasons, we are parenting with God at our side. In His great power and wisdom, the Lord takes the mistakes of both us and our children and He uses them for our good and His glory (Romans 8:28). Nothing is a surprise to the Lord and He is always ready with grace to forgive.  God sees all the sacrifices we make as a parent and He is pleased. Though the sheep show and ball game are just passing moments in this life, they are filled with opportunities to learn eternal lessons and moments of joy God has planned purposefully to bless us.

This Father’s Day remember that God is our heavenly Father. He uses our parenting journey to help us better understand His love for us. He is both our Father and our children’s Father, and as much as you love your child, He loves you and your children more.