Perpetual Surrender
Next week my eleven-year-old son will be leaving for sixth grade science camp. This is a four night, five day camp all sixth graders in our area have the opportunity to attend with their school. It’s a right of passage, you might say. It will also be his first time leaving home without us… ever. He’s not nervous. Not one iota.
He’s the baby of our family: fiercely independent with a strong propensity for adventure. The camp is hardly an hour away but Justice has said he wishes it was farther, such is his desire to prove himself. I can’t say I blame him. At sixteen I had my pick of countries for a summer mission trip and I remember purposefully choosing Australia because it was the most miles from home, the literal opposite side of the world. Like me, Justice will set off on this venture to uncharted territory with nothing but confidence and a sleeping bag (and hopefully some deodorant).
I’ll try not to worry. I’ll hope he remembers all we’ve taught him about good hygiene, including others, and staying true to himself. I’ll hope he gets enough sleep, pays attention, and doesn’t let the words of others get to him. I will watch him leave and I will pray he makes good choices, stays safe, and comes home with at least one new friend. It won’t be easy. Letting our child go never is.
This is Justice’s final year of elementary school and it feels he and I are navigating an ever-mounting tension. There’s this constant push and pull. We’re both desperate for him to make his own decisions, take risks, and learn the hard way, but we’re both fearful he’ll take a wrong step, forget something important, or get irreparably hurt. He doesn’t want me to intercede, but he still needs me to fill in the gaps. I want him to step up and take ownership, show more responsibility, gain my trust, but oh, he’s still just a young boy and we both know he’s not quite ready to go it alone. It’s a fight between wanting to coddle and stay hands off. The tween years are so very grey. One foot is still in childhood while the other is in young adulthood. I can model, teach, impart wisdom, and pray, (lather, rinse repeat), day after day, year after year, but at some point I’ll need to sit back and see how much of it sticks.
My child’s greatest weaknesses have been his downfall more than once. I can drive myself crazy worrying if he’ll ever be able shake them. The consequences of his sin at eleven are nothing compared to the consequences he’ll face in adulthood. I can fret myself to death wondering if he’ll hold fast to his salvation, to his belief in a God who sees, loves, and hears him when the threats of the evil one draw near. When he stumbles, I will wonder if I’ve done enough to protect him, to help him, to make him feel loved and known. But it’s really not up to me, is it? Fellow writer, Anjuli Paschall, said it well: “My kids aren’t vending machines. I can’t deposit time, energy, and love and expect a certain outcome. I can deposit all of me into their slow-growing souls, and they might still turn their backs on each other, Jesus, or what I think is best for them.” I’m learning to surrender to this hard truth.
I wonder how the mother of Moses felt as she placed her infant son in a basket and laid him in the reeds of the river (Exodus 2:3). Sending your child away to protect them from extermination ordered by an evil dictator, I realize, is not at ALL the same as sending your sixth grader off to science camp, but bear with me here. The Bible tells us Moses’ mother, Jochebed, kept him hidden for three months. She did all she could, for as long as she could, to protect him from Pharaoh’s edict (Exodus 1:22-2:2). She nursed him, held him, poured all her love and energy into being everything he needed. But there came a time when she knew she needed to let him go. When she could no longer shelter him, she trusted her son to the God who could. Jochebed’s tremendous faith led her to place her precious child in a basket and hide him in the riverbank. Any fate could have met him there: predators in the river, Egyptian soldiers, illness, hunger, dehydration. Imagine her worry. Imagine her fear. Imagine her wondering, as most mothers do, “Have I done enough?” Have I done enough to protect him? Have I set him up for success? If the worst should happen, will it be because of me?
Like the mother of Moses, we can’t know what will become of our children once we send them off, but we can trust God will draw them out of the river for His purposes. There are many beautiful themes and lessons to gather from Moses’ story, but one of my favorites might be this: perpetual surrender. You see, if you keep reading, you’ll see Jochebed’s act of relinquishing her child to the Lord wasn’t a one time thing. Moses was discovered by the Egyptian princess and returned to Jochebed to nurse until he was weaned. How tempting it must have been for Jochebed keep Moses then! But the Bible says, “Later, when the boy was older, his mother brought him back to Pharaoh’s daughter, who adopted him as her own son” (Exodus 2:10). Not once, but twice, Moses’ mother let him go.
Beyond his infancy, Jochebed waited in slavery as her son grew up in the Pharaoh’s palace. She continued waiting as he fled from Egypt, wanted by Pharaoh for murder. While Moses was marrying and starting a family in Midian, she and her people continued to groan and cry out to God from bondage (Exodus 2:11-24). In just a few verses we ride Jochebed’s emotional roller coaster: Moses’ rescue, his adoption, his growing up, his crime, his escape, his marriage, and ultimately, his calling. The whole time she was suffering in captivity. Watch and wait, patience and prayer, perpetual surrender: the plight of a mother. What was it all for? Because Jochebed trusted God’s greater purpose and plan for her child, millions of people were saved (Exodus 12:37).
Precious mamas, our children were God’s before they were ever ours. Stay patient. Stay on your knees. Surrender perpetually. That is enough. You are doing enough. He will draw them out of the water for His good and for His glory.