I unintentionally took a very LONG blog break but really do want to be more intentional about writing here. The Lord keeps reminding me that there are more stories to be told.
Recently, my son came home from school complaining that he “was the only one in his entire class” who didn’t have a particular electronic device. I had to laugh at the dramatics but I do remember being his age when it felt like everyone else was doing something or had something that I wanted. I told him that I was pretty sure that he wasn’t the only one who didn’t have this and that there would be a lot of things that his friends would have that he wouldn’t and vice versa. My husband and I explained to him that the addition of this particular device wouldn’t be beneficial to our family, that it would take away time from doing the things that we enjoyed doing as a family and it would be another distraction to fight against.
Parenting doesn’t come with an instruction book. Today, it’s even more challenging to parent in a digital age. I was reading in Joshua 24 about choosing who we serve. Joshua 24: 14-15 (ESV) 14 “Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. 15 And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” I was struck by these words. The Israelites were in the Promised Land but they were still faced with a choice of how they would live.
I wrote these words in my Bible as I read the passage: “As for me and my family, we will worship the Lord. It’s about standing up, standing firm, and often going against the flow, the current culture and society- of what is current, acceptable and even expected. It’s about proclaiming the the Truth, denying ourselves and following the Lord. Our family will look different at times and that’s okay. I’m not raising world followers, but world changers and Jesus followers. Choose for ourselves today, each day has a choice: to go against the current and go upstream or just go with the flow.”
Each day is a choice in how we live, how we spend our time, who we serve. Let’s start swimming against the current.