So last week – Last Friday, to be precise – I left the house earlier than usual, just so I could make it to church before 11am. That’s right, the kids are back in school, and that means that I need to put on my handy-dandy ‘chaplain’ hat and talk to them about Jesus in the amount of time entrusted to me.
And I thought I was prepared. We were talking about Psalm 139, and then Psalm 140-141 in the recent months, in order to elaborate on the theme that God is the One who protects us from enemies both domestic and foreign. I didn’t think I was going to go that deep with the kids – I thought I’d start out with telling them, just as I told the congregation, that our God is a Mindful, Present and Precise Father… yeah, that should cover me for at least 4 Fridays.
Things were different last week, though. I thought I’d play catch-up with them – because here’s the thing – I didn’t know who stayed, who left, and I wanted to know the disposition of the students I’d probably be interacting with for the first time. Instead of jumping right into Psalm 139 I preached with the intent of feeling out how things were doing, how it was going with the kids.
To my surprise, it wasn’t just the Junior and Senior High students who were with us – ALL of the students were around, including those in pre-school and elementary levels… Not necessarily my comfort zone, but I took it as a challenge – or, if I was being honest with myself, I was thinking I’d speak to everyone as if I was speaking to just the high school folks. I didn’t really expect the lower levels to listen.
And I talked about what I was doing while they were away on vacation, particularly my trip to Mindanao. I told them about how I never thought I’d ride an airplane again, thanks to this whole pandemic nonsense… and I told them about how I was reminded of how we unconsciously entrust our physical lives and bodies to a pilot who we know at best by name and by the sound of his voice.
I told them about how we also place a similar trust upon motorcycle drivers, particularly whose who we ride with – we hold on to them, not caring about being bashful or anything, trusting them not only to transport themselves, but also the heavy motorbike and then us, from one point to another, through asphalt and mud.
I told them that whether we trust by way of placing indirect confidence upon an airplane pilot, or by clutching onto a motorcycle driver… however we choose to see it, we can place our trust in God. I went ahead and just emphasized on Proverbs 3:5, telling them to tell their neighbors to trust in the Lord… and also, to lean not upon our own understanding.
See, we could easily place our distrust (and disgust) upon a pilot but raising hell on the plane, taking it out on our co-passengers or on the flight attendants. Or we could just jump out of the motorcycle if we really thought we knew better than the driver. I guess all I wanted to tell them for starters was to just trust in the Lord before anything else, before taking things into their own hands.
The next thing I want to share is probably on the verse after that – I’d remind them, just as I used to keep in mind myself, to acknowledge Him in all our ways, and He shall direct our paths.
Two points I see here: We acknowledge Him in all our ways. I suppose I could go the direct route of explanation by saying this means we put Him in our mind before we set out to do anything. However, I think it’s a nicer, more impactful thing to say that Christ paid such a great price for us to be so reconciled to God that we are with Him and He is with us at all times… and this Truth is just so powerful because it implies that whether we intentionally seek Him, or find ourselves going through the motions, He is acknowledged and made visible in all our ways.
Because of the New Covenant we can find ourselves realizing and consequently appreciating that in all our ways, God is acknowledged.
And here’s the thing – if we’re led by linear thinking to acknowledge God in all our ways so that He would direct our paths as a result, well, let’s keep in mind that through Christ’s finished work, He has made it so that we enjoy union with Christ… and as Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, so we enjoy constant, unfailing union with the Way, the Truth, and the Life. This is me leading up to saying that our paths have already been directed through Christ who is the Way that is literally alive in us.
Now maybe that’s too much of a stretch for them to believe or take in… so I’ll probably approach all this by saying you do point 1 to get to point 2, and if I still have enough time, which I hope I do, I will say that because of Christ’s finished work, point 2 has already been established, so we can do point 1 with peace and power.
That seems to be a good way to do it. And I don’t think that any of this is an accident – These younger generations need to know, now more than ever, that we want them to trust in the Lord, to lean not on their own understanding; We want them to know that it would be best for them to acknowledge God’s presence in all things concerning them, so He would direct them accordingly.
BUT we also want to let them consider that because Christ is the Way who directs their paths, they can acknowledge Him without effort, and be naturally humble in trusting the Lord and leaning not primarily on their own ways of thinking.
Starting this school year and I’m thinking to myself that it’s not enough for us to give them a blueprint as to what way we ought to train them into (as Proverbs 22:6 would have us do) – No, with every opportunity we have, we tell them that Christ HIMSELF is the Way, who will never depart from them.
How’s that for a revelation?
Until the next post, God bless you.
JB's Personal Brain Defragmenter 
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