Lysa TerKeurst _{Leading Women in the Adventure of Faith}

The past two days I’ve been sharing the story of my boys. The timing of telling this story is quite intentional. Jackson started college this week.

Seven years ago this week, I was sitting at my kitchen table crying.

I’d just been handed the test results confirming at the tender ages of 13 and 14, my boys needed to be in kindergarten. Kindergarten. And no kindergarten class would take them- not any public school, not any private school.

As if that wasn’t scary enough, there was another reality with which I had to come to grips. My sons would age out of school and no longer be permitted to attend past the age of 21. I would only have 7 years to get Jackson schooled K-12. I would only have 8 years with Mark. That’s it.

Me. The woman who skipped pages when reading every bedtime story I’ve ever read. Me. The woman who only felt I could handle one child and then suddenly woke up one day to the reality she had 5. Me. The woman who is emotionally allergic to flashcards and who still uses her fingers to count.

So, there I sat in the midst of impossibility too tired to get a tissue. I swiped my sleeve across my nose and wondered how in heavens we’d ever climb this mountain before us.

I begged God to remove the mountain and let me wake up one day to discover my boys’ heads full of knowledge and ready to board the beautiful yellow bus that passed by our home day after day.

We serve a God who most certainly can move mountains.

But sometimes the greater revelations of God are discovered when He doesn’t move the mountain. Instead, He takes our hand and helps us climb up and over impossibilities one step at a time. And that’s the path God had for us.

I learned, to be a true woman of faith we must live lives that actually require a little bit of faith. I didn’t have the luxury any longer of saying I had faith but finding comfort in my little back up plan. We women are so clever with that.

Instead, every day I had no choice but to admit my absolute desperation for God.

I lifted up my tiny bit of willingness and revealed my great spiritual maturity as I prayed, “Lord, you have seriously gotten us into a mess.

I mean a real mess. And I sure hope you have some kind of secret knowledge about my abilities to teach. Their inability to grasp multiplication today is about to get on the last good nerve I have left. And we all know a mama with no good nerves left ain’t a pretty site. Amen.”

Those long days turned into years. The years turned into miracles. The miracles turned into a high school diploma and a chance to go to Union University in Tennessee.

As I helped Jackson move into his dorm this past weekend, I found myself taking mental snapshots of where his feet will tread this year. The patchy grass. The linoleum in the classroom halls. The cement stairs leading to his dorm room. The floor of his room which I’m sure will only be swept clean this one day. And I prayed.

“Lord, his precious feet have traveled so far to get to this place. Guide every step he takes on this campus. Help him to walk in a manner worthy of the calling you so obviously have on his life.”

I hugged him goodbye and walked to my car alone. I once again swiped the sleeve of my shirt across my nose and wondered… how in heavens could I miss those days at the kitchen table so very much.