A Dream Fulfilled…
For several years my youngest daughter has been homeschooling. As an educator I know first-hand how difficult it is sail through the educational waters alone. I have been urging her to get involved with a Homeschool network. This past school year after trying to find a suitable one in her community, she decided to start one of her own. The results have been rewarding on so many levels. It made me think of the scripture from Proverbs made even more famous by Langston Hughes:
Hope deferred makes the heart sick,
but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life. Proverbs 13:12 (NLT)
Langston Hughes asked what happens to a "dream deferred"? I testify that a "dream fulfilled" is indeed a "tree of life"! As I saw children who most were strangers in September show the evidence of strongly bonding together and gaining a confidence in who they were and what they were a part of – it made my heart glad. It is so important in this hour for our children to know their identity and be confident in what factors are guiding them toward adulthood. I used to say it all the time when I was growing up my children: "children need walls". They need to know their boundaries. Rather than suffocating them, I believe it makes them feel safe.
They also need to be confident in their community. They need to feel it is a safe place, where they have opportunity to be themselves, to be accepted for who they are, not who someone would like them to be. If I could offer one word to parents today, it would be to be sure that you are involved in a community of faith that values and loves children and who believes that they can and will become what God made them to be.
Our world today is experiencing a cataclysmic shock. Truth has been re-defined as a "a fact or belief that is accepted as true". It doesn’t have to be true. It doesn’t have to right, it only has to be "accepted" as true and right. While that may fly if you’re in the business of producing a better flower, or even growing a higher yield of vegetables – it does not fly when you are bringing God’s most precious creation to maturity. God knew both that this world would change and that children would not need to be measured by every fad and fancy. He prepared a roadmap for us to follow to ensure that our children would have the least struggle with the greatest blessing; it’s found in His Word.
God is the giver of dreams and it’s for sure He knows the best road to take to find our dreams fulfilled.
Maria