A Time to Be Born

“There is a time to be born”(Ecc. 3:2)

“These kids are confronted with everything today.  Not like when we were their age”  – I hear that all the time. Maybe it is true, but think about the terror during the French Revolution, the burning of Rome, being  Jewish during Jesus’ time, or being Jewish during World War II, or having Attila the Hun attack your village.

“There is a time to be born”

If Psalm 139 is true and God put everything in us, ordered our days and knows each of our thoughts, don’t you think He knows the temptations our children would face?  The challenges they would have to over come or allow God to carry them over?

“You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, ¹¹persecutions, sufferings—what kinds of things happened to me in Antioch, Iconium and Lystra, the persecutions I endured. Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. . .  ¹⁶All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, ¹⁷so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”(2 Tim 3:11-17)

Do not doubt for a moment that God equipped each one of our sons and daughters for this time in which they were born.  Do not doubt for a moment that you were equipped to shepherd your sons and daughters through this time.  God equipped us for this time before we were even born.

 Hannah, along with her New Testament counterpart, Elizabeth, lived in a time when a woman’s value and even her righteousness could be judged by her childbearing ability.  Imagine how people talked, probably even openly that Hannah and Elizabeth must be hiding some sin.  What were they doing? What great sin?

These two women must have felt at a loss at times, wondering what they had done to so offended the Lord.  Yet, they did not offend the Lord.  As we know, Elizabeth’s infertility was part of God’s plan, and His plan was John the Baptist.  John could not be born when Elizabeth first had a desire for a child or he would have been too early for God’s plan.  So, too, was Hannah’s infertility a part of God’s plan.  Samuel also needed to be born for a specific time and season (Ecc. 3:2).

I have often thought how blessed my children are to be born in the United States. To have full tummies, warm houses, running water free from disease, physicians to heal us, educational opportunities, freedom of religion.  Then I think of those children that are not so fortunate, like the children in earthquake-devastated Haiti or war-torn Uganda.

Our children, teenagers (who are truly young men and women) are confronted with ungodliness inside and outside the schools via doctrine running against our beliefs, language choices, drugs, alcohol, irresponsibility. Biblically, though, when you really look at the stories, the heroes and heroines of the Bible confronted temptation and often failed.  But our God is a God of second chances.  And our God equipped them for those challenges and temptations before they were born.

Thank You God

for equipping me

for the time in which I was born

Thank you for equipping my children during this time

 for the calling in their lives that was there

before their toes first wiggled

This specific ministry

whether it be as a nurse in the hospital,

a teacher in the classroom

 a police officer keeping the peace,

a soldier bringing freedom so democracy can exist and the Word of God can be planted

or to be a mom

You planted it within them like a seed in the Autumn

You knew the temptations, the snares to trip them, the challenges

You equipped each child, each mom, each dad, each teen

 for good works

 These times were not unexpected to you

And so you planned

for everything

Including Second Chances

Thank you God