Let Them Be Kids: Adventure, Boredom, Innocence, and Other Gifts Children Need

by Jessica Smartt

Your success as a parent does not rest on your shoulders but on his. . . . He would never ever think of sending us out on our own. He would never coldly watch us at a distance as we go, work, and struggle. He would never sit idly by as we give ourselves to the single hardest, most comprehensive, most long-term, most exhausting, and most life-shaping task that a human being could ever take on. No, when your Father sends you, he goes with you. This means that in every moment when you are parenting, you are being parented. . . . In every moment when you feel alone, you are anything but alone because he goes wherever you go. . . . He never forgets you, he never turns his back on you, he never wanders away for a moment, he never favors someone else over you, he never gets mad and refuses to be with you, he never grows cynical, he will never give up, and he will never ever quit. . . . So your hope as a parent is not found in your power, your wisdom, your character, or your success, but in this one thing alone: the presence of your Lord.1