FOURTEEN!

September 24, 2019

FOURTEEN! How could I have lost a year? I was congratulating my granddaughter on entering her teenage years only to find out today that she’s been at it for an entire year. It’s no surprise she’s developing into a beautiful young woman; after all, every “Meema and Beepa night,” Linda prays that she, along with the other grandchildren, will be “as beautiful on the inside as they are on the outside,” a prayer that is being wonderfully answered. We are privileged to have a front-row seat in the theater of their lives, and Madeline is today’s star of the stage.

Of all the things there are to love about her, that which to me stands out most is her tender heart. Last year Linda bought a DVD of “Marley and Me” for her and her brother to watch on a family road trip. They hadn’t gotten out of Ohio before we got a text message accompanying a photo her mother took of Madeline weeping profusely in the back seat. The message was simply, “Thanks, Meema.” 

At fourteen, it’s hard to know what the future holds. Madeline would make a good vet or vet’s assistant, but her caring spirit would also make her a good counselor. If she chooses, she will also be a wonderful wife and mother. We pray daily for her and for our other grandchildren. The future into which they walk will in many ways be quite different from the world we have known. I am grateful tonight not only for Madeline, but also for the Lord whom she loves and serves, who will walk with her as surely as he has walked with us. 

Our prayers for our grandchildren are taken from Scripture, so they are prayers God loves to answer. Linda’s is, “I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts, living within you as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love. And may you be able to feel and understand, as all God’s children should, how long, how wide, how deep, and how high his love really is, and to experience this love for yourselves, though it is so great that you will never see the end of it or fully know or understand it, but someday you will be filled with God himself.“ —Ephesians 3:17-19

My prayer for them comes from Hebrews 13:20-21–“May the God of peace, who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ our Lord; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.” —Hebrews 13:20-21 

Our prayers are being answered in Madeline, and in all our grandchildren, for which I am deeply grateful tonight.